Inside the Vatican magazine November-December 2024

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER $10 / EUR 10 / £6.60

30 YEARS

“He Loved US” Us” POPE FRANCIS ON THE HUMAN AND DIVINE LOVE OF THE HEART OF JESUS CHRIST

C OMPELLiNG S TORiES OF COURAGEOUS CATHOLiC LEADERS

◆ FATHER JOSEPH FESSIO, S.J. California Blackrobe

◆ GEORGE CARDINAL PELL Pax Invictus

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his in-depth, page-turning biography of the founder of Ignatius Press is written by one of Fessio’s earliest Jesuit mentors, historian Fr. Cornelius Buckley, S.J. Raised in the Bay Area after World War II, the bold Joe Fessio entered the Society of Jesus at age twenty and, by divine providence, studied for six years under three of the greatest theological minds of the 20th century—Henri de Lubac, Hans Urs von Balthasar, and Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI). He returned from Europe and started the St. Ignatius Institute at USF, and Ignatius Press. Over the decades, he has become one of the most powerful forces in the American Catholic Church, designing the Catholic Great Books program at USF and founding one of the largest Catholic publishing houses in the world.

This robust yet unsentimental study of Fessio’s unique life, cut with Buckley’s trademark wit, shows what effective Christian missionary work can look like in the age of media.

Includes 32 pages of photos. FRFH . . . Sewn Hardcover, $27.95

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“No one has impacted the Catholic Church in America and beyond like Father Fessio. This delightful biography is a must-read.”

—Most Rev. James Conley, Bishop, Lincoln NE

“George Pell, was a giant — on the football field, as a bishop leading the flock in Australia, as a brilliant intellect, and in his love of Jesus whom he served with vigor every day of his extraordinary life.”

— Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York

“Essential reading to appreciate Fr. Fessio’s undaunted character, sense of mission, and the impact of his work on the global Catholic scene.” — Scott Hahn, Author, Rome Sweet Home “As the light of Christian faith flickers across the West, one American priest leads on with inimitable brilliance, Joseph Fessio, S.J.” —Mary Eberstadt, Author, Adam and Eve after the Pill

his definitive biography of the great Australian Cardinal by veteran journalist Tess Livingstone traces his life from childhood in Australia to his role as the Vatican treasurer; through his trials, unjust imprisonment, and exoneration, to his untimely passing away in January 2023.

His huge legacy includes rebuilding Church precincts in Melbourne and Sydney, revitalizing seminary formation, founding Catholic universities, leading Australia’s Catholic foreign aid agency, and heading World Youth Day 2008. From a weekly column in Australia’s largest Sunday newspaper to bestselling books and scholarly lectures, he has left a trove of writings. This book includes snippets of some of the best of them and captures his ideas, wit, and personality.

In his role as Vatican treasurer, his efforts to reform the Church’s finances met with resistance from an entrenched “old guard’’. Through it all, he retained his dignity and integrity as a faithful successor to the apostles. GCPBH . . Sewn Hardcover, $29.95

“Cardinal Pell was extraordinary in every sense: a man of sacrificial faith, superior intelligence, and tremendous evangelical energy. Livingstone has captured all these qualities, in this marvelous biography.”

—Francis X. Maier, Author, True Confessions: Voices of Faith from a Life in the Church

www.ignatius.com P.O. Box 1339, Ft. Collins, CO 80522

(800) 651-1531

EDITORIAL by Robert Moynihan

A Prince, and Peace on Earth King David sang in Psalm 146: “Do not put your trust in princes, in human beings, who cannot save.

When their spirit departs, they return to the ground; on that very day their plans come to nothing”

Thursday, November 7, 2024, Rome — I write this after midnight, early on November 7, just hours after learning Donald Trump was on November 5 elected president of the United States.

My first emotion was relief. This relief stemmed in part from my sense that Harris had been more of a “war candidate” than Trump.

I believed this, in part, because men like Robert Kennedy, Jr. — who threw his support to Trump on August 24 — had said “if you vote for Kamala Harris, you are not electing her, you are electing the apparatus around her, and that apparatus is filled with censorship-enabling neocons who are running the country into World War 3.”

Yet, my second emotion was... deep concern... deep concern because I doubted Trump would be able, really, to prevent the coming of World War 3 — a war which Pope Francis has been telling us for years has “already started, in pieces.”

Despite Trump’s best intentions, the situation is grave. The US is $35 trillion in debt. The annual interest on this debt is now matching our annual military expenditures(!), and growing. Many problems which could have been faced 20 years or 30 years ago are now beyond our control, or nearly so. This is due to our own choices, thousands, millions of them — lazy, selfish , short-sighted choices.

So, it seemed to me unlikely that Trump would be able to carry out what so many hope he will be able to carry out — the renewal of freedom, prosperity, dignity, “greatness” in America.

As Cardinal Robert Sarah, now 79, says in his brilliant, profoundly spiritual book The Day Is Now Far Spent (published more than five years ago, on March 20, 2019), “the decadence of our time has all the faces of mortal peril.”

A cultural identity crisis, he says, is at the root of the problems facing Western societies. “The West no longer knows who it is, because it no longer knows and does not want to know who made it, who established it, as it was and as it is. Many countries today ignore their own history. This self-suffocation naturally leads to a decadence that opens the path to new, barbaric civilizations.”

Strong words. And Sarah is not even addressing the fiscal and environmental problems we face...

With regard to the question of World War 3, one of the very first people to send congratulations to Trump was Ukraine’s acting president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Tragically, Ukraine has suffered horribly during the war with Russia, which began on February 24, 2022, now almost three years ago. Millions have fled the country, perhaps never to return. Tens of thousands of young men, more likely hundreds of thousands, have died. Zelenskyy wrote: I recall our great meeting back in September, when we discussed in detail the Ukraine-U.S. strategic partnership, the Victory Plan, and ways to put an end to Russian aggression against Ukraine. I appreciate President Trump’s commitment to the “peace through strength” approach in global affairs. This is exactly the principle that can practically bring just peace in Ukraine closer. I am hopeful that we will put it into action together. We look forward to an era of a strong United States of America under President Trump’s decisive leadership. We rely on continued strong bipartisan support for Ukraine in the United States.(...)

Zelenskyy hopes he, and Ukraine, will receive more help from Trump. Yet, many observers believe Trump will not give Zelenskyy more aid. Rather, many think, Trump will seek to make a “peace deal” with the Russians. Trump has said this is what he will do.

Trump on November 6, yesterday, said: “I want to thank the American people for the extraordinary honor of being elected your 47th president, and your 45th president.” Speaking in West Palm Beach, Florida, he made no mention of Russia’s war against Ukraine. Yet... he stressed that the US saw “no wars” during his first presidential term (January 2017-January 2021). “We had no wars, for four years, we had no wars.” Trump went on: “They said: ‘He will start a war.’ I’m not going to start a war, I’m going to stop the wars.” So, Trump’s intent is to stop wars...

But this too is cause for concern, for Trump is assuming (it seems) that the US can dictate to Russia what it does in Ukraine.

Reality check: it cannot. The US tried economic power: own goal.

It tried military power: fail. Admittedly, it’s winning the propaganda war... in the West. But the West is not what it used to be. The US is an empire in decline. All Trump can do at best is stabilize the US, set it up for rebuilding, but Empire? Likely a lost cause.

So I remain deeply concerned about this war in Ukraine, about whether it can be contained, and how it may end, and under what terms. And in this uncertainty, I pray for our children...

Then Trump got another congratulatory message: “Dear Donald and Melania Trump, Congratulations on history’s greatest comeback! Your historic return to the White House offers a new beginning for America and a powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America. This is a huge victory! In true friendship, Benjamin and Sara Netanyahu.”

So now, another front looms: in the Middle East. Iran’s leaders are exchanging missiles with Israel. Trump may be a great dealmaker, but a peace deal between Israel, the Palestinians and Iran?

In closing, as in my last editorial, my thoughts turn to the Holy Land, and, again, to the great saint, St. Charbel Makhlouf (May 8, 1828 to December 24, 1898). A Maronite monk and priest in Lebanon, he spent his last 23 years living as a solitary hermit and was canonized by the Catholic Church in 1977. He is known among Lebanese Christians for his miraculous healings, and for his ability to unite Christians and Muslims. He is the Patron Saint of Lebanon.

Here are words of wisdom attributed to St. Charbel: “Do not sell your souls in the markets of this world. Your souls are very valuable. Whatever price the world may pay you, it is too low a price compared to your souls’ true value. The kingdom of God is not a goal but a journey that you can realize in yourself by the power of the Holy Spirit. Step by step, day-by-day, in the small details that fill the moments of your life, second after second... Begin nothing on earth unless it has its end in heaven; do not walk on a path that does not lead to heaven. The ignorant man clings to the dust until he becomes dust; the wise and prudent man clings to heaven until he reaches heaven. You cannot lift people higher than yourself, but if Christ is in you, you can go up and draw them to you. When you climb high, pull your brothers towards you.”

At Christmas, let us pray for peace, the peace of Christ. m NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN

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CONTENTS NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

Year 32, #6

LEAD STORY The Key to Understanding the Synod on Synodality

by Robert Moynihan, with reports from CNA and analysis by Matt Gaspers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12 INTERVIEW/Cardinal Gerhard Müller: The Holy Spirit or the Spirit of the TImes?

by Matt Gaspers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 Year 32, #6

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EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Robert Moynihan ASSOCIATE EDITORS: George “Pat” Morse (+ 2013), Alberto Carosa (+ 2023) ASSISTANT EDITOR: Christina Deardurff CULTURE EDITOR: Lucy Gordan CONTRIBUTING EDITOR: William D. Doino, Jr. WRITERS: Anna Artymiak, Giuseppe Rusconi, David Quinn, Andrew Rabel, Vladimiro Redzioch, Serena Sartini PHOTOS: Grzegorz Galazka LAYOUT: Giuseppe Sabatelli ILLUSTRATIONS: Erica Wheeler, Stefano Navarrini (+ 2024) CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER: Deborah B. Tomlinson ADVERTISING: Katie Carr Tel. +1.202.864.4263 kcarr@insidethevatican.com

v EDITORIAL OFFICES FOR MAIL: US: 14 West Main St. Front Royal, VA 22630, USA Tel +1.202.536.4555 Rome: Inside the Vatican via delle Mura Aurelie 7c, Rome 00165, Italy Tel: +39.06.3938.7471 Fax: +39.06.638.1316 POSTMASTER: send address changes to Inside the Vatican PO Box 1320 Front Royal, VA 22630, USA Tel: +1.800.789.9494 Fax: +1.202.536.5409 Subscriptions (USA): Inside the Vatican PO Box 1320 Front Royal, VA 22630, USA www.insidethevatican.com Tel. +1.800.789.9494

v INSIDE THE VATICAN (ISSN 1068-8579, 1 yr subscription: $ 49.95; 2 yrs, $94.95; 3 yrs, $129.95), provides a comprehensive, independent report on Vatican affairs published bimonthly (6 times per year) with occasional special supplements.

Inside the Vatican is published by Urbi et Orbi Communications, PO Box 1320, Front Royal, VA 22630, USA, pursuant to a License Agreement with Robert Moynihan, the owner of the Copyright. Inside the Vatican, Inc., maintains editorial offices in Rome, Italy.

