Fr Lombardi on new Council of Cardinals which convenes this week
(Vatican Radio) At a press briefing in the Vatican this morning, it was announced
that Pope Francis has issued a chirograph, or formal, handwritten letter, officially
setting up the Council of Cardinals which will be holding its first meeting from Tuesday
to Thursday this week. Philippa Hitchen has the details:
Listen:
“An encouraging
innovation to enrich the governance of the Church with a new method of consultation”.
That was how Fr Federico Lombardi, head of the Holy See press office, described the
new Council of eight cardinals who represent the Church on the different continents,
from Africa and Asia, Europe and Australia, North, Central and South America and finally
one cardinal, Giuseppe Bertello, president of the Governing body of Vatican City State.
Together with the Italian bishop of Albano serving as secretary and Pope Francis himself,
this small group will be working for the next three days behind the closed doors of
the library inside the Apostolic Palace where most previous popes have lived. All
of the cardinals are staying at the nearby Santa Marta guesthouse where Pope Francis
has chosen to live and all of them will be travelling with the Holy Father on his
pilgrimage to Assisi on Friday at the end of their meeting. In the formal letter,
Pope Francis makes clear he reserves the right to change the number of advisers in
his new Council and to seek their advice individually, or as a group, whenever necessary.
Fr Lombardi noted that, ahead of this week’s meeting, all the cardinals have already
been hard at working, seeking input from bishops conferences in their particular parts
of the globe and they’ve already had a couple of informal get-togethers to share ideas
and suggestions ahead of the opening session on Tuesday morning. Fr Lombardi also
read out the part of the papal letter which spells out the main tasks facing the newly
instituted Council:
“ …a Council of Cardinals with the task of assisting me
in the governance of the Universal church and drawing up a project for the revision
of the Apostolic Constitution Pastor Bonus on the Roman Curia”
Reforming the
Roman Curia and helping with the governance of the Church are clearly tasks that will
take shape slowly over the coming months and years. Though there will be another press
briefing on Wednesday at 1, after the first day and a half of talks, Fr Lombardi stressed
we are unlikely to see any concluding documents or major decisions emerging from this
first step of what aims to be a much less Roman and more widely representative way
of governing of the Universal Church.