MondayVatican » MondayVatican – Benny Lai » Pope Francis, living Paul VI’s “dream” or experiencing Paul VI’s “nightmare”

Pope Francis, living Paul VI’s “dream” or experiencing Paul VI’s “nightmare”

Andrea Gagliarducci — Sun, 11 May 2014 22:05:21 +0000

Paul VI will be beatified Oct. 19 at the end of the extraordinary synod on the family, being the synod a body the late Pope wanted and promoted. A Paul VI that is to be proclaimed saint, probably as soon as 2015, through an accelerated process pursuant to Pope Francis’ wishes. Pope Montini is indeed Pope Francis’ model, as he explained in a recent interview, praising Paul VI for the promulgation of “Humanae Vitae” notwithstanding the opposing views about its content held by a majority of public opinion. Ultimately, much of the issues of this pontificate are the same of Paul VI’s pontificate.

Pope Francis lacks Montini’s Curia experience, and perhaps also his international vision. Raised in the Vatican Secretariat of State, then appointed archbishop of Milan, Giovan Battista Montini practically had already become Pope as he joined the 1963 conclave that elected him as John XXIII’s successor. After his election, there was a lot of speculation about his intentions regarding the continuation of the Second Vatican Council. Paul VI reaction was to address to the Council a programmatic speech, mirroring what he had said at the beginning of the Council. Id est, that a unified vision of the Church was needed and should be upheld by the Council, and that the primacy of Peter could not be set aside. Paul VI did so tactfully, sending to the experts of the Councils, in addition, several proposals to amend some of the documents of the Council in order to underscore the importance of the central Church, and at the same time designing a radical Curia reform, which led to the issuance of the Apostolic Constitution “Regimi Ecclesiae Universae”.

Three pontificates after Paul VI’s, Pope Francis is now facing more or less the same challenges. He does not have to carry forward a Council, but he stands in a post-Council period widely debated. Pope Francis wants to make clear his commitment to the peripheries of the world, and he wants to underscore that laymen are full participants in the management of the Church. Hence, his visits to the parishes; his stress on the role of laymen in his speech to the Council for Economics; and the appointment of his friend and layman Guzman Carriquiry as “Vice-President” Secretary of the Pontifical Commission for Latin-American, a job usually assigned to a bishop.

Paul VI was also a great promoter of the role of laymen in the Church and paid a lot of attention to the peripheries, being the first Pope to celebrate mass on Christmas eve outside the Vatican (in Italsider, an industrial plant in Taranto, Italy). Paul VI was also the first Pope to address the United Nations General Assembly, advocating a moral, rather than a functional, reform of international politics.

A moral reform, more than a functional one, is something that Paul VI wanted for the Church as well. He contributed the Year of Faith and the Credo of the People of God to the Council’s and post-Council’s discussions, in order to reiterate the doctrinal truths. Faced with the ambiguities emanating from the practice of collegiality, Paul VI promulgated “Humane Vitae”, an encyclical which run counter to the views of the majority of theologians that were asked about it.

Collegiality can turn against the Church, if it is not exercised within defined boundaries. This is at the heart of the debate nowadays, with the Curia reform believed to be taking off at the beginning of 2015.

Pope Francis spoke about more synodality, and this is the reason why he gave a more important role to the General Secretary of the Synod, chaired by Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri. In Pope Francis’ view, the General Secretariat of the Synod should be a linking and coordinating body, serving as a sort of “Ministry for Relations with Bishops”. This was underscored by the fact that Pope Francis asked Baldisseri, and not the Secretary of State, as had been customary, to coordinate his meetings with the heads of dicasteries of the Roman Curia.

The synod cannot, in any case, be a governing body. Collegiality is always “sub Petro” (under Peter) and even the dignity of bishops as peers is defined by their having a common leader. Cardinal Gehrard Ludwig Mueller, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, explained this at the presentation of a book curated by the former general secretary of the Synod of Bishops, Nikola Eterovic, which includes all of Benedict XVI’s remarks to the synodal assemblies. Mueller’s comments were clearly a reference to the current debate.

Paul VI wanted the synod as an expression of collegiality. But he wanted it to be a consultative, not deliberative, body in order to uphold central coordination and avoid confusions – including doctrinal ones. This way, he did not undermined the responsibilities of the local Churches, while at the same time not doing away with a central body.

Paul VI’s was also combatting pressures to have an agenda for the Church set outside the Church itself. An attempt to set an outsiders’ agenda that exploited openings and the enthusiasm surrounding the Council, to undermine the Church’s authority. It was the now famous “Council of the media” that overshadowed the “real Council,” as Benedict XVI recounted in his last meeting with the Roman clergy.

It was precisely to prevent this that a new managing of Church communications was introduced. “Paul VI pushed out the journalists from the Vatican,” the dean of vaticanisti Benny Lai used to say about Paul VI’s decision to move the Holy See press office outside of the Vatican Walls. The long process of considering new ways to manage Vatican communications began then.

During the Second Vatican Council, the statements of the Conciliar fathers were not disclosed. The Council of the media was born when the Conciliar fathers resorted to the press to leak the contents of their deliberations, to influence public opinion and particular standpoints.

This is the reason why the information of discussions at synods is managed differently, and is always evolving towards even more transparency. During the synods of bishops, the summary of the interventions (prepared by the synodal fathers) are delivered to journalists right after the congregations, in 5 different languages, and are also published in the Vatican web-site. Same-day briefings in different languages are also provided.

Combatting the possibility of a “Church of the media” has been a constant effort since the reform of the Holy See Press Office, which is under the authority of the Secretariat of State since 1986.

Nowadays, communications have become a major concern of the Holy See. The new Pope had been chosen on the basis of his skills to communicate the Gospel.

There is a lot of speculation about a new Vatican office for communications, in order to enhance transparency and the quality of the information being delivered. All offices dealing with communications could come under a “Secretariat for Communications” single umbrella.

There is another interesting rumor about Vatican communications: Pope Francis could establish a Congregation for Culture, embodying the pontifical councils for Social Communications, Promoting New Evangelization, and Culture. Vatican communications would be the responsibility of a new, separate department, under a revamped Secretariat of State (perhaps State’s current two branches will become two different secretariats).

This department could include, institutionally, “La Civiltà Cattolica,” the Italian Jesuit-run magazine which articles are submitted for clearance to the Secretariat of State before they are published.

Hence, the insistent rumors that Father Antonio Spadaro, editor of La Civiltà Cattolica, the first person to interview the Pope, will be the director of the Holy See Press Office. Father Spadaro is taking on an increasingly institutional role leading this journal which has, it seems, become the main conduit to interpret the Pope’s thinking. The series of articles on the Jesuit Peter Faber, recently proclaimed saint; the hiring of Juan Carlos Scannone, theologian and a teacher of Bergoglio, with the task of better explaining the “theology of the people”, the Argentinean branch of the Theology of Liberation; the goal of making this Italian journal always more international: everything points to thinking of “La Civiltà Cattolica” as ultimately becoming an official publication offering Pope Francis’ thought in depth.

A test for Vatican information will be the next synod for bishops. At the moment, the discussion on the synod is still biased by what has been leaked to the media. Statements are often instrumentalized. Prove of it is the speech Cardinal Walter Kasper gave at the consistory on the family. It was intended to be kept as an internal document, but it was leaked to an Italian newspaper and then included in a book which is going to be a best-seller. Why was the speech not made public immediately, thus avoiding this ‘confusion effect’? Are the Second Vatican Council times back?

Pope Francis dream to be a new Paul VI can become the nightmare of having to deal with the same issues that Paul VI did. When Montini addressed the Curia reform, internal resistances pushed him him into isolation. Benny Lai recounted the criticism circulating that Montini’s Papacy “lacked a central government.”

The criticism emanated from a strong internal debate, which has been reprised – yet with different tunes – under this pontificate. The General Congregations that drove to the election of Pope Francis spoke about the Curia functionality, not about big issues. This is the original sin of this pontificate.

When Paul VI went to the United Nations, in the aura of John XXIII’s Pacem in Terris, he highlighted the need for a reform of the United Nations not based on its functions, but from a strong anthropological point of view (and all the Popes has since followed this view).

Paul VI applied this principle to the reform of the Curia. Nowadays, the discussion is mostly about the efficiency of Curia, rather than on the global mission of the Vatican institutions. Pope Francis is now seeking a balance. He has established a parallel Curia: the new bodies are still not identified in the revamped Vatican web site, but they are preparing their statutes and defining their responsibilities. Now, he will delve into communications, which he has been very interested in. At the same time, Pope Francis probably understands now that there is a need of a vision for a more comprehensive reform. A reform of attitudes, in Pope Francis’ words. The challenge of this Papacy is how to carry this reform on, beyond media agendas. Striking the right balance means the difference between living Paul VI’s dream or experiencing his nightmare.

Pope Francis and the reform of the Church

Andrea Gagliarducci — Mon, 06 Jan 2014 06:30:40 +0000

It was probably not by chance that Father Raniero Cantalamessa, preacher of the Pontifical Household, dedicated the first of his Advent presentations to the Roman Curia to the theme of the reform of the Church. He did so from a particular angle: that of Francis of Assisi, of his extraordinary conversion and of his project of reform for the Church.

Father Cantalamessa explained that St. Francis did not «choose between wealth and poverty, nor between the rich and the poor, or belonging to a class rather than to another,» but he chose «between himself and God, between saving his life or losing it for the Gospel.»

Father Cantalamessa then stressed: «At the heart of the love for poverty or the poor, there is the love for Christ. If not, the poor will be instrumentalized in one way or another and poverty will easily become a source of polemics against the Church, or an ostentation of perfection with respect to others in the Church, as it happened among some of the followers of the Poverello.»

Moreover: the main goal of Francis of Assisi was not reforming the Church, it was living the Gospel. So, Francis «carried on the reform in himself, and he silently indicated to the Church the only way out of the crisis: embracing again the Gospel and men, particularly the humble and the poor.»

This is how Francis of Assisi leveled bastions, broke the Church’s isolation and brought it back to be in touch with the people. Father Cantalamessa explained that «the Gospel was obscured also because authority understood as service had been transformed in authority understood as power, and this produced endless conflicts within and outside the Church.»

Perhaps Father Cantalamessa’s words explain better than any other example the true sense of the reform of the Church put in action by Pope Francis. As it is expected by many that today, January 6th, Pope Francis will announce the name of the new cardinals –who will get their red caps in the February 22 consistory– it is appropriate to take a step back, and look at these nine months of pontificate by Pope Francis from a broader perspective.

Until now, many have found it difficult to understand what is Pope Francis’ project. His applying on himself and making visible the Gospel, touching the “flesh of the poor” and spending hours with people affected by different illnesses at the end of his general audiences and public events, has resulted in the Pope’s gaining great levels of approval among the people.

The numbers are clear: in the last year, more than 6,6 million pilgrims have been to Saint Peter’s Square to see the Pope, and this cannot but please a Church that seemed to be on the defensive and folding inwardly into a world of her own during the last period of Benedict XVI’s pontificate.

The reason for this inwardly folding back of the Church should be analyzed. Already in 2010, the annus horribilis of sex abuses by members of the clergy all over the world, some Vatican observers underlined that the Church was rapidly losing its influence internationally. “C’era una volta un Vaticano,” a 2010 book by the Italian analyst Massimo Franco, highlighted the controversies of the time (under Benedict XVI) as symptoms of a deeper crisis. The American vaticanista John Allen commented that there were «signs of the end of an epoch, in which the Vatican represented the religious and moral sentiments of Western civilization, and the dawn of a new era in which Catholicism has become a minority subculture. Neither the Vatican nor the hierarchy more generally has figured out how to respond to this new world.»

Benedict XVI’s resignation, in some ways, swept away this fatalistic perspective. Benedict XVI was well-aware of the need for the Church not to be self-referential, and warned about this danger as early as 1992, in his book about Europe (“Una Svolta per l’Europa”). During his pontificate, Benedict XVI also called on the Church not to close itself to the world with her rules and moralism, and – in his speech in Fribourg in 2011 – he also highlighted the need for the Church to be less focused on its internal structures.

However, Benedict XVI was only able to lay the foundations of this revolution, not to carry it out. A “Pope who came from the ends of the world” was needed to, at the very least, envision the attainment of this historic revolution.

Jorge Mario Bergoglio impressed his fellow cardinals with a speech based on the need to go out to the streets and to be in a sort permanent-mission state, as the Pope later wrote in his apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium. In the secrecy of the conclave, we cannot know what made the cardinals elect Bergoglio at the end, when votes for him increased at an amazing pace in the last two polls. We can just surmise that some of the cardinals felt the need for a new narrative. Others probably saw in Jorge Mario Bergoglio the opportunity to regain visibility after Benedict XVI put aside many in the “old guard” during his pontificate, thus bringing into crisis a system of special interests entrenched during the last years of John Paul II’s pontificate, when in the end the Pope himself was no longer making any decisions. These two points of view are the human components of a conclave that in the end is governed by the Holy Spirit, which acts is ways well-beyond human reasoning.

Certainly Pope Francis has produced surprises and raised expectations with his first actions, his speeches, and his way of being. A Latin-American Pope is, in any case, in tradition and culture, can be expected to be very different from any other Pope in the Church’s history. Pope Francis does not seem to be interested in a “government program.” He has underlined that «the first reform is that of attitudes.» He appreciates the notion that «the reform of the Church started with the Masses in the Domus Sanctae Marthae.» He is attentive to the Council of Eight Cardinals, awaiting concrete proposals to carry forward a reform of the Church’s organizational structures.

In fact, we still don’t know how this reform will be carried out. It is known that Pope Francis, when he was in Buenos Aires, regularly encouraged the bishops to be close to the people, as he did as well during the meeting with the Generals Superior of the Male Religious Congregations, as reported in the last issue of the Jesuit-run magazine “La Civiltà Cattolica.” These considerations by Bergoglio give rise to the possibility of a Curia with an ever smaller number of bishops and cardinals, and with more laymen and women in key posts.