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Copyright 2024 Robert Moynihan

4 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

NEWS ANALYSIS/America’s “Event Horizon”: The Popes warned us, but we didn’t listen

by Christopher Ferrara . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18 LEBANON/Christians caught in the crossfire as Gaza conflict worsens

by Christopher Hart-Moynihan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20 VATICAN/Francis releases new encyclical, Dilexit Nos, on the loving Heart of Jesus

by Alessandro Di Bussolo (Vatican News) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22 VATICAN/SPECIAL/Pope Francis names 21 new cardinals

by Christina Deardurff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26 VATICAN/“The Pope of Surprises” stirs controversy in Indonesia and Oceania

by ITV staff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .33 CHRISTMAS ART ESSAY: The Incarnation in the Words of the Church Fathers St. Basil the Great: God is in the Flesh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34 St. John Chrysostom: The Ancient of Days Has Become an Infant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .35 St. Athanasius: By His Power, He Restored the Human Race . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36 St. Gregory of Nanzianus: O Strange Conjunction! The Uncreated is Created . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37 St. Hippolytus: He Refashioned our Fallen Nature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .38 St. Gregory of Nyssa: The Notable Day of Our Feast is at Hand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .39 St. John Damascene: We Stand to Him in the Relation of Brothers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .40 St. Augustine of Hippo: He Wished One Day Set Aside for His Human Birth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .41 CULTURE Scripture/What Do You See?

by Anthony Esolen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .42 Spirituality Behind Bars/Struck Down but Not Destroyed

by Marcellus Roberts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .44 URBI ET ORBI: CATHOLICISM AND ORTHODOXY Icon/The Creed: The Church

by Robert Wiesner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46 East-West Watch/Ukrainian government moves to outlaw Ukrainian Orthodox Church

by Peter Anderson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47 News from the East/ Pope meets with Middle-Eastern bishops as war rages; Iraqi cardinal urges Christians to give “testimony of life”; young Russian Catholics gather; Obituary: Vassula Rydén

by Matthew Trojacek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48 Analysis/A Critical Opportunity for the Orthodox of Ukraine

by Peter Anderson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48 FEATURES Tradition and Beauty/ Sacred Music Relegated to Concerts

by Aurelio Porfiri . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .50 Art/“The Treasure of the Holy Land” on Display in Florence

by Lucy Gordan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .52 Lord of the World/“God was man, then, after all”

by Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .56 Vatican Watch/A day-by-day chronicle of Vatican events in August-September, 2024

by Matthew Trojacek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .58 People/ Swiss Guards; Jeff Bezos; Myanmar’s jailed former leader; Japanese scuptor; Akita visionary Sr. Agnes Sasagawa

by Matthew Trojacek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .60 Food for Thought/ The Appian Way: Directions, Sights and Gastronomy

by Mother Martha . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .62

PROFOUND & PROVOCATIVE CONVERSION STORIES ◆ INTO THE DEEP Abigail Favale

◆ THE TWO

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Matthew Wiseman

his book traces one woman’s spiritual odyssey from birthright evangelicalism through postmodern feminism and, ultimately, into the Roman Catholic Church. As a college student, she experienced a feminist awakening that reshaped her life and faith. A decade later, on the verge of atheism, she found herself entering the oldest male-helmed institution on the planet—the last place she expected to be.

With humor and insight, Favale describes her gradual exodus from evangelicalism and surprising swerve into Catholicism. She writes candidly about grappling with wounds from her past, Catholic sexual morality, the male priesthood, and an interfaith marriage. A thoroughly 21st century conversion and compelling account of recovering an ancient faith after a decade of doubt.

IDP. . .Sewn Softcover, $18.95

“There are events in life that leave you changed forever, right down to the very roots and heart of your being, because they go ‘into the deep’. Like this book. The theology is profoundly Christ-centered, the psychology trustworthily honest, and the style winsomely alive.”

—Peter Kreeft, Ph.D., Best-selling Author and Philosophy Professor “A beautifully written story of conversion. In this raw and compelling narrative, Favale reminds us that, in the most mysterious of ways, God’s grace can reach all of us.”

— Carrie Gress, Author, The Anti-Mary Exposed ALSO BY ABiGAiL FAVALE

◆ THE GENESIS OF GENDER

Weaving personal experience with expert knowledge, Favale provides an in-depth yet accessible account of the gender paradigm: a framework for understanding reality and identity that has recently risen to prominence. She traces the genealogy of gender to its origins in feminism and postmodern thought.

GGP . . . Sewn Softfover, $18.95

JERUSALEMS

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he moving story of a young man’s amazing journey to discover the roots of the Christian faith in the Ancient Near East, which led him from Protestantism through the Messianic movement and into the Catholic Church. This journey took him to the rainforest of Papua New Guinea, the Nożyk Synagogue in Warsaw, and the Judean Desert and into the heart of ancient Jewish tradition: the Hebrew Bible.

Through it all, Wiseman’s relentless desire for truth and consistency kept him searching until he discovered the “beauty ever ancient, ever new”. His powerful stor y is like a course in fundamental theology, in compelling narrative form.

T J P . . . Sewn Softcover, $18.95 “A groundbreaking book that could change the lives of traditional Jews, Messianic Jews, Protestant Christians, and wavering Catholics. Highly recommended!” Ronda Chervin, Ph.D., Philosophy Professor and Hebrew Catholic “Wiseman’s journey is worthy of the Magi who followed the star to Bethlehem. An absorbing, challenging, and ultimately inspiring read.” —Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Author, There and Back Again

Also available ◆ SALVATION IS FROM THE JEWS Roy Schoeman Traces the role of Judaism and the Jewish people in God's plan for the salvation of mankind, from Abraham through the Second Coming, as revealed by the Catholic faith and by a thoughtful examination of history.

SFJP . . . Sewn Softcover, $19.95

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Italy: Journey Toward the Face of Christ May 24 - June 3, 2025 From the ancient rooms where St. Paul lived for seven years, to the bishop’s residence in Assisi; from the treasure trove of art and faith at the Vatican Museum, to the Benedictine monastery of Norcia; we will encounter some of the “living stones” of our Church, as we journey toward the Face of Christ — both spiritually and physically, in the form of the miraculous Face of Manoppello. Visit us online to learn more!

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I N S I D E T H E VAT I CA N PI LG R I M AG E S .C O M

Italy: Journey Toward the Face of Christ May 24 - June 3, 2025 From the ancient rooms where St. Paul lived for seven years, to the bishop’s residence in Assisi; from the treasure trove of art and faith at the Vatican Museum, to the Benedictine monastery of Norcia; we will encounter some of the “living stones” of our Church, as we journey toward the Face of Christ — both spiritually and physically, in the form of the miraculous Face of Manoppello. Visit us online to learn more!

∞

I N S I D E T H E VAT I CA N PI LG R I M AG E S .C O M

Join us on a pilgrimage during the Jubilee of 2025 and experience a journey of faith, hope, and renewal!

Classic SPAIN: Pilgrimage and Lenten Retreat with Fr. Murr, March 11 - 18, 2025

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the Flower World Prophecy, May 2 - 9, 2025

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Classic MEXICO: Our Lady of Guadalupe & the

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Signature ITALY: Christmas in Rome,

September 27 - October 7, 2025

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Join us on a pilgrimage during the Jubilee of 2025 and experience a journey of faith, hope, and renewal!

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Signature ITALY: Christmas in Rome,

Our Signature Pilgrimages (intimate, limited to 15 pilgrims) are impossible to mass-produce. Like the products of an artisan, they are works of painstaking preparation that reflect our unswerving commitment to create something of great and unique beauty.

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR INSIDE THE VATICAN wants to hear from you! Email us at editor@insidethevatican.com or write us at 14 W. Main St., Front Royal, VA 22630. Letters are edited for clarity and used as space permits.

THANKS AND BLESSINGS Inside the Vatican has been my go-to source for truth and clarity for many years and I thank the Lord for guiding me to it.

You have always been such a model of peace and charity no matter what the situation and I know you will guide us through the confusion ahead.

Margaret Ruckdeschel gmoopeg@consolidated.net I listen to Robert Moynihan’s every podcast — a great source for truth about our Church. I am so impressed. [Ed. note: Find us on YouTube’s Urbi et Orbi Communications channel.] annamarie51@yahoo.com Your “Letters” are like a breath of fresh air! Your dad, William, died 10 days after my dad, Kenneth, in 2020, and your mom, Ruth, died almost exactly a year after my mom, Mary, in 2017. I cared for my mom during her last 30 months; I cared for Dad for another two years. I was with both of them as they took their final breath.

May the triune God continue to bless your work.

Patrick cccoach@tds.net Robert, you still have the tender heart of a 7-year-old. It’s been a blessing for both of us to get to know you through our pilgrimages and through your letters. May God continue to bless your ministry.

Carl and Mary Klingelberger mklingelberger51@gmail.com

CONFIRMED A CATHOLIC I want to let you know that I will be confirmed in the Catholic Church on the weekend of All Saints, Saturday, November 2. I called the priest the next day, as you suggested to me, and made it clear how important my conversion is. My sponsor will be my grandson, Aidan, 18 years old and now in college. I am overjoyed at the blessing of becoming a Catholic!

Barbara Hartwell barbhartwell@frontier.com 8

INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

AND RUSSIA?

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What is Putin really up to? In Mikhail Suslov’s monograph Putinism: Post-SovietRegime Ideology, is one historically-based theory: “Aleksei Chadaev, as he did 10 years before, summed up the re-vamped official position in a new book, Putin: Our Values (2018)... The centrepiece of Chadaev’s musings this time is Russia’s identity and values, juxtaposed to the liberal values of today’s West. He proposes to call the Russians... the ‘European Old Believers,’ [as] Russia in Chadaev’s assessment, propagates authentic European values, while Europe itself abandoned them and adopted new values, abhorrent to the Russians. Starting from the argument of Russia as a truer and better Europe than Europe per se, Chadaev continues to identify this set of authentic values.

“Its cornerstone is ‘traditional humanism,’ meaning that what is valuable is not an autonomous individual, but an individual as a ‘fundamental part of something bigger: family, collective, nation.’ It therefore follows that a prudent conservative policy would not be to lean on the past, but to awaken (‘probudit’) the historical and cultural code in the present.

“Components of this code include national sovereignty, traditional family, importance of religion, and ‘traditional understanding of the value of freedom and human rights’ (i.e., freedom and human rights are less important than communitarian values).

“Russia is carrying out an ideological reconquista of Europe by returning European traditional values to the Europeans, with these principles on Russia’s banners.

“The big picture envisaged by Chadaev is Europe of the Holy Alliance times [Note: The “Holy Alliance” was a loose organization of most of Europe’s sovereigns, formed in Paris on September 26, 1815, by Alexander I of Russia, Francis I of Austria, and Frederick William III of Prussia, as they were negotiating the Second Peace of Paris after the final defeat of Napoleon. The avowed purpose was to promote the influence of Christian principles in the affairs of nations. The alliance was inspired by Alexander of Russia. It was eventually

signed by all European rulers except the Prince Regent of Britain, the Ottoman sultan, and the Pope], when Russia protected religion and monarchy against the tidal wave of the new ideas initiated by the French Revolution.”

Dan Schmidt danielschmidt1949@gmail.com It’s hard not to sympathize with Russian efforts to establish a body of thought and practice that rejects the contamination of some of our Western values.

Bill Schambra waschambra@comcast.net A student of history knows that the invasion of other European countries does not end well with compromise. It only encourages further aggression. I am reminded of Chamberlain waving an agreement, saying “Peace in our time,” which was not peace at all. [Note: in 1938, after Chamberlain met with Adolf Hitler in Munich.]

Once again America is slow to see the gravity of the situation and the possible replacing of democracy with dictatorship.

It is easy to make pronouncements from a safe distance, like Simplicius. I live in Europe with Ukraine at my back door.

NATO protects us. Russia says it makes the West the aggressor, but I would remind my fellow Americans back home that NATO is defensive, NOT offensive... and for a reason. Parts of Georgia, then Crimea, then eastern Ukraine... Do you think Putin will end there?

Kurt Behrel schwaben49@gmail.com

POPE PIUS XII Pope Pius XII (1939-1958) was my Pope. After World War II, his health was so fragile… I remember praying for him as a child, the bedridden Pope suffering for weeks on end with hiccups… All four Pius Popes were men of great holiness, fought modernism and relativism, begged men to repent. And what do we have today?

Nita Young northcountryalaska@gmail.com I grew up on Pope Pius XII, the last Pope who completely understood and defended the full truth and beauty of the Catholic faith.

Charles Parlato parlato_charles@yahoo.com

CARDInAL BAGGIO I watched your podcast with Fr. Murr on Pope John Paul I, who died on September 28, 1978. I think it is important to note that there is one more mention of Cardinal Sebastiano Baggio in Time magazine in the fall of 1978. You quoted issue 15, but there is another mention in issue 16: “Vatican sources later let it be known that the document was a gloomy report on the state-of-thechurch in a certain nation that could only have shocked John Paul. Besides, earlier on the day of his death, a Cardinal living in Rome had apparently rebuffed John Paul by refusing to accept appointment as the new Pope’s successor as Patriarch of Ven-

ice. Such reports suggested that John Paul may quite literally have been shocked to death.” (“A Light That Left Us Amazed,” Time, Oct. 9, 1978, 86-7.)

I’m a Catholic priest who studied in Rome in 1991-96, first Laterana, then Angelicum. I discovered there that something had gone terribly wrong, but I did not know what. In those times I reported my findings to the late Cardinal Miloslav Vlk, which was unwise, as he prevented me from studying anymore. Vlk was, I suppose, close to the St. Gallen mafia, but I am not sure. Thanks for your testimony.

Fr. Cyril Kubánek, Czech Republic cyril.kubanek@gmail.com

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9

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR AND MEDJUGORJE? What’s wrong with calling out the theological errors in the ongoing comments of the alleged seers of Medjugorje? What’s wrong with noting that that the whole affair began with “prophecies” in the Charismatic Renewal, and that the childrens’ first spiritual director — Fr. Thomas Vlašić — fathered a child with a nun and left Medjugorje to establish a Queen of Peace Group in Parma, Italy — and that the “Madonna” of Medjugorje approved this move?

In May 1981, Vlašić went to a meeting of the Catholic charismatic renewal, where the well-known Sr. Briege McKenna told Vlašić that she had a vision of a twintowered church, with him surrounded by great crowds. Earlier that year, at a Charismatic Renewal meeting, Fr. Emiliano Tardif told Vlašić as a prophecy: “Do not fear; I am sending you my Mother.”

Then in June 1981, Our Lady allegedly began appearing in Medjugorje to six children aged 10 to 16. The roots are important!

The roots are the Charismatic movement, whose money kept Medjugorje alive publishing criticism of the local bishop and later the Yugoslavian Bishops conference, and leading forbidden pilgrimages there.

What kind of good fruit comes from disobedience in the end? Fr. Vlašić was excommunicated in 2020. Since his liacization in 2009, Vlasic “has continued to carry out apostolic activities with individuals and groups, through conferences and online; he has continued to present himself as a religious and priest of the Catholic Church, simulating the celebration of sacraments.”

Send pilgrims to Fatima instead.

Linda Rose (Spera Rose, OCDS) spera-in-deo@live.com Thank you for presenting such a cogent appraisal of what the Vatican Note on Medjugorje contains and how it emphasizes the spiritual fruits coming from Medjugorje!

I made a pilgrimage there in 1995 during a truce in the Homeland War, and was deeply touched by the number and quality of the confessions and the reception of Holy Communion which followed!

I am very glad that the DDF issued this note about Medjugorje!

Fr. Jim O’Neal elliottoneal1@gmail.com I appreciate your objectivity in this matter. I believe you’ve said you are per-

sonally enthused about Medjugorje, which makes your objectivity all the more... commendable, and among the reasons that I subscribe to your work.

On the whole, this phenomenon simply doesn’t pass the smell test for me; and excited masses of people desperate (by and large) for (a) spiritual sparks and (b) personal validation (it’s human nature) tend to work against the premise rather than for it, in my intuition at least. The “fruit” that is mentioned ought to be a normal, authentic Catholic experience. I am amazed at the balance and clarity of CDF’s comments (as excerpted in your letter). Encouraged, on the one hand, and skeptical on the other; braced for the right that follows the jab.

Charles D. Wright charlesdwright@gmail.com I hope you will not take offense, but while I greatly respect you and Bishop Joseph Strickland, I think it is a great mistake to be a supporter of the Medjugorje messages and visionaries. I lay out the main reasons why in my review of the definitive book on the subject, Donal Anthony Foley's Medjugorje Complete: The Definitive Account of the Visions and Visionaries. See: remnantnewspaper.com/web/index.php/fet zen-fliegen/item/5561-vindicating-themother-of-god-against-false-apparitions Peter Kwasniewski professorkwasniewski@gmail.com

A WAY FORWARD I watch your podcasts regularly. I appreciate immensely your clearly sincere desire to find a constructive way forward in resolving the conflicts/confusion that Mother Church has been steeped in for the last many years. I salute you for your unwavering commitment to the search for Truth, and your willingness to be all in on issues that are not subject to compromise.

Bill Gehl Bucharest, Romania

SCANDAL IN SINGAPORE Yes, Rosemary, the Holy Father’s Singapore statement (“All religions are a pathway to God”) was indeed scandalous.

That can’t be denied I’m afraid, even though he did say some other good things in that speech to the young people who reflected the island nation’s religious diversity. In fact, the “sanitized” or “whitewashed” English translation of his state-

10 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

ment on the Vatican website showed someone with influence in Rome realized something was badly wrong with what Francis actually said. (The Italian original and other web translations are all accurate.)

Now, it just so happens that in the Novus Ordo calendar, today’s Gospel (24th Sunday, Year B) tells how our Lord, right after giving Peter the keys and making him the leader of the Apostles, rebuked him sharply, saying, “Get thee behind me, Satan! You think not as God does but as men do!”

So that was a golden opportunity to speak out against the scandal Peter’s successor has just caused in Singapore.

In my homily today, I said that, if even St. Peter himself could (unintentionally) act like Satan, tempting the Lord to flee from the Cross, much more is it possible that Peter’s successors can make serious mistakes when they’re not using their gift of infallibility.

We know that our Catholic faith is the one true religion, and non-Christian religions are not pathways leading to God. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life.

No one comes to the Father except by me.”

Fr. Brian Harrison materdei82@hotmail.com Your excellent discussion with Fr. Murr on the Pope’s visit to Singapore turns heartbreaking: The fact that the Pope would not speak the name of Christ at the interfaith gathering is something unthinkable. The Pope’s remark that all religions have the same God is false: “Allah” is a demon God, not the God of Jews or Christians. “...there is no other name under heaven... by which we must be saved.”(Acts 4:12) Jack Carter jbcarter7@aol.com

AND THE SSPX? The SSPX (Society of St. Pius X) has only been protective and nurturing through these turbulent post-Vatican II times. In Old Testament times, when God warned that His will was not for kings to govern, but He allowed men to have them anyway as they wanted, He showed them that their will was false. Now He has shown us that our will was false in choosing to worship Him in a Mass of idolatry (worship centered on men), rather than the Latin Mass of all times!

Tim Bratt thughbratt@gmail.com

We must do all in our power to recocile the SSPX with Holy Mother Church. Saying the Supreme Law of Saving Souls overrides obedience to the Pope approaches schism.

John B John.AB1531@proton.me

TRADITION IS THE GLUE As a 74-year-old cradle Catholic, I lived through Vatican II (1962-1965). Myself, my parents, and all but one of my five siblings left the Church. My last confession was in 1966. I had always found the Tridentine mass boring and unfulfilling… the modernized Mass was even worse… corny, wanting to be “New-agey” and failing.

Then came the abuse scandals, including the imprisonment of a close relation.

I told my children we must all walk our own path to God and did not spoon-feed them anything, positive or negative. Yet my spiritual quest continued, and I found solace in Zen Buddhist meditation.

Now, listening to your podcasts, I have felt a kind of “coming home.” I realize that these roots can never be fully extracted — even after 50 years’ absence.

My dad, a convert, once related that when he was fighting WW2 in the Solomon Islands, he attended a Mass in a village. He said, “It was exactly the same as what I had experienced in Te Mata with Mum” (our home).

Tradition is the glue that holds society together, which is why I say you must go back to the Tridentine mass.

Vatican II was a kind of panic. They saw a great wave coming and tried to counter it. It was never going to work. The Church would have retained as many practitioners by changing nothing.

Now it sounds like the tide may have changed again.

God sent me a great gift: I am now rearing my second family with my very own children aged 6 and 7. I will take my young family to Latin Mass soon. Then it is up to the power of the holy Eucharist, if it has any.

I have seen just how much this Eucharist meant to my great aunts and uncles.

Should it become important to my children also, I would be delighted for them.

I love your podcasts. Please keep them coming.

Michael Carter New Zealand

THE SHROUD OF TURIN Your discussion of the “Shroud of Turin” brought back memories of Father Francis Filas, S.J., who in the 1950s hosted a yearly Good Friday national broadcast about the Shroud. I later knew him at Loyola University, Chicago, in the 1960s.

Pat and Greg Strauss New Brunswick, Canada

FROM A PRISONER Since my last letter, an Indian priest has come twice to our prison to hear confession and say Mass! The anti-Catholic chaplain left! I’ve been trying to get a rosary and new brown scapular for 6 years... prison regulations allow wearing a scapular or medal and a rosary less than 28” long. The cross cannot be more than 1 inch long.

We also need catechesis! Thessalonians 2 says that the Lord will send a strong delusion because they failed to love the truth! Archbishop Viganò is spot on about this. Pray for Bishop Schneider!

William Young, #650486 2501 State Farm Rd. Tucker, Arkansas 72168 I’m a Catholic incarcerated in Texas. I was introduced to your magazine by another prisoner who was paroled last month, and can no longer share it with me. May I ask for a free subscription as an indigent prisoner?

Patrick McFeely, #02071829 Jester III, 3 Jester Rd. Richmond, Texas 77406

“HAVE FAITH — AND KEEP IT” Only God knows why we are here and now. I believe every Christian, everywhere, since Jesus ascended to Heaven, has asked themselves: what should I do?

It is true that we are living in a very special time. Some believe that we are already the “little flock” to whom Jesus said: “Do not be afraid!”

I am not sure, yet, we should fight as the Militant Church should always do.

Remember that even St. Francis of Assisi, in his last years, was tormented by the possibility that all he had done was just his pride or the devil’s work. Human beings do not know anything for sure; that is why God sent His own Son to teach us what to believe. We should have Faith and keep it, no matter what. The most im-

portant thing is to tell the Truth. I will pray for you!

Michel Yamagishi ymichel@uol.com.br Writing just to say that I very much admire you for publishing letters that disagree with your viewpoint.

I have been rather uninterested in the whole Latin Mass discussion. There is too much confusion and suffering out there on other issues. I must also say that as a Russian Orthodox, I am used to there being different forms of liturgical practice (Greek and Russian are so very different, and the Orthodox Church in America does yet something else), and in so many languages, that this whole discussion seems pointless.

I love Church Slavonic, and am one of few people who can read it and understand it during services, but I really see the need for English liturgies as well. I do not see these as being inconsistent, and neither kind of liturgy is more or less faithful or pious, at least not to me. God is present if we let HIM in.

Also, as Russian Orthodox, we have always before us the example of the Old Believers, who split off due to these ritualistic questions, and that was such a grief to everyone, and continues to this day.

If we look to history, schisms happen so much more than reunifications.

So I guess I would want us to all pray for unity and for whatever gives us unity, as Christians. This applies to the CatholicOrthodox split as well as to any divisions within Catholicism.

Please continue your work; you are clearly praying and thinking and that is all to the good.

Lena Zezulin forzezfamily@gmail.com

INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

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LEAD STORY

“iT is a ConTinUaTion of VaTiCan ii” The Key To UndersTanding The synod on synodaliTy n BY ROBERT MOYNIHAN, DRAWING ON A CNA REPORT BY ALMUDENA MARTÍNEZ-BORDIÚ From the austere disposition of cardinals and bishops during Vatican II in the 1960s to the round tables (below) in the Paul VI Audience Hall at which the delegates of the 2024 Synod sat without any hierarchical distinction (Photo - G. Galazka).

Opposite, in the circles: Fr. Yves Congar (d. 1995), a Dominican theologian at the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) and Fr. Vimal Tirimanna, C.Ss.R., a Sri Lankan theologian and 2024 Synod delegate

The “Synod on Synodality” ended on October 26 without calling for any radical changes in Church doctrine or practice. But the process of the Synod itself is turning out to be the “radical change” in how the Church governs herself. This change finds its roots in one interpretation of the ecclesiology of the Second Vatican Council (196265). So argues American Catholic writer Matt Gaspers, who says that this is “the key” to understanding the 2024 Synod. —RM

T

he Second Session of the Synod on Synodality took place in October at the Vatican, the culmination of a three-year process initiated by Pope Francis in October 2021. Composed of 368 voting members from across the globe — 96 of whom were not bishops — this year’s assembly focused on the question, “How to be a synodal Church in mission?”

When the Synod concluded, on the evening of October 26, in a significant departure from previous synods, Francis adopted the final document, foregoing a traditional “apostolic exhortation” in favor of direct implementation of the assembly’s conclusions.

The 52-page document, approved by 355 synod members in attendance, outlines substantial proposals for Church renewal, including: (1) expanded women’s leadership roles; (2) greater lay participation in decision-making; and

(3) significant structural reforms. The final document is organized into five main sections and calls for five forms of conversion: spiritual, relational, procedural, institutional, and missionary.

Among the most significant proposals is a call for strengthening pastoral councils at parish and diocesan levels.

The document advocates for regular ecclesiastical assemblies across all Church levels — including continental — and more ecumenical dialogue.

The text introduces the concept of “synodal authority” while acknowledging that in “a synodal Church, the authority of the Bishop, of the Episcopal College and of the Bishop of Rome in regard to decision-taking is inviolable.”

