As these meetings are behind closed doors, both Paolo Rodari of Il Riformista and Andrea Tornielli of Il Giornale - the two Vaticanistas who are most wired into what's happening behind the scenes at the Vatican - have no formal news reports but only brief notes in their blogs today about the unprecedented meeting of Benedict XVI with Austrian bishops outside the context of an ad limina visit. Here's the one by Rodari:
Will the Pope say something
in public about the sorry state
of the Austrian Church?
by Paolo Rodari
Translated from
June 16, 2009
They met yesterday and will be meeting again today - Benedict XVI; Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops; Cardinal William Joseph Levada, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith; and Cardinal Claudio Hummes, Prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy, with the principal lights of the Austrian hierarchy, starting with the Archbishop of Vienna and president of the Austrian bishops' conference, Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn and his auxiliary, Mons. Egon Kapellari, Archbishop of Graz; the bishop of Linz, Mons. Ludwig Schwarz; the bishop of Salzburg, Mons. Alois Kothgasser; and Mons. Peter Zurbriggen, Apostolic Nuncio in Austria.
It is an unprecedented meeting behind closed doors at which the Pope is trying to set things straight with the errant and dissident Church in Austria.
After the nomination of Mons. Gerhard Maria Wagner as auxiliary bishop of Linz - subsequently scuttled because of protests from these same bishops - the Pontiff was informed about the instances of disobedience and the anti-Roman attitude within the Austrian bishops conference.
The bishops basically opposed Mons. Wagner's nomination because they consider him too conservative, even as in their own dioceses, these bishops admit to continuous liturgical abuses while tolerating priests living in open concubinage.
Too much for Papa Ratzinger, to say the least!
The Curial big guns included by the Pope in the meetings with the Austrian bishops say a lot about the nature of the problems in the Austrian Church! As terrible as the Irish child abuse report was, the Holy Father met the bishops of Armagh and Dublin by himself recently (of course, the abuses reported all happened in the past, unlike the current and apparently widespread abuses and laxities in the Austrian Church).
ZENIT, SIR
and Andrea Tornielli have all filed reports citing a communique from the Vatican Press Office earlier today after the two days of meetings between the Holy Father, some Curial discastery heads and five bishops from Austria. But I don't see it on the Vatican website nor on Vatican Radio online nor in tomorrow's issue of L'Osservatore Romano.
Here is a translation of the ZENIT item, which reads like a translation of a Press Office bulletin:
The Pope asks Austrian bishops
to deepen their faith and
be faithful to the Magisterium
VATICAN CITY, June 16 (Translated from ZENIT.org) - On June 15-6, Benedict XVI and the heads of some dicasteries of the Roman Curia met at the Vatican with a delegation of Austrian bishops.
The prelates convoked to thse extraordinary meetings were Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Archbishop of Vienna and president of the Austrian bishops' conference; Mon. Alois Kothgasser, Archbishop of Salzburg; Mons. Egon Kapellari, Bishop of Graz-Seckau and vice-president of the Austrian bishops' conference; Mons. Ludwig Schwarz, bishop of Linz, and Mons. Peter Stephan Zurbriggen, Apostolic Nuncio in Austria.
The dicastery heads who took part in the meetings were Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops; Cardinal William Joseph Levada, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of teh Faith; Cardinal Claudío Hummes, Prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy; Cardinal Zenon Grocholewski, Prefect of the Congregation for Catholic Education; and Cardinal Stanisław Ryłko, President of the Pontifical Council for the Laity.
A communique released by the Holy See says that during the meetings, which were characterized by 'collegial affection', the participants discussed "in fraternal dialog adn a constructive spirit, some issues about the situation in the Diocese of Linz and the Church in Austria, looking at solutions for current problems".
The note says other subjects discussed were "doctrinal and pastoral questions and the situation of the clergy, the laity, and the major seminaries and theological faculties in Linz and other dioceses of Austria".
It goes on to say that "the Pope reminded the participants of the urgency to deepen the faith, to keep integral fidelity to the Second Vatican Council and the post-Conciliar Magisterium of the Church, and to renew catechetical efforts in the light of the Catechism of the Catholic Church".
[How ironic that the Pope has to remind Austrian bishops about the need for strong catechetical instruction, considering that Cardinal Schoenborn was the chief editor of the Catechism of the Catholic Church!
It says a lot about Schoenborn's leadership - or lack thereof - that all these years, and even after the Pope's visit to Austria, not only was he unable to stop the liberal laxity in the Church of Austria, but appeared to encourage it by questionable actions such as celebrating Mahony-style Pop Masses, allowing tha exhibition of a blasphemous painting in Vienna's CAthedral Museum, and caving in to pressure about Mons. Wagner, after welcoming his nomination and praising him in print.]
On their part, the Austrian bishops "thanked the Holy Father for his paternal solicitude and for this meeting - a sign of his closeness to the Church in Austria - and assured him of their full communion and their affection".
They also expressed their appreciation to the Roman Curia "for their fruitful collaboration and their availability".
We can only pray fervently that something positive does come out of this, and that the above statements by the Austrian bishops are not jurt a routine formula.
If they will not and cannot discipline themselves first and then their clergy and laity, who will? Each of them is directly responsible for his local flock, and they should attend to them instead of butting as they did into what the Holy Father decides to do about the Lefebvrians, for instance!
What nerve to issue that letter criticizing the Holy Father all the while they have been coddling priests who flaunt their concubinage! And to have such contempt for the FSSPX priests who do everything by the book except swear blind loyalty to Vatican-II directives that they question.
The record of the Church in Austria in the last few decades does not raise much hope in a direction of positive change, but maybe the Holy Spirit will finally blow their way!
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 16/06/2009 22:57]