But that would be a purely cosmetic “change”, as Pope Francis is well aware of. On the one hand, a Pope is always under the pressure of public opinion, and this is why good communications are crucial. In Germany, von Mitschke Collande, a McKinsey consultant, presented a whole project of Curia reform based on “business-world criteria.” Previously, he had written a paper about how the Church needed to “re-position” itself in the faith market. On the other hand, the professionalization of the Holy See’s public communications function, which began during Vatileaks, might have possibly contributed to losing sight of the real task at hand.

The real task is very well explained by Angelo Scelzo, Deputy Director of the Holy See’s Press Office and for years an official of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications. Scelzo wrote a book tracing back the 50 years of Vatican communications, starting with the Second Vatican Council Inter Mirifica. The book is entitled “La Penna di Pietro” (Libreria Editrice Vaticana). In the book, Scelzo explains that «as any good means and tools of communications, the Vatican media had always relied on an editorial perspective. This editorial line was not put together in a marketing office, but emerged from the documents that, mostly from the Second Vatican Council onward, supported the development of Vatican media as well as shaped its character.»

The increasing number of external consultants in the Vatican has not change the core of Pope Francis’ message. The Pope’s message is perfectly aligned with that of his predecessor and is completely “orthodox.” So orthodox that Georg Gaenswein, Prefect of the Pontifical Household and personal secretary of pope emeritus Benedict XVI, can rightly claim in an interview to the German magazine Cicero that the call for the Church’s spiritual demondanization was the spiritual legacy of Benedict XVI, as evident in his Fribourg speech. A speech – Gaenswein notes – «that so many have tried to interpret according to their particular special interests. I cordially invite all to read again and attentively the Freiburg speech. We should simply acknowledge that Francis is doing what Benedict XVI called for.» The Prefect then stressed that «the poor Church must not be misunderstood. Poverty does not mean misery. The Church must have space for beauty, greatness, and all that is noble, because they signal God. Pope Francis has a spiritual, not a sociological, notion of poverty, coming from Christ’s poverty. He was also deeply impressed by his experience as archbishop of Buenos Aires during the difficult Argentine economic crisis.»

Obviously there is an anxious eagerness to know what the Francis’ reform project is about. This anxiety affects the work of the journalist, more than that of the Vatican communicator. Until now, it is difficult to ascertain Pope Francis’ overall vision, and the statements by members of the Council of Cardinals sometimes do not help to really understand what is the overall design. This is typical of a work in progress.

But many questions are left pending. The journalist try to anticipate the answers, or at least to understand in which direction the wind is blowing. The sources, in this case, can play their game, or simply make mistakes with the analysis, since everything is brand new and unpredictable. The possibilities for a mistake are very high, simply because sometimes we try to read more than is warranted by the given facts. This is part of the dialectic between source and journalist. The journalist accepts this risk and the responsibility to write the news story on the basis of information from sources. In several occasions, the writer of this news piece gave wrong, or at least incomplete, information, even when confirmed by at least two different sources. There is no way to “fix” these mistakes other than by carrying on trying to give news with the maximum level of accuracy possible. To do so, the journalist needs the help of Vatican interlocutors.

Benny Lai, who recently passed away and was the dean of the vaticanisti, used to say that «the Vatican is a world of whispering and nuances» and recalled that he was negatively affected, like so many others, when Paul VI decided to move the Holy See Press Office outside the Vatican Walls. «Before – he said in an interview – we were able to be the confidants of monsignors, we could take a walk with them inside the Vatican, we could go and meet them in their offices. Since Paul VI chased us out of the Vatican, we lost that confidential trust.»

In a world continually searching for news, Father Federico Lombardi, Director of the Holy See’s Press Office, shared a valuable insight. In April 2013, Lombardi was recognized by the Italian insurance company Allianz as the “communicator of the year”, because «he was able to face complexity with irony, but free of superficiality.» During an event for the occasion, Lombardi stressed that he had always «tried to have the journalists understand that anticipating the coming news is not always the best way to communicate them, and that if you try to be the first sometimes you can make a mistake, even a big mistake.»

Perhaps there is the need to strike a balance between the urge to deliver news and providing a more in-depth analysis. Anyway, if Pope Francis’ reform is that of Francis of Assisi, it will hardly grab newspaper headlines. A reform of attitudes does not make much noise. It just grows silently within those able to nurture it.

Is Pope Francis Leaning Toward The Establishment Of An Informal Permanent Council?