“Such an exercise of authority, however, is not without limits,” the document adds. The text calls for a revision in canon law, “clarifying the distinction and relation between consultation and

12 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

deliberation and shedding light on the responsibilities of those who play different roles in the decision-making process.”

Women’s Leadership The document explicitly states there is “no reason or impediment” to prevent women from assuming leadership roles in the Church. Furthermore, “the question of women’s access to diaconal ministry remains open,” and that discernment should continue.

The text advocates for increased female participation in clergy formation and broader involvement in Church decision-making processes.

The document significantly expands the role of lay faithful in Church governance. It calls for their increased presence in synodal assemblies and all phases of ecclesiastical decision-making. New procedures for selecting and

October 2, 2024, Vatican City. Pope Francis during a session of the 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops in the Paul VI Audience Hall (Photo - G. Galazka)

evaluating bishops and expanded lay participation in diocesan leadership and canonical processes are proposed.

Implementation Phase While Pope Francis has declared the synodal path “completed,” the document emphasizes that a crucial implementation phase lies ahead. This next stage will focus on integrating synodality as a “constitutive dimension of the Church.”

The text also addresses accountability measures, calling for enhanced financial transparency and protocols for abuse prevention, declaring: “The need within the Church for healing, reconciliation and the rebuilding of trust has resounded at every stage of the synodal process.”

The document represents the culmination of one of the most extensive consultative processes in Church history, building on both the 2023 assembly’s work and the broader synodal journey initiated in 2021. The exercise aimed to balance “traditional Church teaching” with “contemporary pastoral needs” while promoting “greater inclusivity and transparency” in Church governance.

Back to the Beginning “If we want to speak of a synodal Church,” Pope Francis said three years ago, “we cannot remain satisfied with appearances alone; we need content, means and structures that can facilitate dialogue and interaction within the People of God, especially between priests and laity... This will require changing certain overly vertical, distorted and partial visions of the Church, the priestly ministry, the role of the laity, ecclesial responsibilities, roles of governance and so forth.”

As American Catholic writer Matt Gaspers notes in a report he forwarded to me, “During the same address, Francis also quoted Fr. Yves Congar (d. 1995), a progressive Dominican the-

ologian at the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965), who once said: ‘There is no need to create another Church, but to create a different Church’ (Fr. Yves Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 1950).”

“A CONTINUATION OF VATICAN II” Gaspers adds: “Arguably the best summation of the meaning of the Synodal process was given last year by Fr.

Vimal Tirimanna, C.Ss.R., a Sri Lankan theologian and Synod delegate, who said during a press briefing: ‘This synodal process is not a private agenda of Pope Francis; it is a continuation of Vatican II. Of course, [the] Church had so many other things to face during the last five decades or so, but now, the Vatican II theology — rather, the ecclesiology of Vatican II [emphasis added] — is being revived.’”

Gaspers adds: “Commenting on the seating arrangement during the Synod, Fr. Tirimanna likewise observed that ‘the round tables themselves,’ at which delegates sat without distinction in the Paul VI Audience Hall, ‘are a symbol of the ecclesiology of Lumen Gentium,’ the Council’s Dogmatic Constitution on the Church.

“And interestingly, the phrase ‘ecclesiology of Vatican II’ is found in Synodality in the Life and Mission of the Church (SLMC), a document produced by the Vatican’s International Theological Commission in 2018. It has been a foundational text through-

out the synodal process and is quoted multiple times in the final document just approved by delegates and issued

by Pope Francis.”

The goal of creating “a different Church” based on the “ecclesiology of Vatican II,” Gaspers contends, has been the “overarching narrative promoted by Synod officials and documents over the past three years.”

The following paragraph from the Final Document is evidence for this thesis: “Rooted in the Tradition of the Church, the entire synodal journey took place in the light of the conciliar magisterium.

“The Second Vatican Council was indeed like a seed thrown onto the field of the world and the Church...The Synod 2021-2024 continues to draw upon the energy of that seed and develop its potential.

The synodal journey is indeed putting into practice what the Council taught about the Church as Mystery and Church as People of God, called to holiness through continual conversion that comes from listening to the Gospel. In this sense, the synodal journey constitutes an authentic further act of reception of the Council, thus deepening its inspiration and reinvigorating its prophetic force for today’s world” (FD, 5).

Thus Gaspers concludes: “This is the key to understanding the Synod, which, in many ways, was a continuation of the battle between what Christopher Ferrara has called ‘the party of Catholic Tradition on the one hand, in continuity with all that the Church has handed down in her doctrine and practice through the centuries … and, on the other hand, the party of innovation, modernization, liberalization, adaptation, indeed revolution in the Church.’” (Christopher Ferrara, False Friends of Fatima, p. 11).

This battle was waged during the Council, and it continues in the Church today. Let us consider a few examples and draw some connections between the Council and the Synod, in the following analysis by Matt Gaspers.

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LEAD STORY

“It Is a ContInuatIon of VatICan II”

EMPHASIS SHIFT IN ECCLESIOLOGY During Vatican II, the “party of innovation” was successful in causing a significant emphasis shift in ecclesiology, the branch of theology that deals with the nature and constitution of the Church. (Fr. Tirimanna illustrated the shift quite well when he celebrated the seating arrangement of Synod delegates as representing “a concentric Church, not a pyramidal Church.”)

Prior to the Council, emphasis was traditionally placed on the Church’s sacred hierarchy and the dignity of those who belong to it. Pope Pius XII, for example, taught in Mystici Corporis Christi (1943): “That those who exercise sacred power in this Body are its chief members must be maintained uncompromisingly,” and further, “Bishops must be considered as the more illustrious members of the universal Church” and “should be revered by the faithful as divinely appointed successors of the Apostles.” (MCC, 17, 42).

“At the same time,” Pius XII said said, “when the Fathers of the Church sing the praises of this Mystical Body of Christ… they are thinking not only of those who have received Holy Orders, but of” those in religious life and the laity, as well. (MCC, 17). Thus, Pius XII honored all the members of the Church but emphasized the special dignity and role of the hierarchy, in accord with St. Ignatius of Antioch’s ancient teaching (ca. A.D. 110): “Apart from these [bishops, priests, and deacons], there is no Church” (Epistle to the Trallians, 3).

The “ecclesiology of Vatican II,” on the other hand, “stresses the common dignity and mission of all the baptized, in exercising the variety and ordered richness of their charisms, their vocations and their ministries” (SLMC, 6).

“Having set forth the functions of the hierarchy,” begins the 4th chapter of Lumen Gentium, “the Sacred Council gladly turns its attention to the state

of those faithful called the laity.

Everything that has been said above concerning the People of God [2nd chapter of LG] is intended for the laity, religious and clergy alike. But there are certain things which pertain in a special way to the laity, both men and women... Due to the special circumstances of our time,” which are not specified, “the foundations of this doctrine must be more thoroughly examined” (LG, 30).

While Lumen Gentium does note that the common priesthood of the faithful differs from the ministerial priesthood “in essence and not only in degree,” it also emphasizes that they “are nonetheless interrelated: each of them in its own special way is a participation in the one priesthood of Christ” (LG, 10).

“Let the spiritual shepherds recognize and promote the dignity as well as the responsibility of the laity in the Church,” the document says. “Let them willingly employ their prudent advice. Let them confidently assign duties to them in the service of the Church, allowing them freedom and room for action.” (LG, 37).

In some ways, these exhortations are good and can lead to positive lay collaboration with the hierarchy.

However, they can also be used by the “party of innovation” as a mandate for lay prominence (if not dominance), which was a major topic throughout the Synod and is promoted in the final document: “The lay faithful, both men and women, should be

14 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

given greater opportunities for participation, also exploring new forms of service and ministry in response to the pastoral needs of our time in a spirit of collaboration and differentiated co-responsibility,” including “increased participation of laymen and laywomen in Church discernment processes and all phases of decision-making processes (drafting, making and confirming decisions).” (FD, 77).

While the final document says “the authority of the Bishop, of the Episcopal College and of the Bishop of Rome in regard to decision-taking is inviolable,” it also asserts that such authority “is not without limits: it may not ignore a direction which emerges through proper discernment within a consultative process, especially if this is done by participatory bodies,” going so far as to call for “a revision of Canon Law from a synodal perspective, clarifying the distinction and relation between consultation and deliberation and shedding light on the responsibilities of those who play different roles in the decision-making process” (FD, 92).

If consulting and heeding the laity becomes mandatory for bishops in regard to governing their dioceses, this would certainly qualify as a revolution in ecclesiology.

ANOTHER SHIFT: FROM CONVERSION TO DIALOGUE Another seismic shift that occurred during the Council, which was very apparent throughout the Synod, involves the very definition of the Church and her stance toward nonCatholics. Whereas Pius XII reiterated Catholic dogma that the “true Church of Jesus Christ… is the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic and Roman Church” (MCC, 13), Lumen Gentium introduced a novel distinction between “the one Church of Christ” and “the Catholic Church,” stating that the for-

October 27, 2024, St. Peter’s Basilica. After the Holy Mass celebrated on the occasion of the Conclusion of the Synod of Bishops, the Chair of St. Peter was exposed under the newly renovated baldacchino (Photo - G. Galazka).

mer “subsists in” the latter (LG, 8).

This has led many to embrace the claim that the “Church of Christ” is somehow larger and more encompassing than the Catholic Church.

In short, thanks to the “party of innovation,” the Council shifted the emphasis from conversion to dialogue, and the Synod has exclusively promoted dialogue from the beginning.

Take, for example, the official Synod handbook (2021), which insisted that “no one — no matter their religious affiliation — should be excluded from sharing their perspective and experiences [during the consultation phase], insofar as they want to help the Church on her synodal journey of seeking what is good and true.” The Working Document for the Continental Stage (2022) likewise affirmed: “A synodal process is incomplete without meeting brothers and sisters from other confessions, sharing and dialogue with them, and engaging in common actions” (DCS, 22). We find similar language in the final document issued this year: “Being in the world and for the world, [the People of God] walk together with all the peoples of the earth, in dialogue with their religions and their cultures, recognising in them the seeds of the Word [a phrase found in the Conciliar decree Ad Gentes], journeying towards the Kingdom.” (FD, 17) “We reaffirm the commitment of the Catholic Church to continue and intensify the ecumenical journey with other Christians, by virtue of our common Baptism and in response to the call to live together the communion and unity among disciples for whom Christ prayed at the Last Supper (cf.

Jn 17:20-26).” (FD, 40) “The plurality of religions and cultures… are an invitation to each person to confront his or her own unconscious bias, resist the temptation of being at the center, and open oneself to the acceptance of other perspectives.”

(FD, 42) The phrase “plurality of religions” is reminiscent of the Document on Human Fraternity (February 4, 2019, abbreviated as DHF) and its claim that “the pluralism and the diversity of religions… are willed by God in His wisdom.”

The Synod’s final document recalls the signing of DHF by Pope Francis and the Grand Imam in 2019 and says, “A synodal Church commits itself to walk this path alongside the believers

of other religions and people of other beliefs wherever it lives. It freely shares the joy of the Gospel and gratefully receives their respective gifts” (FD, 123).

All of this stands in stark contrast to the Church’s traditional emphasis on the need for non-Catholics to convert in order to be saved. This is the focus of the traditional Good Friday prayers, the contents of which are radically different in the Missal of Paul VI (1970).

As for “journeying towards the Kingdom,” the Roman Catechism (issued after the Council of Trent) explains that every time we pray the Our Father, we are asking “God that the kingdom of Christ, that is, His Church, may be enlarged; that Jews and infidels may embrace the faith of Christ and the knowledge of the true God; that schismatics and heretics may return to soundness of mind, and to the communion of the Church of God which they have deserted…” (Catechism of the Council of Trent [TAN Books, 2017], p. 565).

There is no such language found in any of the Synod texts produced over the past three years, nor any reminders that “the union of Christians can only be promoted by promoting the return to the one true Church of Christ of those who are separated from it” (Pope Pius XI, Mortalium Animos, 10).

“PERMANENT REVOLUTION” The term “revolution” denotes the repudiation and replacement of something old with something new. To a degree, this is what happened during Vatican II. In the words of Fr. Congar, “the Church has peacefully undergone its October Revolution,” referring to the Council.

As with all revolutions, however, there are always some who want to push the envelope further, and the same is true in the Church.

Examples of this from the Synod include the call for a female diaconate (which remains on the table — see FD, 60) and the acceptance of “alternative lifestyles” associated with the “LGBT” acronym, both of which obviously go beyond the letter of Vatican II. And yet, they are consistent with the radical spirit that animates “the party of innovation, modernization, liberalization, adaptation, indeed revolution in the Church.”

