Apropos Curial reform...Sandro Magister suggests that Pope Francis is not waiting for his cardinal advisers to advise him, but that he has already asked a management guru to do so, on the recommendation of one of the eight cardinals, Reinhard Marx, Archbishop of Munich-Freising. In his remarks to CLAR, the Pope referred to Marx but only as the Cardinal from Munich, not by name, but it was Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga of Honduras whom he singled out as the 'organization man' who would wield the baton on Curial reform...
Also, before posting his site's English version of the article, may I respectfully point out to Mr, Magister how utterly gratuitous his subtitle is about a Pope who "listens but decides on his own". Doesn't every Pope worth the name? Surely, he is not implying that Benedict XVI, say, never listened to anyone and simply decided everything on his own - the absolute autocrat!; or, alternatively, that he listened to everyone and allowed himself to be guided by them in his decisions - an indecisive wimp!
I am almost sure Magister must have used the same line he now uses for Francis about Benedict XVI when he reported on the decision to issue Summorum Pontificum in 1977, or about Paul VI issuing Humanae Vitae in 1968 against the recommendation of a commission he had appointed to study artificial contraception - in both cases, the Pope concerned consulted with everyone he could and then decided his way despite stiff opposition from many of those he consulted!
I must say I find it perplexing, regrettable and most annoying that even the 'best' of the Vaticanistas like Magister and Andrea Tornielli have chosen the expedient but inherently dishonest line of being so fawning to the reigning Pope that they seem to have completely forgotten all the superlatives - in many cases, identical to those they use now - they once had for Benedict XVI. To the point that even the most normal and self-evident actions and words by Pope Francis are greeted as unprecedented, one-of-a-kind, and historical!
The McKinsey reference in the subtitle is to a global management consulting firm that the Vatican used to streamline the Vatican Governatorate before Mons. Vigano came in, and to whose work the Governatorate owes its improvement as much as it did to Vigano's self-vaunted rectitude. He himself acknowledged the McKinsey firm's work in one of his infamous 'kvetching' letters.
Bergoglio, the 'Black Pope' Dressed in White
He governs the Church like a superior general of the Jesuits.
He listens, but decides on his own.
A McKinsey man has been called in to study the reform of the curia.
Which Francis wants to purify from corruption and from the "gay lobby"
[Which implies that Benedict XVI did not want that at all?!?!]
by Sandro Magister
ROME, June 13, 2013 -
All that was lacking was a guru from McKinsey to design that reform of the curia which everyone expects from Pope Francis. [Really? Says who?] And here he comes.
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 diocese of Berlin turned to him to get its accounts back in order, and the German episcopal conference asked him to draw up a plan to save on costs and personnel.
The idea of putting him to work for the reform of the Roman Curia as well came from Reinhard Marx, the archbishop of Munich, one of the eight cardinals called by Pope Jorge Mario Bergoglio to act as his advisor.
The proposal, which he welcomed enthusiastically, was made to him by Fr. Hans Langerdörfer, the powerful secretary of the German episcopal conference, a Jesuit.
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.
His reticence in attributing to himself the name of Pope and his preference for calling himself as bishop of Rome have made champions of the democratization of the Church rejoice.
[The Pope told CLAR, none of these notions come from him - it is all from the Other who dwells in him. OK...so the Holy Spirit does not want the Pope to be called Pope? Does this not deserve a motu proprio to the effect that, from now on, the Bishop of Rome must never be called Pope? It's a word that derives from the Italian word for father, 'Papa'. Should he not be called 'Holy Father' either? Ummm... too much tinkering with things that are right and have always been considered right!]
But theirs is a blunder. When Francis, on April 13, appointed eight cardinals “to advise him in the governance of the universal Church and to study a project for the revision of the Roman curia,” he selected them according to his own judgment. -
[He had every right to do so - it would have been strange to have somebody else choose his advisers for him!] P.S. to Pope Francis - George Weigel must be so disappointed you did not even think of referring publicly to his book Evangelical Catholicism, which is supposed to have all the answers for the Church you now lead at this moment in history. After all, you were one of the big names he interviewed for the book.]
If he had followed the suggestions of the pre-Conclave,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.
He wanted one for each geographical area: Reinhard Marx for Europe, Sean Patrick O'Malley for North America, Andrés Rodríguez Maradiaga for Central America, Francisco Javier Errázuriz Ossa for South America, Laurent Monsengwo Pasinya for Africa, Oswald Gracias for Asia, George Pell for Oceania, plus one from Rome, not of the Curia strictly speaking but of Vatican City-State, the president of its governorate, Giuseppe Bertello
[long tagged by the Italian media as a 'Bertone protege' as if that were a defect, so his presence in the Council of Eight is at least an acknowledgment by Pope Francis that, apart from the Bertone connection, Bertello deserved his nomination to the Governatorate by Benedict XVI and being made a cardinal afterwards!]
Almost all of those chosen hold or have held executive positions in continental ecclesiastical institutions.
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. [Isn't this the rule for any Chief Executive worth his salt? 'The buck stops here', as Harry Truman famously said![ 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.
One effect of this system upon the reform of the Roman curia announced by Pope Francis is that no commission of experts has been installed with
the task of elaborating a unified and complete project.
[I thought that was what the McKibsey guru has done!]
The eight cardinals are asking separately for the contribution of persons they trust, of the most disparate profiles. In addition to the McKinsey man recruited by Cardinal Marx, at least a dozen of them have been consulted, from various countries.
Others have come forward of their own initiative, as for example Cardinal Francesco Coccoalmerio, president of the pontifical council for legislative texts, the designer of a project of reform centered upon a “moderator curiae" who would take care of the functioning of the machine.
In early October the eight will be gathered around the pope. They will deliver to him a sheaf of proposals. He will be the one to decide. Alone.
[Of course! Who else? The buck stops with him!]
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 14/06/2013 15:12]