Headhunters for the Future Bishops

By Sandro Magister
The Chiesa
July 21, 2015

http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1351098?eng=y

Rather than a streamlining of the curia, what is happening inside the Vatican walls is the opposite. It is a continual addition of new organisms to the existing ones.

The latest to be born, on June 27, was a secretariat for communication set up to oversee the pontifical council for social communications, the press office of the Holy See, the Vatican internet service, Vatican Radio, the Vatican Television Center, L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican print shop, the photographic service, the Libreria Editrice Vaticana.

As prefect of the newly created secretariat, Pope Francis appointed one of his closest collaborators and confidants, Monsignor Dario Edoardo Vigano, who also remains director of the Vatican television channel.

Vigano’s first sortie in his new garb, in “L'Osservatore Romano” of July 15, was a panegyric on the communicative “orality” of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, taking as an example one of his speeches in Paraguay:

> Vigano fa l'ermeneutica del papa, ma dimentica la colossale gaffe di Asuncion

But at this pace the much-heralded reform of the curia will be a long time coming.

Of new men put in the right spot - like Pietro Parolin in the secretariat of state or George Pell in the secretariat for the economy - so far there have been very few.

Of second-rate figures not only confirmed by even promoted - like Giuseppe Versaldi in the congregation for Catholic education - there continue to be scads.

Above all, however, there has been nothing close to a clarification of the responsibilities of key congregations like the one for the doctrine of the faith and the one for bishops.

The cardinals who head these respectively, Gerhard L. Muller and Marc Ouellet, at times find themselves undermined or overridden in matters that should still be their prerogative.

With regard to the pivotal documents of the current pontificate - from “Evangelii Gaudium” alla “Laudato si’” - the congregation for the doctrine of the faith has an influence decisively inferior to what it had with the previous popes.

As for the congregation for bishops - which sees to the selection of candidates to lead the dioceses and where Francis has installed as secretary another of his stalwarts, the Brazilian Ilson De Jesus Montanari - with the current pope it often happens that it is he alone who makes the choice of a new bishop, leapfrogging altogether the congregation and its procedures and deliberately ignoring the orientations and expectations of the local episcopates. One glaring example of this papal autocracy was the appointment of the new archbishop of Chicago in the person of Blase Cupich:

> Vatican Diary / Behind the scenes of the Chicago appointment (30.9.2014)

These are the facts, while the discussion on how to innovate in the selection of the successors of the apostles, or the executive branch of the Catholic Church, is almost nonexistent.

The following text is intended precisely to break this silence. Listing twelve criteria for the selection of future bishops.

The author, Paul A. McGavin, an Australian priest and a chaplain of the University of Canberra, is a theologian with previous studies in economics.

On this same issue, he wrote an open letter to Pope Francis five months ago: