“Pope Francis”, in scolding the Curia this past Christmas, stops far short of what’s actually needed

The Latest from Leonard De Chirico:

Pope Francis was chosen “from the end of the world” in the hope that he would deal with the crisis of the Roman Curia as an outsider. Since being elected he has been sending clear signals about his uneasiness towards the Vatican establishment. The latest example of his criticism was his message to the Roman Curia just before Christmas (December 22, 2014) where he diagnosed a spiritually gangrenous reality….

Back to the list of sicknesses. One consideration is worth mentioning. Historically the Roman Curia is a child of the Renaissance courts that surrounded the princes in their various tasks as absolute monarchs. The Pope as a Renaissance prince also had his dignitaries assigned to him and Popes even today continue to have them in the Vatican state. Throughout the centuries the Curia was given a theological status as if it were a small model of the Church itself; indeed the Church at its best on a small scale. The Curia is a product of a monarchial vision of the church and the role of the Pope as absolute monarch of a state is also part of the same breed. Pope Francis criticized the awful spirituality of the Curia, but did not go so far as to question its political and monarchial nature. While denouncing its wrong behaviors, he did not tackle the wrong theology behind it. …

This means that reforming the Curia entails much more than denouncing the poor spiritual conditions of its members or changing personnel in key positions. It involves a radical re-envisioning of the structures of the church according to the supreme apostolic teaching, i.e. the Bible, where the church has no court of dignitaries nor prince at its head, but Jesus Christ alone, who was crucified, rose again and is now exalted.

Of course, I wrote this a long time ago, in an “open letter” to the pope:

The time is long, long past for some pope to stop saying “I [personally] am a sinner…” (as you had done at the beginning of the interview), to stop shifting the blame to “the sins of the children of the Church”.

If your intentions truly are what you say they are, you need to start saying, and quickly, “The Roman Catholic Church has sinned against Christ and his church and humanity” — and then, as is required by your own doctrine of confession, you need to articulate these sins clearly and in fact numerically.

It takes no imagination whatsoever to understand what these sins are.

That alone will be a show of good faith. All the rest of your happy-hopeful statements are mere window dressing and evasion and dissembling.

“Superior General” Bergoglio: Not a “collegial” pope, to the alarm of some

He calls himself “bishop of Rome” and goes by his family name “Bergoglio”. He even expressed some reluctance to be pope.

However, thinking that these things showed him to be in favor of “democratization” in the church is “a blunder”, according to the Chisea espressonline.it.

But that publication is clear to say that Bishop of Rome Bergoglio operates like the “Black Pope”, the “Superior General” of the Jesuits:

Bergoglio is also a Jesuit, and by now his actions have made it clear that he intends to apply to the papacy the methods of governance typical of the Society of Jesus, where the superior general, nicknamed the “black pope,” has practically absolute power.

Of course, I had written about this phenomenon back on April 15, but as this “papacy” unfolds, some folks seem none too comfortable about it.

Not only did Bergoglio bypass the standard operating procedure for how everyone thought the Curia ought to be reformed:

If he had followed the suggestions of the preconclave, he would have found the “council of the crown” nice and ready. All he had to do was to call around himself the twelve cardinals, three for each continent, elected at the end of each synod and therefore of the last as well, in October of 2012. Elected by a secret vote and representative of the elite of the worldwide episcopate, containing almost all of the influential names of the last conclave: cardinals Timothy Dolan of New York, Odilo Scherer of São Paulo, Brazil, Christoph Schönborn of Vienna, Peter Erdö of Budapest, Luis Antonio Gokim Tagle of Manila.

But no. Pope Francis wanted his eight advisors to be chosen by himself alone, not by others. Called to answer only to him, not to an elective assembly as well.

But he’s brought in an outsider, “a guru from McKinsey to design that reform of the curia”:

His name is Thomas von Mitschke-Collande, he is German and was the manager of the Munich branch of the most famous and mysterious company of managerial consulting in the world.

In matters of the Church, he knows his stuff. Last year he published a book with a title that was hardly reassuring: “Does the Church want to destroy itself? Facts and analyses presented by a business consultant.”

The eight Cardinals who have also been named in the “reform the Curia” project will not ever form a commission to discuss this project. They will individually advise this pope as to what they think is best. Then the pope will decide. “Alone”:

But this is exactly what happens in the Society of Jesus. Bergoglio was one of its provincial superiors and assimilated its style. In the leadership of the Society the assistants who surround the superior general, appointed by him, represent their respective geographical areas. The decisions are not made collegially. Only the superior general decides, with direct and immediate powers. The assistants do not need to agree with one another and with him; they advise the superior general one by one, in the greatest freedom.

It’s definitely not the “collegial” model. The Cardinals in the conclave didn’t know it then, but as C.S. Lewis said, a vote for Bergoglio “is like being asked to agree not only to what a man has said but also to what he is going to say.”