June 23, Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time
ST. JOHN FISHER (England, 1469-1635), Bishop, Cardinal, Martyr
Fisher is the ecclesial 'twin' of Thomas More, his secular contemporary. They were imprisoned together and then beheaded two weeks apart, essentially for their refusal to uphold the validity of Henry VIII's adulterous marriage to Anne Boleyn, much less his split from the Roman Catholic Church to set up the Church of England. Fisher was a great Renaissance humanist in the category of Erasmus and More himself. He was named a bishop at 35 and gained fame as a preacher and writer. With the Reformation, he wrote eight books against the Lutheran heresy, earning him a leadership role among European theologians. Then he was asked to make a ruling on Henry VIII's marriage and he upheld Catherine of Aragon as his lawful wife. Henry found a pretext to imprison Fisher and More in the Tower of London when they refused to take an oath to the Act of Succession that meant recognizing the validity of the king's marriage and his leadership of the Church of England. Meanwhile, the Pope had made Fisher a cardinal, further angering the King. When he told a priest that he did not consider the King as head of the Church, he was brought to trial and sentenced to death. Along with Thomas More, he was beatified in 1886 and canonized in 1935.
Readings for today's Mass:
www.usccb.org/bible/readings/062313.cfm
AT THE VATICAN TODAY
Unusually, Pope Francis had a Sunday audience before today's Angelus with th3 Associazione dei Santi Pietro e Paolo
st the Aula di Benedizione of the Apostolic Place. The Association has traditionally trained and provided ushers
who welcome the faithful during liturgical celerbations in St. Peter's Basilica. It is also engaged in various
charitable and cultural activities in Rome. Address in Italian.
Sunday Angelus - The Pope reflected on Jesus's words in today's Hospel, "Whoever would save his life will lose it,
but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it", saying the martyrs offer the best example of this message.
He reminded the faithful of the Feast of St. John the Baptist on Monday, June 24.
After the Angelus, he proceeded to the Vatican train station to welcome hundreds of children from various countries
who had taken part in a train ride from Milan, stopping in Bologna and Florence, and ending in Rome, on 'A trip through
beauty' sponsored by the Pontifical Council for Culture. The purpose was to expose the children to artistic creations
inspired by the faith in the four cities they visited. The Pope spent about 20 minutes talking to them and asking them
about the trip.
One year ago...
Benedict XVI presided at a meeting of all the heads of dicasteries in the Roman Curia. In the evening, he met with Cardinals Marc Ouellet, George Pell, Camillo Ruini, Jean-Louis Tauran, and Josef Tomko. Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi said that "with the situation created by the publication of private documents from the Vatican, the Holy Father wishes to pursue his reflections in continual dialog with the persons who share responsibility with him for the governance of the Church". He said the five cardinals were those considered by the Pope who :could usefully present their considerations and suggestions to him on how to re-establish a climate The Pope also named Cardinals Polycarp Pengo, Archbishop of Dar-es-Salaam (Tanzania); Telesphore Placidus Toppo, Archbishop of Ranchi (India); and John Tong Hon, Bishop of HongKong, to the Council of Cardinals for the study of the organizational and economic problems of the Holy See.
Announced later in the day by Fr. Federico Lombardi: Greg Burke, longtime Rome-based European correspondent of Fox News and a member of Opus Dei, has been named 'communications adviser' to the Secretariat of State. Fr. Lombardi said Burke will "contribute to the improvement of communications strategies within the Holy See". He said that specifically, Burke would help "integrate attention to communications questions in the work of the Secretariat of State and to take charge of relationships with the Vatican Press Office and other communications organisms of the Holy See".
Pope meets Curial heads then
meets with five trusted cardinals
to discuss leak scandal
VATICAN CITY, June 23, 2012 (AP) - Pope Benedict XVI convened a special meeting of cardinals Saturday to get their advice about how to deal with the scandal over leaked Vatican documents,
another sign of the damage the leaks have done to trust in the Holy See's governance. [Why should the meeting be seen as 'a sign of the damage...' rather than a sign of the Pope's normal concern about a managerial and morale problem, not to mention as[S} a sign of collegiality even in dealing with problems that are not ecclesial but administrative?]