The answer to this “permanent revolution” in the Church was summed up beautifully by Cardinal Gerhard Müller last year: “God does not need us to give His Word an update or the Church an upgrade.

“Instead of listening to ‘human precepts and doctrines’ (Col. 2:22), we are to adhere to ‘the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching which accords with godliness’ (1 Tim. 6:3).

“Let us forsake the vain project of using our limited human logic to ‘reform’ God’s word in accord with alleged paradigm shifts.

“We are the ones who need to reform and conform to God.”m

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN 15

LEAD STORY

“it iS A ContinuAtion oF vAtiCAn ii”

the holy Spirit or the Spirit oF the tiMeS? An interview with CArdinAl GerhArd Müller, A Synod FAther And ForMer heAd oF the vAtiCAn’S doCtrinAl oFFiCe n BY MATT GASPERS

G

erman Cardinal Gerhard Müller, former prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, was among 120 delegates chosen directly by Pope Francis to participate in the XVI General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, the “Synod on Synodality,” which took place in two sessions (October 2023 and October 2024).

In the past, Cardinal Müller has expressed grave concerns that the Synod’s goal is “to make the Church conform more with this international Agenda 2030,” rather than to proclaim the truth that “God came down from heaven in His Son, Jesus Christ, for us and for our salvation.”

Inside the Vatican’s Matt Gaspers asked Cardinal Müller to comment as he prepared to participate in the Synod on Synodality’s just-ended 2024 Session. ****** Inside the Vatican: You previously described the Synod on Synodality as a “hostile takeover of the Church” which “we must resist.” Is it still a serious threat to the Church?

Cardinal Müller: The problem is that the ecclesiological status of this assembly is not clear.

The Synod of Bishops was originally intended as an advisory body for the Pope.

It was intended to be the institutionalized and collegial co-responsibility of the world episcopate in the government of the Church, in so far as the bishops, through their consecra-

Women were present in large numbers at the October 2024 Synod. One much-discussed question was whether women could be “deaconesses,” because women “deaconesses” were spoken of by St. Paul.

However, scholars agree that the role of those deaconesses was not a “rung on the ladder” leading to the sacrament of Holy Orders. The Synod seemed to assent to this understanding, but more discussion lies ahead...

tion, share in the universal teaching and pastoral office of the Church.

Now non-bishops also have the same right to vote and speak as bishops.

Those who confuse an ecclesiastical synod with a secular-democratic body consider this to be progress, because they believe that non-bishops now share in the politically interpreted “power” in the Church.

In reality, the Synod has changed its nature.

It is no longer an institution of collegiality among bishops but a general body that submits its votes to the Pope, who, at his own discretion, rejects one proposal and makes the other a law of the Church.

But this is a monopolization of ecclesiastical authority based on a false understanding of papal primacy, which is precisely what Vatican II wanted to correct and which also runs counter to the dogma of Vatican I. The Pope, as Successor of Peter and Vicar of Christ, does not relate to the Church in the same way that the

16 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

autocratic party leader relates to the cheering members of the party congress in political systems.

Vatican documents have repeatedly connected the Synod on Synodality to the Second Vatican Council, saying, for example, that the Synod is taking place “in the wake of the drive for continuous ‘aggiornamento,’ the precious legacy of the Second Vatican Council” (2022) and that the current Synod “constitutes a true act of further reception of the Council… reinvigorating its prophetic force for today’s world” (2023). Do you agree that the Synod on Synodality is essentially a continuation of Vatican II? Cardinal Müller: The Synod on Synodality has no doctrinal authority, such as that which belongs solely and exclusively to an ecumenical council headed by the Pope or to a regional synod recognized by the supreme teaching authority of the Pope.

We are not dealing with a Second Vatican Council here.

But the participants should be inspired by the doctrinal texts of the Second Vatican Council.

It is essential to overcome this ideology according to which the Second

The Descent of the Holy Spirit, by Sandro Botticelli, Birmingham Museums & Art Gallery, England

Vatican Council was something like the late victory of Modernism.

What is meant here by “Modernism” is the heresy, rejected by the Church, that revelation is not a historical reality, but that dogmas are only the changing collective expression of changing religious subjective feelings of an unknown Divine beyond His revelation in Jesus Christ and His presence in the infallible doctrine and sacraments of the hierarchical and sacramental Church.

Some dream of interpreting Vatican II as the first breakthrough against the narrow neoscholastic theology, which should then be completed by its great ideas into the vision of a Church that conforms to the world of modern ideologies.

This would no longer be the sacrament of salvation of the world in Christ but only a religious organization that offers its members spiritual experiences and a playing field for their socially romantic dreams of a fraternal world in the sense of the universal brotherhood of people of all religions and worldviews in the oneworld religion.

The Vatican’s document Synodality in the Life and Mission of the Church (2018) connects “synodality” to what it calls “the ecclesiology of Vatican II.” Cardinal Mario Grech has similarly asserted, “A correct reception of the Council’s ecclesiology is activating such fruitful processes as to open up scenarios that not even the Council had imagined and in which the action of the Spirit that guides the Church is made manifest.” Do you see a connection between “the ecclesiology of Vatican II” and the current Synod?

Cardinal Müller: The Holy Spirit does not initiate processes or construct scenarios, nor does He justify the sweet-sounding concepts and colorful visions of a Church that functionaries and ideologues think up and present to the astonished people of God as surprises of the Holy Spirit.

Vatican II presented the revealed faith regarding the Church of the Tri-

une God with the help of Holy Scripture, the Church Fathers and the Councils, but it did not make arbitrary ecclesiological concepts of individual theological authors the measure and criterion of its self-understanding.

We believe in the Holy Church, for which Christ gave Himself up to make her His Bride, and not in the literary product of a theology professor or in the spiritual experiences of religious visionaries.

“HE IS THE HOLY SPIRIT WHO REJUVENATES AND RENEWS THE CHURCH THROUGH THE POWER OF THE GOSPEL AND “LEADS HER TO PERFECT UNION WITH HER BRIDEGROOM” This has its meaning in its place, but it must not be confused with the deposit of faith that comes from God’s revelation and obliges us to accept it obediently in conscience.

You wrote last October, “A Synod of Bishops should deliberate on how to meet the challenges of faith in today’s world so that Christ is brought to the attention of today’s people as the light of their lives.” What are these primary “challenges?”

Cardinal Müller: The point around which everything revolves and on which the healing presence of the Church in the world of today and tomorrow is decided, is anthropology.

According to secular thinking, man is

just an accident of the earth’s development, thrown into existence without ever finding meaning in his existence or recognizing God as his origin and goal. But God came down from heaven in His Son, Jesus Christ, for us and for our salvation. He took on flesh from Mary and shared our life and destiny, even to the point of the Cross and suffering. And only through His Resurrection from the dead has He given us real hope that death, suffering, and injustice will not have the last word.

What is the use of making a career in the Church, of realizing oneself as a layperson, of fighting for the diaconate of women and of “abolishing” celibacy as an unpleasant condition of access to a secure position (making it optional), of sharing the supposed power and secure benefices with the clergy, if God is dead in the hearts of men and the Church is seen as a monument from a better past?

It is right and good if, in the context of the Synod of Synodality, everyone appeals to the Holy Spirit and wants to hear what He says to the churches (Apoc. 2:7). But that is not the spirit of the times of the ideological visions of a man-made New World Order of the Great Reset or Agenda 2030, but the Spirit of the Father and the Son, Who was sent down to the Apostles by the exalted Christ on the day of Pentecost, “so that He may continually sanctify the Church and that the faithful may thus have access to the Father through Christ in one Spirit.”

And it is not we who make the Church fit for the future with our working papers, votes, agendas, programs and structural reforms. Rather, He is the Holy Spirit Who rejuvenates and renews the Church through the power of the Gospel and “leads her to perfect union with her Bridegroom.

For the Spirit and the bride say to the Lord Jesus: ‘Come’ (Apoc. 22:17).

Thus the whole Church appears as a people united by the unity of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.” (Second Vatican Council, Lumen Gentium, art. 4).m

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN 17

ANALYSIS

two popes wArned us — we didn’t listen AmericA’s trAgic “event horizon” now seems unAvoidAble, except through prAyer... n BY CHRISTOPHER A. FERRARA*[NOTE: THIS ESSAY WAS WRITTEN IN OCTOBER BEFORE THE ELECTION]

Liberty Leading the People by Eugene Delacroix and Washington Crossing the Delaware by Emanuel Leutze

T

he story political modernity tells about itself, which even American “conservatives” view as received wisdom, is that the “moderate Enlightenment” freed Western man from an outmoded worldview, leading to the so-called Age of Democratic Revolution (roughly 1760 to 1800). Then, so the story goes, the oppressed peoples of America and France, followed by the whole of the Western world, rose up against the tyranny of Popes and kings, establishing republics according to their own sovereign will.

Today, so we are told, Liberty reigns throughout the West and Western man enjoys a degree of personal, economic and religious freedom he could scarcely have imagined during the long Dark Age of the old order of altar and throne.

From a Catholic perspective, as seen in the admonitory and prophetic anti-liberal encyclicals of a string of Roman Pontiffs from Pius IX through St. Pius X, a radically different narrative emerges from the details of philosophical and revolutionary history: the philosophes of the “moderate” Enlightenment, following the path laid down by Hobbes and Locke, the cofounders of political liberalism, disseminated demagogic and lying propaganda against the Church and the monarchy.

Revolutionary cadres exploited popular grievances and engaged in political theater to incite a small segment of the populace, almost entirely in key urban centers (e.g., Boston and Paris), to rebel against local authority.

In the resulting power vacuums, self-appointed radical leaders declared themselves provisional governments in the name of “the people” and crushed all opposition by force. The provisional governments were replaced by “republican gov-

18

INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

ernments” created “in convention” by self-appointed “representatives” behind closed doors and then presented to the masses as a fait accompli.

Then followed a token “consent of the governed” by means of hastily arranged plebiscites in which only a tiny percentage of the population participated. Later attempts to resist or withdraw from these governments were declared treasonous and were prevented by massive bloodshed whenever necessary.

The new governments first “conceived in Liberty” in America and France almost immediately imposed far greater burdens on the people than the overthrown kings had ever done — just as the anti-Federalists had predicted in the aftermath of the Constitutional Convention.

The Age of Democratic Revolution was followed by the Age of Obedience to ever-more-powerful central governments.

Today, the political principles of the “moderate” Enlightenment embodied in the modern state system — first imposed in every case by the violence of revolutionary cadres — are now seen as a “conservative” inheritance opposed to the excesses of liberalism — including socialism.

These principles, inherited from the political philosophy of Hobbes and Locke, include the following: • A hypothetical “social compact” or contract as the foundation of the State • The origin of political sovereignty in the “consent” of the governed (invariably presumed to be given by those wielding power) • “Government by the people” according to the “sovereign-

Two British philosophers: Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) and John Locke (1632 -1704).

Two Roman Pontiffs: Leo XIII (pontificate 1878- 1903) and Benedict XVI (pontificate 2005-2013)

ty of the people,” meaning majority rule on all questions, even if contrary to the natural law • Church-State separation and the non-“interference” of religion in politics • The confinement of religion, above all Christianity, to the realm of “private” opinions and practices with no controlling effect on law or public policy • The unlimited pursuit of gain, including the freedom to buy, sell and advertise anything whatsoever deemed permissible by law • Total liberty of thought and action, both private and public, within the limits of a merely external “public peace” • The dissolubility of marriage, and thus the family, as a mere civil contract founded on a revocable consent The Roman Pontiffs understood that these principles in practice would mean not only the end of Christian civilization, but the end of human history itself in terminal apostasy.

Writing in 1878, Leo XIII condemned “the shamelessness of those who, full of treachery, make semblance of being champions of country, of freedom, and every kind of right; in fine, the deadly kind of plague which infects in its inmost recesses, allowing it no respite and foreboding ever fresh disturbances and final disaster.”

Even evangelical Protestants, echoing the warnings of the Roman Pontiffs, could see by the mid-nineteenth century that “final disaster” would be the outcome of the emergence of the secular state divorced from Christ and the law of the Gospel in the United States.