Andrea Gagliarducci — Sun, 03 Nov 2013 23:05:48 +0000

The most recent proposal floating is that of creating a Congregation for the Laity. After all – Cardinal Oscar Andrés Maradiaga has maintained – there is a Congregation for the Clergy and one for Bishops, but there is not one for the lay people, who are the biggest part of the Church. There is also a lot of talk –recently Cardinal Errazuiz Ossa raised it as well– about a reform of the Secretariat of State, which could be renamed the «Pope’s Secretariat» and would be something less than the coordinating body it has been until now. At first sight, none of these proposals is really close to Pope Francis’ heart, as he has clearly said that «the reform of attitudes is more important.» The Pope has also asserted that he aims to achieve broader synodality among all the ranks of the Church.

The next consistory (the official ceremony where the selection of new Cardinals is confirmed) will be a good test. The consistory will take place Feb. 22, while a meeting of the Council of Eight cardinals will be held on Feb. 17-18 and the Council of the Synod will meet on Feb. 24. Altogether, there will be about 15 days of consultations of cardinals, taking into account that a meeting of the council of cardinals for economic and managerial affairs of the Holy See (the so-called Council of Fifteen) will be held in February, the week before the meeting of the Council of Eight.

A Vatican official told Mondayvatican Oct. 30: «More than a consistory for the creation of new cardinals, I have the impression that this will be mostly a sort of synod of cardinals. It will represent a new way to offer advice, with cardinals from all over the world, giving everybody the opportunity to share their opinions. It will be something very similar to the CELAM assembly, which the cardinals in the group of eight have clearly said inspired their thinking about a reform of the synod of bishops.»

Cardinal Maradiaga is the coordinator of the group of eight cardinals, while Errazuiz Ossa is one of its most influential members. With more frequency in recent times, Maradiaga has expanded on his ideas about the Curia reform. He has also raised the reform of the IOR (the Institute for Religious Works, the so-called Vatican bank), although it is not part of the curia reform. He has shared with the media many details about what he thinks these reforms should entail.

That of the Congregation for the Laity is his most recent proposal, and some Canon law experts, as well as committed layman in the Catholic Church, have received the idea with skepticism.

In the Roman Curia, there are two different kinds of departments (a.k.a. dicasteries): the Congregations and the Pontifical Councils. While the Congregations have executive powers, the Pontifical Councils do not, and are more in the background. Broadly speaking, Congregations are part of the Church’s government, while the Pontifical Council are about the presence of the Church in the world.

A possible streamlining of the Curia has been widely discussed. It seems that Benedict XVI wanted to consolidate the responsibilities of different pontifical councils. This is the reason why one of his fist moves was to make the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue part of the Pontifical Council for Culture. At the same time, he left for some time the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace and that for the Pontifical Council for Migrants under the same president.

Internal pressures and opposition, the need to find a balance between his men and the «system», and the Curia’s very strong old guard headed by the former Secretary of State Angelo Sodano (still very influential, also with the press) led Benedict XVI to renounce to redesigning the Curia.

Realizing that an overall reform would take too long, Benedict XVI opted for a different approach, one attracting less attention but even more challenging: to anchor everything strongly on Doctrine, develop a solid juridical-legal framework, and to aim for a change in attitudes.

Benedict XVI implemented the reform of the criteria of admission to seminaries; the global reform of Vatican finances; the reform of the Penal Code, which has gone into effect under Pope Francis; the new constitution of Caritas Internationalis; the motu proprio about Catholic charities; and the reform of discipline in seminaries, which are now under the administration of the Congregation for the Clergy.

Pope Francis’ project seems to be of a different kind. More than consolidating pontifical councils and thus streamlining the «consultative» dicasteries, it seems that he aims at integrating the pontifical councils within the congregations, even by elevating some pontifical councils to the rank of congregation. It is rumored that the confirmation of the leadership of some Vatican dicasteries in their posts, until the expiration of their mandates, supports this hypothesis. This is the case, for example, with the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, which could become a Congregation encompassing the Pontifical Council for the Family, Migrants, and the Laity.

A Congregation for the Laity (which in Maradiaga’s vision would encompass the Pontifical Council for the Family, the Pontifical Academy for life, and the current Pontifical Council for the Laity) is a brand new proposal.

Commenting on it, an official of one of the dicasteries that would be interested in this possible reform told Mondyavatican that «this proposal would in fact ‘clericalize’ these dicasteries.» A Congregation for the Laity, he adds, «would put issues relating to the family and the laity under one of the Roman Curia’s strongest type of structure. The members of congregations and pontifical councils are cardinals and bishops, rarely laymen. But giving the laity a congregation does not mean give laymen more importance within the ranks of the Church. More likely, it is about about putting the laity under one umbrella.»

The same official underscores that «lay people are very important within the ranks of dicasteries, where they oversee key portfolios and hold posts at the highest levels. Should there be a (political) will to expand the role of laymen, more of them should, above all, be made members of congregations and councils, and not just consultants in them.»

