Vatican Diary / " the Holy Father Told Me…"

The Chiesa
May 7, 2013

http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1350512?eng=y


VATICAN CITY, May 7, 2013 – For the Institute for Works of Religion, the IOR, the Vatican “bank,” no sort of “suppression” is expected. And of the pope's advisors - those designated by him for this task, those who are so by office, and those who claim to be so by their own initiative - is asked the “highest discretion,” “silence,” and “prayer.”

This is the twofold message that Pope Francis wanted to issue both “ad intra," meaning to prelates and cardinals who are bit too chatty, and “ad extra," meaning to the media and banking circles that have a great interest, and perhaps interests as well, in the fate of the Vatican financial institute that manages “assets” of more than 6 billion euro.

The pontiff, however, did not do so directly, but left the task of “hatchet man" to the substitute of the secretariat of state, the archbishop - a diplomat and member of Focolare - Angelo Becciu, who spoke out in a self-interview published on the front page of “L'Osservatore Romano" printed on the afternoon of April 30 with the date of May 1, supplemented with two further questions and answers in the news broadcast of Vatican Radio on May 1:

> Intervista de "L'Osservatore Romano" al sostituto. La riforma di papa Francesco

> Mons. Becciu parla ai microfoni della Radio Vaticana della prospettiva di riforma della curia

It rarely happens that the substitute, a central figure in the current configuration of the Roman curia, grants interviews, even if with Becciu it happens more frequently than when in his place was the current cardinal prefect of “Propaganda Fide," Fernando Filoni.

If the interview in “L'Osservatore Romano" was then also republished - in Italian and French - in the bulletin of the press office of the Holy See, as it was on May 1, and Becciu himself repeatedly made reference to conversations with the pope to back up his statements (the substitute in any case has a regularly scheduled weekly audience), it seems evident how much his words reflect the thought of the pope himself.

As for the fact that the most widely circulated Italian newspapers, from “Corriere della Sera" to "la Repubblica", from "La Stampa" to "il Sole 24 Ore," took absolutely no notice of this media initiative of pope Jorge Mario Bergoglio - due also to the fact that on May 2 in Italy newspapers are not published - this is a question that pertains on the one hand to journalistic professionalism but on the other to the poor timing chosen by the Holy See.

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There are, then, two main messages that the Holy See has issued to correct statements and interpretations that became widespread, on the journalistic level, after the publication on April 13 of the pontifical appointment of a “group” of eight cardinals charged with studying a reform of the curia and of acting as “advisors” to the pope in the governance of the universal Church.

The first message coincides with what Archbishop Becciu calls a “desire of the Holy Father”:

"Those who are in the curia should continue to work with dedication and in silence; just as those who make contributions or want to give contributions, suggestions, for the reform of the curia should do so with the greatest discretion or in silence and, he emphasizes, in prayer.”

In the interview with “L'Osservatore Romano” - in which the introduction and the questions are just as important as the answers - Becciu criticizes those who in recent weeks, writing and speaking about the reform of the curia, have spoken or written of “moderators,” of “superministries of finance," of "revolutions." And he explains that “after speaking with the Holy Father” he felt it to be his duty to assert, obviously without fear of refutal, “that at this moment it is absolutely premature to advance any hypothesis about the future arramgement of the curia.”

It must be noted that while the news agency ANSA wrote about the creation of a “superministry of finance” on April 20 and some important Italian newspapers ran headlines about a “revolution” underway, the hypothesis of the creation of a “moderator curiae" was launched in a high-profile interview in “Corriere della Sera" on April 22 by Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio, president of the pontifical council for the interpretation of legislative texts.

Thus the invitation "ad intra" of Becciu to greater discretion and confidentiality.

An invitation, however, that has not been observed by all. Certainly not by Cardinal Joao Braz de Aviz, prefect of the congregation for religious, who on Sunday, May 5 publicly distanced himself from the measures of the congregation for the doctrine of the faith against the “liberal” American sisters of the LCWR and broke the secrecy over the conversation in which Pope Francis is said to have proceeded with him in the selection as the new secretary of his dicastery of the superior general of the Friars Minor, José Rodriguez Carballo:

> Vatican religious prefect: "I was left out of LCWR finding"

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The second message issued with Becciu's interviews instead consists, as already stated, in an authoritative stance on the IOR, with regard to its “suppression” or “possible reform.”

On “suppression” Becciu was categorical: “The pope was surprised in seeing attributed to himself statements that he never pronounced and that misrepresent his thought.”

The substitute explained that in the homily improvised by the pope at the Domus Sanctae Marthae during the morning Mass of April 24 that unleashed these conjectures - in which he had said that the IOR is “necessary up to a certain point” - the reference made to the Vatican entity was only "a passing remark, occasioned by the presence at the Mass of some of the employees of the Institute, in the context of a serious invitation never to lose sight of the essentiality of the Church.”

As for the “reform of the IOR,” the reply of the substitute was more articulated:

“On this the Holy Father has told me expressly: I have appreciated the IOR for the services that it has provided and I also know that they are working on greater transparency to make the IOR more ' presentable,' if anyone has considered it 'not presentable.' And therefore he trusts those persons who have been appointed for the sake of compliance with the standards required by the various international agencies.”

In the interview, Becciu also took the opportunity to reply to the criticisms that have come from sectors of the traditionalist world of intending to “bring into question the primacy of the pope” with the creation of the “group” of eight cardinal advisors.

The substitute reiterated that he does not see this possibility, because “this is a matter of a consultive body, not executive,” but he admits that this is nonetheless an “act of great significance, which is intended to give a precise signal concerning the ways in which the Holy Father intends to exercise his ministry.”

Therefore primacy is not in question, but the modalities of its exercise are.

Nor did he neglect to answer an objection from the progressive side, according to which the expression “advisor” is “too undefined.”

“The function of advisor," Becciu explained, “must be interpreted in a theological vein. From a worldly perspective, we would have to say that a board without executive power is irrelevant, but this would mean equating the Church with a business. Theologically, however, the advisor has a function of absolute significance: to help the superior in the work of discernment, that is, understanding what the Spirit is asking the Church at a precise historical moment. Without this reference, moreover, one would understand nothing of the authentic significance of the action of governance in the Church.”

Pope Francis, in short, is extending the range of advisors beyond the confines of the curia, but he does not want to become the CEO of a religious multinational.

In his interviews, finally, the substitute confirmed that all of the top positions in the Roman curia, including the memberships in the various dicasteries, remain for the moment “provisory,” according to the formula “donec aliter provideatur," until further provision. And this “indicates the will of the Holy Father to take the necessary time for reflection - and for prayer, we should not forget - to get a thorough understanding of the situation.”

He therefore does not seem to be in a hurry to make curial rearrangements or appointments. But for the pope, everyone at the Vatican should feel himself to be in a provisory “prorogatio." Until he gives new orders.