Thus, in 1872 a movement of mostly Presbyterian evangelicals called the National Reform Association proposed that the Preamble of the Constitution be amended to read as follows: We the People of the United States, [humbly acknowledging Almighty God as the source of all authority and power in civil government, the Lord Jesus Christ as the Ruler among the nations, his revealed will as the supreme law of the land, in order to constitute a Christian government,] and in order to form a more perfect union…

The 43rd Congress of the United States rejected the NRA’s “Christian Amendment” out of hand, with a House Judiciary Committee report declaring that “[T]he fathers of the Republic … in full realization of the dangers which the union between church and state had imposed upon so many nations of the Old World, [decided] with great unanimity that it was inexpedient to put anything into the Constitution or frame of government which might be construed to be a reference to any religious creed or doctrine.” Congress was deaf to the NRA’s entreaty that, given the utter exclusion of Christ and the Gospel from the nation’s organic law, it would not be long before “our whole political page becomes a pure, unbelieving, irreligious, Christless, Godless blank.”

Today, as even Francis Fukuyama admitted in his tribute to the triumph of political liberalism, which he viewed as the evolutionary pinnacle of human progress: “The liberal state growing out of the tradition of Hobbes and Locke engages in a protracted struggle with its own people.”

With the presidential election of 2024, the struggle between the liberal state in America and the residuum of Christianity in the populace subject to its immense power has reached a point of no return.

Theoretical physicists tell us every black hole has an “event horizon” — the point of no return for any object that reaches it. Political liberalism is a moral black hole which, as Election 2024 approaches, has drawn the United States very near to its event horizon — that “final disaster” of which Pope Leo and even the Protestants of the NRA warned.

Should Trump win the Presidency again, the nation’s acceleration toward the edge of the abyss would diminish for a time, just as it did after his election in 2016, only to resume with a vengeance in 2020.

But make no mistake: the mode of “conservatism” Trump represents is still subject to political liberalism’s moral entropy.

This is why the Democrats of only a lifetime ago would view today’s gay-friendly, abortion-in-some-cases “conservative” Republicans as radical liberals.

Our duty to mitigate harm to the common good counsels a prudential decision to delay as long as possible the nation’s traverse of liberalism’s event horizon.

But let us not delude ourselves by thinking that a vote in any election can reverse the irreversible course of a civilizational apostasy. That would require a miraculous metanoia no less dramatic than the reconversion of the West after the fall of Rome. Unless and until that happens, we must be realistic about the situation in which we find ourselves, so famously described by Alasdair MacIntrye: “[T]he barbarians are not waiting beyond our frontiers; they have already been governing us for quite some time.”

And, when we vote, we should bear in mind the prayer remarked by Pope Benedict XVI in his own dire assessment of political modernity during his Christmas greeting to the Roman Curia fourteen years ago: Excita, Domine, potentiam tuam, et veni ut salvos facias nos — “Stir up Your power, O Lord, and come, that You may save us.”

For as Pope Benedict observed on that occasion: “The very future of the world is at stake.”

* Christopher Ferrra, J.D., is President and Chief Counsel of the American Catholic Lawyers Association, and author of numerous articles and books on political philosophy, culture and the Fatima apparitions.m NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN

19

NEWS

Christian CoMMunity suffers as israeL-Lebanon ConfLiCt worsens Maronite Christians in Lebanon are Caught in the Crossfire between israeL and MusLiM hezboLLah forCes n BY CHRISTOPHER HART-MOYNIHAN

“

Here below, the August 4, 2020 Beirut port explosion, a tragedy from which Lebanon still has not recovered.

Bottom, leaders of Hezbollah (left) and Hamas (right) who have been killed by the IDF: (top left) Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr and (bottom left) Hassan Nasrallah, Supreme Leader of the Lebanese Shiites, (top right) Ismail Haniyeh, leader of Hamas, and (bottom right) Yahya Sinwar, the planner of the October 7 attack

T

here is a big danger all around, and we never know when will be the next strike.” That was how Georges Assaf, a long-time collaborator of Urbi et Orbi Communications and a leader within Lebanon’s Maronite Christian community, summed up Lebanon’s situation on a podcast October 3 about the current status of Christians amid the ongoing, intensifying war between Hezbollah and the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).

Following a summer during which many international observers thought a “wider war” involving Israel, Hezbollah, and Hezbollah’s ally and backer Iran might still be avoided, the events of recent weeks have answered such questions in the negative.

While Hezbollah had been engaged in cross-border missile strikes with the IDF since the beginning of the Israel-Gaza war on October 7, 2023, the Israeli killing of Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in a targeted strike on a Beirut high-rise July 30 was a sign that the crisis was sliding toward full-scale war, and subsequent events of September and October 2024 have marked a significant escalation — and a concomitant escalation in the suffering of Lebanon’s civilian population.

Two particular events in recent weeks bear mentioning. First: the

pager and walkie-talkie explosions of September 17 and 18, during which the IDF targeted Hezbollah communications devices.

The compromised devices had been acquired by Hezbollah through a shell company and used for several months before the mass detonations on the 17th and 18th, which killed more than 42 people and injured more than 3,500.

While the pager and walkie-talkie detonation was ostensibly targeting Hezbollah’s operations, the indiscriminate nature of the attack, including the increased probability of non-combatant casualties, drew intense criticism from Lebanon’s government. Lebanon’s health minister, Firas Abiad, claimed the scale of the attack and the casualties was “far greater” than that of the August, 2020 Beirut port explosion, itself a catastrophic blow from which Lebanon still has not recovered.

Horrific injuries, many of them to the eyes and face as a result of users

20 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

holding the devices near their heads just prior to the explosion, left thousands instantly — and permanently — disabled and overwhelmed Lebanon’s collapsing medical system.

While President of Israel Isaac Herzog denied Israeli involvement in the attack, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated, “If Hezbollah has not understood the message, I promise you, it will understand the message,” and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant subsequently announced that Israel would be pursuing a “new phase” of the ongoing conflict.

The second crucial event in the recent escalation was the killing of long-time Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, in a targeted airstrike on his southern Beirut compound on September 27, 2024.

The implications of Nasrallah’s death from the Israeli perspective were summarized by former Director General of the Israeli Foreign Ministry Alon Liel in an October 25 interview with news outlet Al Jazeera, where Liel stated, “a few weeks ago, when Nasrallah was killed, the feeling in Israel was that this is all over, they don’t have a leader, and all the assistants around him, all the commanders around him, were killed and Hezbollah will collapse, but as you [can] see, it didn’t happen. Fighting is still going on… Israel lost 10 soldiers in

the last 24 hours; so reality is hitting enced forgiveness. When I was five giveness and reconciliation, while us again, maybe, in the face, and I years old, someone came to our my country and my people suffer think that this euphoric mood after house and brutally murdered my and experience the consequences of Nasrallah’s and [Yahya] Sinwar’s parents. I have an aunt who is a nun wars, conflicts, violence, vengeance, killings is changing now to a more in the Lebanese Maronite order. She and hatred. We Lebanese always realistic mood, that the fighting will came to our house to take us four want to condemn hatred, vengeance, still go on for a while.” children — the eldest was six years and violence. We want to build Christians in Lebanon have large- old, the youngest two — and took us peace. We are capable of doing so. If ly been caught in the crossfire in the to her monastery. In the Pope Francis has chosen forlatest deadly flare-up of the decades- church, she invited us to giveness, for us and for me, it long conflict between Hezbollah kneel and pray — to pray to is a great message to give.” and Israel, Lebanon’s southern God for mercy, for love.

The reality of the ongoing neighbor. Hezbollah, a Shia hostilities, which since the beMuslim paramilitary organizaginning of September has extion backed financially and politpanded to become the most sigically by Iran, has made no secret nificant Israel-Hezbollah conof its intention to take the fight to flict since 2006, does not seem Israel and the IDF in the spirit of conducive to building peace. “permanent resistance” since its The towns and villages in founding in the early 1990s. southern Lebanon, now caught Because Hezbollah uses between entrenched Hezbollah southern Lebanon as its base of forces and an incipient Israeli operations and controls many ground invasion, are primarily branches of government and Shia, but there is a patchwork society within Lebanon as a of Maronite and Orthodox whole, acting in many ways as a Christian enclaves as well. In “state within a state,” the IDF July 7, 2018. The meeting for peace in the Middle East called late September, Fr. Gregory recently took the decision to by Pope Francis with the heads of the Churches and Christian Salloum of the Greek Orthocommunities. Above, Bishop Mounir Khairallah, invade southern Lebanon, an dox Patriarchate of Antioch the Maronite Catholic Bishop of Batrun operation that is now resulting in was hospitalized after sufferthe displacement of Christian fami- She told us: ‘Let us not pray so much ing serious injuries in an Israeli lies and communities in the area that for your parents; they are martyrs airstrike on Ibl al-Saqi, Lebanon. are not affiliated with Hezbollah. before God. Let us instead pray for Other leaders within the Christian Similarly, the IDF bombardment those who killed them and seek to community, like Fr. Najib al-Amil, of Beirut and surrounding areas has forgive throughout your lives. Thus are working tirelessly to ensure that negatively impacted the civilian you will be the children of your the Christian villages are not used as population there, many of whom are Father, who is in Heaven.’” staging grounds for Hezbollah’s Christians.

Khairallah also noted that the cur- attacks. In a September interview Many conversations on the side- rent war in Lebanon is “not entirely with The Guardian, Fr. al-Amil statlines of the recent Synod in Rome a war of confession or religion. It is ed, “We don’t know what will haptouched on the catastrophic situation a war that has been imposed on us.” pen. We are isolated, tired and the Christian community, and Leb- He continued, “Lebanon is a mes- scared.” anon as a whole, is currently under- sage of peace and should remain a On September 29, when asked to going. Bishop Mounir Khairallah message of peace. It is the only comment on the killing of Nasrallah (photo), the Maronite Catholic Bish- country in the Middle East where while en route from Belgium to op of Batrun, spoke eloquently at the Christians, Muslims, and Jews can Rome, Pope Francis called for a Synod press briefing on October 5, live together, respecting their diver- return to rules that, even in the midst sharing his own personal story of sities, in a nation that is a ‘model of the general immorality of war, loss and hardship. nation,’ as Pope Benedict XVI said. “indicate some morality.”

Bishop Khairallah’s story is re- Coming here, in this situation, to “When there is something dispromarkable. Growing up during the speak at the Synod might seem portionate, there is a dominating tenperiod of Lebanon’s Civil War, from strange. Speaking also about for- dency that goes beyond morality,” 1975 to 1990, he lost several mem- giveness, which Pope Francis has Francis said. “A country that does bers of his family to the violence. In taken as a sign for this Second Ses- these things — and I’m talking about his statement at the press briefing, he sion, would be even more complex. any country — in a superlative way, noted, “I have personally experi- Yes, I come here to speak about for- these are immoral actions.”m NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN 21

NEWS

“heart sPeaks to heart” PoPe Francis on october 24 Published his 4th encyclical, Dilexit nos (“he loved us”), on the sacred heart oF Jesus and its imPortance in the christian liFe n BY ALESSANDRO DI BUSSOLO (VATICAN NEWS)

D

ilexit nos, Pope Francis’ fourth Encyclical, published October 24, retraces the tradition and relevance of thought on “the human and divine love of the heart of Jesus Christ,” calling for a renewal of authentic devotion to avoid forgetting the tenderness of faith, the joy of serving, and the fervor of mission “‘He loved us,’ St. Paul says of Christ (cf. Rom 8:37), in order to make us realize that nothing can ever ‘separate us’ from that love (Rom 8:39)”: Thus begins Pope Francis’ fourth Encyclical, released October 24, 2024, which takes its title from the opening words, Dilexit nos.

The Encyclical is dedicated to the human and divine love of the Heart of Jesus Christ: “His open heart has gone before us and waits for us, unconditionally, asking only to offer us His love and friendship,” the Pope writes in the introductory paragraph. “For ‘He loved us first’ (cf. 1 Jn 4:10).

Because of Jesus, ‘we have come to know and believe in the love that God has for us’ (1 Jn 4:16).”

LOVE OF CHRIST REPRESENTED IN HIS SACRED HEART In our societies, the Pope writes, “we are also seeing a proliferation of varied forms of religiosity that have nothing to do with a personal relationship with the God of love” (87), while Christianity often forgets “the tender consolations of faith, the joy of serving others, the fervor of per-

home,” noting the relationship between Dilexit nos and his social Encyclicals Laudato si’ and Fratelli tutti (217).

And “in the presence of the Heart of Christ,” he asks the Lord “to have mercy on this suffering world” and pour upon it “the treasures of His light and love, so that our world, which presses forward despite wars, socioeconomic disparities, and uses of technology that threaten our humanity, may regain the most important and necessary thing of all: the heart” (31).