In fact, Pastor Bonus states that «the dicasteries are composed of the cardinal prefect or the presiding archbishop, a body of cardinals and of some bishops, assisted by a secretary, consultors, senior administrators, and a suitable number of officials» (art. 3). It also foresees that, «according to the specific nature of certain dicasteries, clerics and other faithful can be added to the body of cardinals and bishops.»

Pastor Bonus can obviously be changed. But there would also be a need to change Canon Law, which establishes that some posts are reserved for clergy only.

A brand new Pastoral Constitution to replace Pastor Bonus is in fact what the group of eight cardinals is thinking about. At the same time, Archbishop José Carballo, Secretary of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, has spoken about the possibility of reforming Canon Law. Taking the floor Oct. 29 at a conference about vocational perseverance, and speaking about religious brothers and sisters abandoning consecrated life, Carballo asserted that «there seems to be a need for a specific path for each novice,» and also «a novitiate longer than what is contemplated in Canon Law,» to allow for better discernment.

According to canon 648 of the Code of Canon Law, the novitiate must last from a minimum of 12 months to a maximum of 2 years.

A reform of the Code could be an option, because Canon Law «is not the Gospel, it is written by men,» Carballo said. At that point, Cardinal Joao Braz de Aviz, Prefect of the Congregation, commented: «That is what Pope Francis told us.» In a conversation after his remarks, Carballo told the author of this blog that «a reform of Canon Law should not only be about the novitiate, it could also be more comprehensive.»

In fact, no reform of the Code of Canon Law is expected at this time. Perhaps in the more distance future. The new code of Canon Law was issued in 1981 after decades of work. It took 16 years to draft «Pastor Bonus» – which was mostly a realigning of the Curia more than a revolution. The reform of the Synod of Bishops will also take some time, which is the reason why the minor adjustments of every synod are portrayed as exceptions – not changes – to the norm.

The general impression is that we are at the stage of general consultations, more or less open. The group of eight cardinals will meet Dec. 3-5, and it is possible that in February there will be a broader consultation of cardinals, maybe extending it to the members of the General Secretariat of the synod. Paul VI even thought about having the members of the General Secretary of the Synod participate in conclaves. He was dissuaded from doing so, Benny Lai reported, by Cardinal Giuseppe Siri, who thought that the members of the General Secretary of the Synod could be influenced by others.

That of February may be a sort of mini informal council, partly corresponding to the notion of the permanent assembly that Pope Francis wishes for the Church. This sort of a reform of synodality, a concept close to the Pope’s heart.

Vatican Finances. How the story began

Andrea Gagliarducci — Sun, 10 Feb 2013 23:00:09 +0000

Just one day after the death of Pope Pius XI, on February 10, 1939, Msgr. Angelo Pomata stood in front of a cahier’s window at Religious Works (the “ancestor” of the Institute for Religious Works). The cashier was Massimo Spada. Pomata was dispatched there by Eugenio Pacelli – who, after the death of the Pope, assumed the charge of Chamberlain. Pacelli (the future Pope Pius XII) asked Msgr. Pomata to deposit some money (Italian liras and dollars) found in a drawer of the Pope’s desk. Spada opened a bank account, to the name of “Segreteria di Stato – Obolo nuovi conti correnti” (Secretariat of State – Pence new accounts). This may be the starting point of the history of Vatican finances. Through that account, and then through the completely autonomous Institute for Religious Works –the so called «Vatican Bank», but which is actually more of a Trust Fund– the Pope can release funds at his own discretion. Funds to balance the Holy See’s budget, as recently happened. Or to deliver to charity. Or even funds –as it was with Pius XII– to be sent through safe channels, to help peace operations.

All too often, the mere mentioning of Vatican finances immediately prompts the depiction of mysterious scenarios and obscure arrangements. Recently, an article in the English newspaper The Guardian emphasized that it was funds that the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini’s gave the Vatican that allowed it to build a financial empire that now includes luxury shops in the heart of London. In reality, it is not quite so. History can help us to better understand Vatican finances reason for being. Basically, the Vatican’s financial structure was born with the establishment of Vatican City State, «that piece of land that permits us to fulfill our mission», in Pius XI’s words.

