UNITED STATES
Christian Science Monitor
By Randy Dotinga / March 21, 2014
UNT‘The Vatican Diaries’ author John Thavis looks at the Catholic Church under the leadership of Pope Francis
It may be the best of times for the worldwide Catholic church, which is enjoying a remarkable wave of affection for Pope Francis. But these are no glory days for many of those who toil within the immense bureaucracy of the Vatican.
Pope Francis, the surprise choice of last year’s papal conclave, continues his efforts to reform the church by pushing it away from unforgiving edicts, complex theology, and the Vatican itself.
Will the bureaucrats fight back? For perspective, I called author John Thavis, who divides his time between Minnesota and Rome. A former Rome bureau chief with the Catholic News Service, he wrote the bestselling 2013 book “The Vatican Diaries: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Power, Personalities and Politics at the Heart of the Catholic Church.”
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“The Vatican Diaries” is now out in paperback with a new section about Pope Francis.
In our interview, Thavis talked about dissent within the Vatican, the Pope’s focus on the mother of Jesus and the devil, and the prospects for a long-lasting legacy.
Q: Is there an internal old guard that’s working against the Pope in the Vatican bureaucracy known as the Curia?
A: There is an old guard at the Vatican which encompasses much of the Curia, and they’ve lost control of the papacy.
I’ve been back to Rome quite often over the past year, and every time it has struck me how the level of enthusiasm around the world for this new Pope is definitely a notch or two above that inside the Vatican.
You hear this when you talk to people who have made their careers there. They’re disoriented by this new Pope and apprehensive when they say things how the church needs to decentralize, how it’s not some kind of royal court.
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