IMPORTANCE OF RETURNING TO THE HEART

sonal commitment to mission” (88).

In response, Pope Francis proposes a new reflection on the love of Christ represented in His Holy Heart. He calls for a renewal of “authentic devotion” (163) to the Sacred Heart, recalling that in the Heart of Christ “we find the whole Gospel” (89). It is in His Heart that “we truly come at last to know ourselves and we learn to love” (30).

THE WORLD SEEMS TO HAVE LOST ITS HEART

Pope Francis explains that by encountering the love of Christ, “we become capable of forging bonds of fraternity, of recognizing the dignity of each human being, and of working together to care for our common

22 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

Opening with a brief introduction and divided into five chapters, the Encyclical on the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus incorporates, as announced in June, “the precious reflections of previous Magisterial texts and a long history that goes back to the Sacred Scriptures, in order to re-propose today, to the whole Church, this devotion imbued with spiritual beauty.”

The first chapter, “The Importance of the Heart,” explains why it is necessary to “return to the heart” in a world where we are tempted to become “insatiable consumers and slaves to the mechanisms of the market” (2). It analyzes what we mean by “heart”: the Bible speaks of it as a core “that lies hidden beneath all outward appearances” (4), a place where what is shown on the outside or hidden doesn’t matter;

Christus Consolator by Ary Scheffer

there, we are truly ourselves (6). The heart leads to questions that matter: what meaning do I want for my life, my choices, or my actions?

Who am I before God (8)?

For Pope Francis, it is important to recognize that “I am my heart, for my heart is what sets me apart, shapes my spiritual identity and puts me in communion with other people” (14).

“THE WORLD CAN CHANGE BEGINNING FROM THE HEART”

It is the heart that unites the fragments and “makes all authentic bonding possible, since a relationship not shaped by the heart is incapable of overcoming the fragmentation caused by individualism” (17).

The spirituality of saints like Ignatius of Loyola (accepting the Lord’s friendship is a matter of the heart) and St. John Henry Newman (the Lord saves us by speaking to our heart from His Sacred Heart) teaches us, writes Pope Francis, that “before the Heart of Jesus, living and present, our mind, enlightened by the Spirit, grows in the understanding of His words” (27). This has social consequences, as “the world can change beginning with the heart” (28).

“ACTIONS AND WORDS OF LOVE” The second chapter is dedicated to the actions and words of love of Christ. The acts by which He treats us as friends and shows that God “is closeness, compassion, and tender love” are evident in His encounters with the Samaritan woman, Nicodemus, the prostitute, the adulterous woman, and the blind man on the road (35).

His gaze, which “plumbs the depths of your heart” (39), shows “how attentive Jesus was to individuals and above all to their problems and needs” (40), in such a way “as to admire the good things He recognizes in us” — as He recognized the good in the centurion — even if others ignore them (41).

His most eloquent word of love is “being nailed to the Cross,” after having wept for His friend Lazarus and suffered in the Garden of Gethsemane, aware of His violent death “at the hands of those whom He had loved so greatly” (45, 46).

THE MYSTERY OF A HEART THAT LOVED SO MUCH

In the third chapter, “This is the heart that has loved so greatly,” the Pope recalls how the Church reflects and has reflected on “the holy mystery of the Lord’s Sacred Heart.” He refers to Pius XII’s Encyclical Haurietis aquas, on the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus (1956). He clarifies that “devotion to the Heart of Christ is not the veneration of a single organ apart from the Person of

Jesus,” because we adore “the whole Jesus Christ, the Son of God made man, represented by an image that accentuates His heart” (48).

The image of the heart of flesh helps us contemplate that the love of the Heart of Jesus Christ not only understands divine charity but also extends to human affection (61). His Heart, Pope Francis continues, quoting Pope Benedict XVI, contains a “threefold love”: the sensitive love of His physical heart and His twofold spiritual love, both human and divine, in which we find “the infinite in the finite” (67).

THE EXPERIENCE OF “A LOVE THAT GIVES ITSELF AS DRINK” In the last two chapters, Pope Francis highlights two aspects that devotion to the Sacred Heart should unite to “to nourish us and bring us closer to the Gospel”: personal spiritual experience, and community and missionary commitment.

In the fourth chapter, “A love that gives itself as drink,” he revisits the Scriptures, and with the early Christians, recognizes Christ and His pierced side in “the one whom they have pierced,” a prophecy from the book of Zechariah in which God refers to Himself as an open fountain for the people, to quench their thirst for God’s love, “to cleanse them from sin and impurity” (95).

Various Church Fathers have mentioned “the wounded side of Jesus as the source of the water of the Holy Spirit” — especially St. Augustine, who “opened the way to devotion to the Sacred Heart as the locus of our personal encounter with the Lord” (103). Gradually, this

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ExcErpts from popE francis’ octobEr 24 Encyclical Dilexit Nos The heart’s love is a “raging fire” Saint Bonaventure tells us that in the end we should not pray for light, but for “raging fire.” He teaches that, “faith is in the intellect, in such a way as to provoke affection. In this sense, for example, the knowledge that Christ died for us does not remain knowledge, but necessarily becomes affection, love.” Along the same lines, Saint John Henry Newman took as his motto the phrase Cor ad cor loquitur, since, beyond all our thoughts and ideas, the Lord saves us by speaking to our hearts from his Sacred Heart. This realization led him, the distinguished intellectual, to recognize that his deepest encounter with himself and with the Lord came not from his reading or reflection, but from his prayerful dialogue, heart to heart, with Christ, alive and present. It was in the Eucharist that Newman encountered the living heart of Jesus, capable of setting us free, giving meaning to each moment of our lives, and bestowing true peace: “O most Sacred, most loving Heart of Jesus, Thou art concealed in the Holy Eucharist, and Thou beatest for us still… I worship Thee then with all my best love and awe, with my fervent affection, with my most subdued, most resolved will. O my God, when Thou dost condescend to suffer me to receive Thee, to eat and drink Thee, and Thou for a while takest up Thy abode within me, O make my heart beat with Thy Heart. Purify it of all that is earthly, all that is proud and sensual, all that

is hard and cruel, of all perversity, of all disorder, of all deadness. So fill it with Thee, that neither the events of the day nor the circumstances of the time may have power to ruffle it, but that in Thy love and Thy fear it may have peace.”

(Dilexit nos, Chapter 1, Paragraph 26) Actions and Words of Love Jesus’ words show that his holiness did not exclude deep emotions. On various occasions, he demonstrated a love that was both passionate and compassionate. He could be deeply moved and grieved, even to the point of shedding tears. It is clear that Jesus was not indifferent to the daily cares and concerns of people, such as their weariness or hunger: “I have compassion for this crowd... they have nothing to eat... they will faint on the way, and some of them have come from a great distance” (Mk 8:2-3). (Dilexit nos, Chapter 2, Paragraph 44) “The whole Jesus Christ” Devotion to the heart of Christ is not the veneration of a single organ apart from the Person of Jesus. What we contemplate and adore is the whole Jesus Christ, the Son of God made man, represented by an image that accentuates his heart. That heart of flesh is seen as the privileged sign of the inmost being of the incarnate Son and his love, both divine and human.

More than any other part of his body,

wounded side, recalls the Pope, “began to be associated with His Heart” (109) and he lists several holy women who “in recounting their experiences of encounter with Christ, have spoken of resting in the heart of the Lord as the source of life and interior peace” (110).

Among the modern devotees, the encyclical first mentions St. Francis de Sales, who presents his spiritual proposal with “a single heart pierced by two arrows” (118).

APPARITIONS TO ST. MARGARET MARY ALACOQUE Under the influence of this spirituality, St. Margaret Mary Alacoque recounted the apparitions of Jesus at Paray-le-Monial, between the end of December 1673 and June

DEVOTION TO HEART OF CHRIST SENDS US TO THE BRETHREN

1675. The core of the message conveyed to us can be summed up in the words heard by St. Margaret: “This is the heart that so loved human beings that it has spared nothing, even to emptying and consuming itself in order to show them its love,” St. Margaret heard (121).

24 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

The 5th and final chapter of the Encyclical, “Love for Love,” develops the communitarian, social, and missionary dimension of any authentic devotion to the Heart of Christ, which, as it “leads us to the Father,” also “sends us forth to our brothers and sisters” (163). Indeed, love for one’s brothers and sisters is the greatest gesture we can offer Him “to return love for love” (166).

Looking at the history of spirituality, the Pope recalls that St. Charles de Foucauld’s missionary commitment (photo opposite) made him a “universal brother”: “Allowing himself to be shaped by the heart of Christ, he sought to shelter the

the heart of Jesus is ‘the natural sign and symbol of his boundless love.’” (Ch. 3, Para. 48) The Little Flower In one of her poems, [St.] Thérèse [of Lisieux] voiced the meaning of her devotion, which had to do more with friendship and assurance than with trust in her sacrifices: “I need a heart burning with tenderness, Who will be my support forever, Who loves everything in me, even my weakness…

And who never leaves me day or night…

I must have a God who takes on my nature, And becomes my brother and is able to suffer! …

Ah! I know well, all our righteousness Is worthless in your sight…

So I, for my purgatory, Choose your burning love, O heart of my God!” (Ch. 4, Para. 135) St. Thérèse: “It is confidence and nothing but confidence…”

To Sister Marie, who praised her generous love of God, prepared even to embrace martyrdom, Thérèse responded at length in a letter that is one of the great milestones in the history of spirituality. This page ought to be read a thousand times over for its whole of suffering humanity in his fraternal heart” (179).

Pope Francis then speaks of “reparation”: as St. John Paul II explained, “by entrusting ourselves together to the heart of Christ, ‘over the ruins accumulated by hatred and violence, the greatly desired civilization of love, the Kingdom of the heart of Christ, can be built’” (182).

THE MISSION TO MAKE THE WORLD FALL IN LOVE

The Encyclical recalls again with St. John Paul II that “Consecration to the heart of Christ is thus ‘to be seen in relation to the Church’s missionary activity, since it responds to the desire of

depth, clarity and beauty. There, Thérèse helps her sister, “Marie of the Sacred Heart,” to avoid focusing this devotion on suffering, since some had presented reparation primarily in terms of accumulating sacrifices and good works. Thérèse, for her part, presents confidence as the greatest and best offering, pleasing to the heart of Christ: “My desires of martyrdom are nothing; they are not what give me the unlimited confidence that I feel in my heart. They are, to tell the truth, the spiritual riches that render one unjust, when one rests in them with complacency and one believes that they are something great… what pleases [Jesus] is that he sees me loving my littleness and my poverty, the blind hope that I have in his mercy… That is my only treasure… If you want to feel joy, to have an attraction for suffering, it is your consolation that you are seeking… Understand that to be his victim of love, the weaker one is, without desires or virtues, the more suited one is for the workings of this consuming and transforming Love… Oh! How I would like to be able to make you understand what I feel! ... It is confidence and nothing but confidence that must lead us to Love” (Ch. 4, Para. 138).n

Jesus’ heart to spread throughout the world, through the members of His Body, His complete commitment to the Kingdom.’ As a result, ‘through the witness of Christians, love will be poured into human hearts, to build up the body of Christ, which is the Church, and to build a society of justice, peace and fraternity’” (206).

PRAYER OF POPE FRANCIS The text concludes with this prayer of Pope Francis: “I ask our Lord Jesus Christ to grant that His Sacred Heart may continue to pour forth the streams of living water that can heal the hurt we have caused, strengthen our ability to love and serve others, and inspire us to journey together towards a just, solidary and fraternal world.

“Until that day, when we will rejoice in celebrating together the banquet of the heavenly kingdom in the presence of the risen Lord, who harmonizes all our differences in the light that radiates perpetually from his open heart. May He be blessed forever” (220).m

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PoPe Francis creates 21 new cardinals (Photo Grzegorz Galazka)

n BY CHRISTINA DEARDURFF

NORTH AMERICA, AGAIN, IS LARGELY SNUBBED IN FAVOR OF THE SECOND AND THIRD WORLDS

P

ope Francis has once again named a group of 21 new cardinals from around the world, to be installed at a December 8 consistory, bringing the number of cardinal-electors in the College of Cardinals to 142 — far exceeding the limit of 120 set by Pope Paul VI in the 1970s.

And once again, Francis remains true to his desire to include the “Church of the peripheries” by choosing men from the second and third worlds in larger proportion than those from the first world. Representation from North America, especially, is absent from the list, with a lone exception: the 53year-old Archbishop of Toronto, Canada, Francis Leo. Europe is represented by a Serb, a Lithuanian, an Englishman and five Italians.