Vatican City State was born as the reparation for a wrongdoing. In 1870, the Bersaglieri soldiers of the Italian King Vittorio Emanuele opened a breach in Rome’s city walls, a dozen metres to the west of the Roman gate – known as Porta Pia – and marched down Via Pia, defeating Pope Pius IX’s troops. The Pope went into exile to Castel Gandolfo, and most of the Holy See’s patrimony was confiscated. It is in that period that Saint Peter’s Pence collection began. It was a spontaneous collection of offers from the faithful, and this allowed the Holy See to cover its bills. The Kingdom of Italy proposal for reparations, the legge delle guarentigie (Law of Guarantees) was a unilateral offer that did not compensate the Holy See for the loss of goods and lands. In addition, many lands belonging to monasteries and parishes were also confiscated, to give the economy of the Kingdom of Italy a respite. Relations between the Holy See and Italy were very tense. With time, this tension subsided. Catholics re-organized, overcame the Papal ban over political participation in the institutions of the Italian Kingdom, and gave birth to a political thought of their own, along the lines of the “new-born” social doctrine, inspired by Pope Leo XIII –who is considered by many one of the greatest philosophers of the last two centuries. Then, the First World War broke out. Pope Benedict XV was committed to peace, and frustrated by how difficult it was for the Holy See to conduct diplomatic relations. At the time, States entertained diplomatic relations with the Holy See through their embassies to Italy. Countries in war with Italy recalled their ambassadors, and so relations between the Holy See and these States in particular became very difficult. Benedict XV was keenly aware of this: a territory and a sovereign State was needed to carry a mission of peace.

When the First World War ended, Giovanni Giolitti was the Italian premier. Benedict XV considered the possibility of a «Conciliation» between the Church and the Italian State. Giolitti was against any such conciliation because he opposed (like some still do today) recognizing the Holy See’s sovereignty. «If the Vatican – Giolitti said – would ask me to for a fully sovereign territory the size of a postage stamp (and certainly it would ask for something much bigger), I wouldn’t give it to it. » Giolitti’s words are reported in the Conciliation Memoirs of Cardinal Pietro Gasparri, still unpublished, and also mentioned by Benny Lay – the dean of the vaticanologists – in his book Finanze Vaticane (Vatican Finances). Giollitti’s attitude moved the Vatican to turn its attention to Benito Mussolini, who – when he was just a member in the Chamber of Deputies – took the position that fascism should not preach or practice anti-clericalism. It was 1921. The following year, Mussolini rose to power.

Conciliation negotiations were long and difficult. One of the challenges was agreeing on financial compensation. Pius XI worked personally on this issue. The Pope aimed to obtain an indemnity of 2 billion liras –which the Italian State could pay in instalments. For the Pope, this amount corresponded (with the addition of interests) to what the Italian State had unilaterally committed to pay after the occupation of Rome, per the Leggi delle Guarentigie. Pius XI settled, in the end, with 1 billion and 750 million liras, part in cash, part in bearer bonds.

What to do with this money? Two months after signing the Lateran Pacts and almost thirty days before their ratification, the Pope reached out to Bernardino Nogare (born in 1870, deceased in 1958). Pius XI asked Nogara to manage the funds from the Financial Convention of the Lateran Pacts. This is the «Mussolini money» The Guardian wrote about. This money came, in fact, from the Italian State as compensation for the occupation, and helped the Holy See to carry on its mission.

The Guardian, however, maintains that Mussolini was rewarding the Vatican with a huge amount of money in exchange for support and official recognition of the regime. This money would have been invested in prestigious real estate in London. The real estate belonged to Grolux Investments, a society controlled by the Swiss Profima. The latter could be traced back to the Vatican. In fact Bernardino Nogara was a member of Profima’s board.

Why would any of this be considered breaking news? Bernardino Nogara introduced the Vatican to the holding of stocks. Charged with the Special Section of the Administration of the Apostolic See Patrimony (the so-called Speciale), Nogara bought stocks, making conspicuous and smart investments. Through them, Nogara became a member of the boards of administration of several Italian companies, which enhanced his international prestige. During the Great Depression of ’29, Nogara founded Grolux Investments and the Swiss society Profima, to diversify Holy See investments, particularly by investing in gold and real estate.

The story of the establishment of Grolux is in John Pollard’s book Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy: Financing the Vatican, 1850-1950. In that book, Pollard follows a money trail over three continents. Pollard’s is said to be a book about Popes and their administration of money. But truly, most of the Popes –with Pius XI one of the exceptions– have not paid any attention to administrative matters. The latter were delegated to a highly select group of ecclesiastics and lay people with financial expertise. They are fascinating protagonists of this story. Just think about Giacomo Antonelli, Cardinal and Pius IX’s Secretary of State, who oversaw the Papal treasury from 1850 to 1876. Antonelli was one of the architects of the first massive reorganization of the budget for the Papal States. The success of his efforts to balance the budget depended on a loan requested and obtained from the Rothschild Banking House. Some could be surprised: did the Church really ask for a loan to a Jewish bank? In fact, this should not come as a surprise, considering that the Church’s relations with the Jewish community are closer than one may think. So close that Federico Cammeo, a Jewish jurist, drafted the Fundamental Law of the new-born Vatican City State after the Conciliation Bernardino Nogara, furthermore, was a top manager of the Banca Commerciale Italiana, managed by the Jewish banker Giuseppe Toepliz (and because of this, for many years the Vatican did not buy stocks in Italian banks other than the Banca Commerciale Italiana).