Benedict was already scheduled to attend a regular meeting of the heads of Vatican offices Saturday morning. The Vatican press office said he had added a second meeting later in the day with other cardinals in a bid to try to "restore a climate of calm and confidence" in the Curia.
And the Vatican said he would meet over the coming days with still more cardinals who will be gathering in Rome for a Church feast day on Friday to "continue the dialogue with the people who share the responsibility of the Church's governance with him."
The Vatican has been
scrambling to cope with the leaks of hundreds of Vatican documents exposing
corruption [Only two - Mons. Vigano's letters - out of dozens of documents, alleged any corruption at all, and even he only cited one specific case of what he considered contract over-pricing! And yet, from the start, MSM has codified that one case into 'CORRUPTION IN THE VATICAN' as though it were a widespread practice], and I am compelled to point this out everytime they repeat this unfounded general charge!], political infighting and power struggles at the highest level of the Catholic Church.
The Pope's butler has been arrested in the case, accused of aggravated theft after
[copies of] the Pope's own documents were found in his Vatican City apartment.
The Vatican is conducting two main investigations into the leaks: a criminal one headed by the Vatican gendarmes that led to the arrest of the butler, Paolo Gabriele, and another internal probe led by a commission of three cardinals tasked with getting to the bottom of the scandal.
Last weekend Benedict met with the cardinal's commission to learn details of [their questioning of] some of the two dozen people they have questioned.
The meetings Saturday were another indication of the seriousness with which he has taken the scandal and the damage it has done to the trust that is supposed to form the basis of the Vatican's governance.
In its statement, the Vatican said the regularly scheduled meeting with department heads, aimed at coordinating the Vatican's work, was "today particularly important and urgent to show efficient witness to the union of spirit that animates the Curia."
The second meeting Saturday includes Vatican cardinals and the archbishops of Sydney and retired vicar of Rome — two longtime papal advisers.
[I don't see why the AP chose not to list the 5: Marc Ouellet, Prefect of Bishops; George Pell, Archbishop of Sydney; Camillo Ruini, former Vicar-General of both John Paul II and Benedict XVI in Rome; Jean-Louis Tauran, president of the Pontifical Council for Inter-Religious Dialog, member of the five-man Cardinal's Commission that oversees IOR, and former #3 man at the Secretariat of State in the latter part of John Paul-II's Pontificate; and Josef Tomko, former Prefect of Propaganda Fide, confidante of his fellow Pole John Paul II, and one of the three cardinals investigating Vatileaks-etc for the Pope.]
[The obvious thing about the afternoon meeting is that it does not include Cardinal Bertone. It is reminiscent of a meeting called by the Pope in Castel Gandolfo in the summer of 2009, the year Bertone was to turn 75, the statutory retirement age, at which the cardinals present were Scola, Schoenborn, Ruini and Bagnasco - all considered 'Ratzingerians'. The cast of characters today may have been determined primarily by which of those the Pope wishes to consult privately happened to be in Rome today (other than Ruini who lives in Rome, the three other cardinals who were called to Castel Gandolfo are currently in Milan, Vienna and Genoa, respectively, and it is likely they will be consulted when they come to Rome later this week for the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul). The presence of Cardinals Tauran and Tomko ensures high-level representation of the 'Old Guard' in these consultations.
About the 2009 meeting, Andrea Tornielli reported that Cardinal Schoenborn said the Pope 'closed off the discussion' about allowing Bertone to retire, before it could even begin. Now, those who think Bertone should retire when he reaches 78 in December - such as the Archbishop of Paris, Cardinal Andre Vingt-Trois,and Vittorio Messori - are saying to 'lay off Bertone for now - he'll be gone by the end of the year, anyway". No one but Benedict XVI knows, however.
And in the past, still according to Tornielli, the Pope has apparently ignored the opinion of his good friend Cardinal Meisner of Cologne that he would be better off allowing Bertone to retire. One wonders whether there has been any change since then of the Pope's personal cost-versus-benefit assessment of keeping on Bertone. God forbid that history will record, perhaps not entirely without basis, his insistence on retaining Bertone as one of the major 'mistakes' of his Pontificate. ]
