VATICAN CITY
Vatican Insider
During this week’s meeting, the Council of Cardinals discussed the IOR, the Governorate, the Secretariat of State and the role of women, lay people and couples in the Vatican. Procedures for the appointment of bishops were also discussed.The overall tone of the meeting was “free, frank and friendly”
IACOPO SCARAMUZZI
VATICAN CITY
The nine cardinals assisting the Pope with the reform of the Roman Curia and the government of the universal Church, the “C9” as it is called, will meet again in September following a four-day meeting, which ran from Tuesday to today, the fifth since the start of the pontificate. Other meetings will also be held in December and February but it is not certain that the February gathering will give birth to the new apostolic constitution that would replace the “Pastor Bonus”, the blueprint for the Vatican’s various congregations, pontifical councils and offices. The Pope and his cardinal advisors discussed the role of women, lay people and married couples in the Roman Curia and of the Nunciatures, with a focus on the process for the nomination of bishops. In terms of the IOR, changes are expected in the Institute’s governance and these will be presented at a press conference with Cardinal George Pell, the Vatican Secretary of the Economy, next Wednesday.
The C9 will next meet from 15 to 17 September, from 9 to 11 December and from 9 to 11 February, the Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi said during a press briefing. But Fr. Lombardi did not confirm whether the Council of Cardinals would conclude its work at the last of these meetings: “It is too premature to say whether it is the final meeting,” he said. “No drafts have been produced for a new apostolic constitution,” Fr. Lombardi said. “We are moving along at a steady pace but more time is needed” before the Council concludes its work. The Vatican spokesman denied one journalist’s suggestion that the work of the C9 is slowing down. The downside of an assembly that “represents the Church and all its various components across various continents and throughout the world” is that meetings cannot “last that long” and the group’s work “cannot be completed quickly.” There is no sense of urgency in the process of Church reform but the Pope is, of course, free to decide to speed things up.
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