Nogara could count on the benefits of a renewed diplomatic activity of the Church. Benedict XV had left the Vatican coffers empty, because the First World War prevented bishops from coming to Rome for ad limina visits and contribute to Peter’s Pence. From 1930 on, Nogara invested in a web of projects extended throughout Europe and financial centres in the United States and South America. He was the first non-roman to be in charge of the Vatican finances. He came from a family so Catholic that it weep because of the breach of Porta Pia. With a degree in industrial and electro-technical engineering from the University of Milan, he left for England as soon as he married and went to work in a mine in Wales. From there he was sent to a mine in Greece. In 1908, he was living in Constantinople and managing mines in Asia Minor. There, he founded the Eastern Commercial Society, a branch of the Banca Commerciale Italiana. Well-versed in the political and economic realities of the Ottoman Empire, he became the Italian government’s trusted advisor for Easter affairs. In this role, he was involved in the Ouchy Treaty, which ended the war in Libya between Italy and Turkey. In 1914, Nogara was the Italian delegate to the Board of Administration for the Ottoman Public Debt. At the end of the First World War, he was part of the economic and financial commission of the Conferences created to draft peace treaties with Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey.

Overall, Nogara was comfortable dealing with multiple relations in diverse context – the diplomatic-political context as well as the banking one. He was the right man to manage a estate with such a clear international make-up that Speciale’s staff were required to be fluent in French and English.

In the meantime, the Opere di Religione (Religious Works) administration increased in importance within the Sacred Walls. Italy’s alliance with Hitler’s Germany in the war, in 1940, makes increasing the operational capacity of the Opere di Religione all the more important and urgent. This branch of the Vatican financial system, since the very beginning of the war, was able to exchange Italian liras for hard currencies, which facilitated the Pope’s aid to the victims of the conflict. How to enhance this work? From 1940 on, the administration of Opere di Religione was placed under a Cardinals’ Commission. Through this mechanism, the Pope’s assistance reached occupied Poland, the Balkans, and wherever the Pope and the Secretariat of State needed it to reach. As the Ossservatore Romano (the Vatican daily newspaper) recently noted in an article heading, «Pius XII fought Nazism even with (money from the Vatican’s) investments.»

Were these operations legal? Carlo Pacelli – Pope Pius XII’s nephew and general advisor of Vatican City State – raised this issue with some Italian jurists, among them Vittorio Emanuele Orlando – a prominent Italian politician, who had been Prime Minister and was also part of the Italian delegation in the negotiations of the Peace Treaty of Versailles, which ended the First World War. The question was: given that the Opere di Religione operated from the Vatican, were its transactions linked to Vatican City State or could they be considered legally independent? The jurists concluded they could be considered independent. And so, on June 27, 1942, Pius XII promulgated the establishment of the Institute for Religious Works (Istituto per le Opere di Religione, I.O.R.), an entity with its own corporate identity. This permitted the Holy See to deliver the Pope’s aid all over the world, even to Hiroshima and Nagasaki – also thanks to Vatican bank accounts opened in the United States, a request made by Vatican official to the U.S. Chargé d’Affaires Harold Tittman and approved by President Roosevelt.

This is how the Holy See’s estate and financial wealth was born and its management evolved. It is a sovereign wealth fund, managed through a sort of Central Bank (APSA; the Administration of the Apostolic See Patrimony) and an entity (the IOR) which assets are at the sovereign’s disposal, while the Prefecture for Economic Affairs oversees over the dicasteries balances and have now power to address Holy See’s financial and economic policy and everything is under the Authority for Financial Information oversight. These financial arrangements have been enhanced and modernized through the years with new agencies and also new ways to report balances. The Holy See is now committed to a qualitative enhancement toward full financial transparency. Perhaps this development is most worrisome to those who have been reckless in their interactions with Vatican financial institutions, taking advantages of the latter’s peculiarities and of Vatican sovereignty. Ultimately, the Holy See financial scandals were always about Italian bankers (from Michele Sindona, to Roberto Calvi, to Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, the former IOR president who was recently involved in an Italian bank investigation regarding his role as Italian representative of the Spanish bank Grupo Santander), and in fact relations between Italy and the Holy See have been very tense, seemingly proving a certain level of Italian hostility toward the Holy See’s path to financial transparency. The Holy See has overcome this hostility, embarking on an international standards path, which is the only way to go in a globalized world. This path will eventually make Vatican City State a modern State, with multilateral relations and an internationally recognized financial capacity. This is the only path to make the Holy See independent from any external influence. The question is: who is not comfortable with the Holy See sovereignty?