The Serb is Archbishop László Nemet, SVD, metropolitan archbishop of Belgrade; the Lithuanian is Archbishop Rolandas Makrickas, currently coadjutor archpriest of the Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome.

The Englishman is the former Master of the worldwide Order of Preachers — the Dominicans — Father Timothy Radcliffe. Recently, Pope Francis tapped Fr. Radcliffe as retreat master for the preparatory retreats, in 2023 and 2024, for the two sessions of the Synod on Synodality.

Of the five Italians, three of them are diocesan bishops — Archbishop Roberto Repole of Turin, Bishop Baldassare Reina, vicar of the Rome diocese, and Archbishop Domenico Battaglia of Naples — and two work or did work for the Vatican — Father Fabio Baggio, CS, a current undersecretary of the Dicastery for Human Development, and Archbishop Angelo Acerbi, a retired apostolic nuncio with several foreign postings in his history. (Unusually, Naples’ Archbishop Battaglia is an 11th-hour replacement 26

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Baldassare Reina

Eoberto Repole

Fabio Baggio Timothy Radcliffe

Angelo Acerbi

Francis Leo

Domenico Battaglia

CANADA LITHUANIA

ENGLAND

Jaime Spengler

Jean-Paul Vesco

ITALY

Rolandas Makrickas

JAPAN

SERBIA IRAN

Luis Gerardo Cabrera Herrera

ALGERIA

László Német Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi

INDIA PHILIPPINES

IVORY COAST ECUADOR

BRAZIL

PERU

Carlos Castillo Mattasoglio AUSTRALIA

Vicente Bokalic Iglic

Ignace Bessi Dogbo

Pablo Virgilio David

ARGENTINA

Fernando Natalio Chomali Garib CHILE

George Jacob Koovakad

for Indonesian Bishop Paskalis Bruno Syukur, OFM, a former Franciscan provincial and a leader in the Indonesian Bishops’ Conference, who declined the Pope’s appointment as cardinal in late October. Bishop Syukur pled that he wished to instead “continue to grow in priestly life and in service to the Church and the People of God.” The Indonesian press also notes his reportedly poor handling of a sexual abuse case in his Diocese of Bogor.)

Another European, but one whose work is in Australia, is Ukrainian-born Bishop Mykola Bycok, CSsR, who heads the Ukrainian Catholic Eparchy, centered in Melbourne but covering Australia, New Zealand and Oceania.

Another significant chunk of the new cardinals — five — come from the Pope’s home continent of South America. They are the archbishop of Santiago del Estero, Argentina, Vicente Bokalic Iglic; the archbishop of Porto Alegre, Brazil, Jaime Spengler; the archbishop of Santiago, Chile, Fernando Natalio Chomali Garib; the archbishop of Guayaquil, Ecuador, Luis Gerardo Cabrera Herrera; and the archbishop of Lima, Peru, Carlos Gustavo Castillo Mattasoglio. (As an aside, we note that the Pope’s home country of Argentina, with the latest appointments, now has eight cardinals — a higher proportion relative to population than most countries.)

Asia, where the Catholic Church has seen a steady growth rate of around 1.8%

Church politics (Francis chose Fr. Timothy Radcliffe, one of the current Synod’s public faces, to emphasize his commitment to synodality despite criticism from more traditional quarters in the Church).

Another point of comment has been the fact that 11 of the 21 new cardinals, so more than half, are members of religious orders.

That means that these men have not been primarily formed in the context of a local diocese, but rather in religious orders which by their nature transcend physical borders and have a more collegial style of governance.

In other words, they may tend to have a more “global” perspective, which may dovetail better with Francis’ vision of a “synodal” Church having a more “horizontal,” rather than vertical, structure and leadership culture.

Certainly, the face of what we once called “Christendom” is changing rapidly.

The nations that were once the pillars holding up the Catholic Church are now facing demographic winter, internal strife, loss of identity and, most tragic of all, loss of faith.

In fact, it has been repeatedly pointed out that the very “peripheries” of the Church are changing; the historical “center” of Catholicism is in Europe, but the vitality — and the numbers — of the body of the Church are increasingly located elsewhere.

Soon Europe itself will be the new “peripheries.”m Mykola Bycok

Dominique Mathieu

per year, now has two new cardinals: Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi, the archbishop of Tokyo, and Pablo Virgilio Sinogco David, the bishop of Kalookan, Philippines.

Also from Asia, but working as a Vatican Curial official, is Monsignor George Jacob Koovakad, official of the Secretariat of State and organizer of papal trips.

And the new cardinal who shepherds the tiny Catholic Church in Iran, also in Asia, is Archbishop Dominique Joseph Mathieu, OFM Conv, a Belgian missionary bishop of the Tehran-Ispahan diocese, which was first established in Ispahan in 1629.

The continent of Africa, which has shown the Church’s largest growth (approximately 2.1% per year) has two new cardinals: the archbishop of Abidjan, Ivory Coast, Ignace Bessi Dogbo, and the bishop of Algiers, Algeria, Jean-Paul Vesco.

Analyzing their significance Pundits began to analyze the significance of the Pope’s new appointments the moment they were announced.

The theories ranged from world politics (anti-war Francis, it was argued, chose the Ukrainian Eparchy head in Australia for the red hat rather than Ukraine’s Primate, Sviatoslav Shevchuk, a supporter of Ukraine’s prosecution of the war with Russia) to

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SERBIA

Archbishop Francis Leo, 53, was born in Montreal to Italian immigrant parents. He earned both a licentiate and a doctorate in theology at the International Marian Research Institute, and was ordained a priest in Montreal in 1996. After training for the Vatican diplomatic corps in Rome, he was posted to the apostolic nunciature in Australia (2008-11) and then to the Holy See Study Mission in Hong Kong (2011-12).

In 2012 he returned to Montreal to become director at the Major Seminary. In 2022, Pope Francis appointed him auxiliary bishop of Montreal, and in 2023, as Metropolitan Archbishop of Toronto.

In a 2023 interview with America magazine’s Gerald O’Connor, Archbishop Leo explained that he founded the Canadian Mariological Society after he returned to Montreal from overseas posts in 2012 because “I find there’s a great need to get to know the Mother of Christ, for our own personal journey of faith and for the good of the church.”

He is a member of the third order of the Dominicans, founded by the saint who first received the rosary from Our Lady. And in true Dominican spirit, he says he also likes “Thomas Aquinas and his reasonableness.”

“Faith and reason, they are not enemies, they work together,” he said.

lászló (ladislav) német Archbishop of belgrAde Another priest of the Divine Word Missionaries, Archbishop László Német, was born in Odžaci, in then-Yugoslavia, now Serbia, and completed his theological studies in Poland. He was ordained a priest there in 1983.

After missionary work in the Philippines, he moved to Austria and held parish and teaching positions as well as collaborating 28

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Rolandas makRickas Archbishop Archbishop Rolandas Makrickas, 52, was born in Biržai, Lithuania, the youngest of five children. Because of Soviet restriction of religion, his early religious education was private and undertaken in a hostile environment. The end of the Soviet era, in 1990, allowed him to pursue his faith more freely, and though he briefly considered a career in aviation, he entered the Kauna Priest Seminary in 1990, only its second year of operation.

After studies in Rome, he was ordained in 1996, and became undersecretary of the Lithuanian Bishops’ Conference.

Subsequent to training in the Vatican diplomatic service from 2003-06, he was sent to several countries around the globe, including a stint in the U.S. that included the 2013 papal visit. In 2019, he joined the Section for General Affairs of the Secretariat of State in Rome as head of administration, the first non-Italian to hold that position.

In 2021, Pope Francis appointed him extraordinary commissioner to manage the assets of the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore (St. Mary Major), making him an archbishop two years later. “It is first of all a shrine,” he says of the basilica, “and the first Marian shrine in Europe.”

On March 20, 2024, Pope Francis named him coadjutor archpriest of Santa Maria Maggiore.

timothy Radcliffe friAr, order of friArs preAchers Fr. Timothy Radcliffe, OP, 79, was born in London. He was educated at Oxford, entered the Dominican order in 1965 and was ordained in 1971. During the 1970s and 1980s, he taught scriptures at Oxford and was elected provincial of England in 1988.

In 1992, he was elected master of the Dominican Order, holding that office until 2001.

After his retirement from heading the worldwide Dominican order, Fr. Radcliffe led the Las Casas Institute, dealing with governance and social justice, at Blackfriars, Oxford. He now preaches internationally.

Some of his views on theology and ethics, especially on topics of sexuality, are criticized by traditionalists as departing from Catholic morality.

Somewhat controversially, Pope Francis tapped Fr. Radcliffe to lead the preparatory retreats before both the 2023 and 2024 sessions of the Synod on Synodality.

In one of his 2023 reflections, he spoke about the concept of “home,” telling the Synod Fathers, “For others, the present Church does not seem to be a safe home. It is experienced as exclusive, marginalizing many people: women, the divorced and remarried. For some it is too Western, too Eurocentric. The IL [Instrumentum Laboris] mentions also gay people and people in polygamous marriages. They long for a renewed Church in which they will feel fully at home, recognized, affirmed and safe.”

ITALY

Archbishop of ToronTo

LITHUANIA

CANADA

fRancis leo

with the Holy See’s Mission to the UN in Vienna. Subsequently, he was named provincial of the Hungarian Province of his order, then Secretary-General of the Hungarian Bishops’ Conference.

In 2008, Pope Benedict XVI named him Bishop of Zrenjanin. In 2022, Pope Francis made him Archbishop of Belgrade.

Archbishop Német has been the President of the International Episcopal Conference of Saints Cyril and Methodius, which comprises Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia, since 2016. It is a difficult job: in Kosovo, 96% are Muslim. In Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia, the vast majority are Orthodox, and the Catholic Church is poor in these nations. “Only in Serbia,” said the Archbishop of Belgrade, “do we even have the right to teach religion in schools.”

ENGLAND

neW cArdinAls

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RobeRto Repole Archbishop of Turin Archbishop Roberto Repole, 57, was born in Turin, Italy; his father was a municipal government official. He was educated in Turin and received his doctorate in theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. He was ordained in 1992. After parish work and then teaching theology at the uni-

September 30, 2023, St. Peter's Square. Ordinary Public Consistory for the creation of new Cardinals (Photo Grzegorz Galazka)

ITALY

baldassare reina biShop, vicar oF the roMe dioceSe Bishop Baldassare Reina, 53, known as “Baldo,” was born in San Giovanni Gemini, in the province of Agrigento, in Italy. He was educated in Agrigento and at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, earning a doctorate in theology. He was ordained in 1995.

From 1998 to 2001, he was a diocesan assistant of Catholic Action and a parish priest, later becoming a professor and then rector at the major seminary, and taking on progressively larger roles in diocesan administration.

ment, and not of impoverishment, for us.

Thus, instead of creating the fear of an invasion, which one hears many speak about, the facts should make us want to encounter them.

“If it was truly my brother or sister, would I close the door?”

ITALY

In 2022, Pope Francis made him a member of the Dicastery for the Clergy.

In January 2023, Reina was appointed vice-regent of the Diocese of Rome — the Pope’s diocese — and on October 6 of this year, when Francis announced the creation of new cardinals, he simultaneously announced the appointment of Bishop Reina as Vicar General for the Diocese of Rome.

In an October 7 letter to Catholics in Rome, Reina wrote that Pope Francis’ “dedication to the universal Church and the prophecy he has given us in these years of pontificate urge me to work for a transparent and poor Church, capable of releasing and spreading the fragrance of the Gospel.”

angelo acerbi archbiShop ITALY

versity level in Turin, he became president of the Italian Theological Association.

In 2022, Pope Francis appointed Fr. Repole both archbishop of Turin and bishop of Susa — a surprise, as he was not then a bishop and his name had not been mentioned in press speculations.

Some commentators have called Archbishop Repole a “Boarinian,” that is, a member of a group of theologically and politically liberal clerics influenced by Sergio Boarino, rector of the Turin seminary in the 1980s and 1990s.

In an article on the appointment of Fr. Repole to the see of Turin, Italian magazine La Rupubblica said that Repole “has expressed his own hope for greater synodality, a recurring theme in Francis’ teaching… ‘Already in the ancient Church,’ he recently wrote, ‘different models of ministry coexisted that seem to go well with a perspective of better synodality, which allows us to think of the bishop as a principle of unity with and in his priests, rather than outside of it.’”

Fabio baggio Friar, Scalabrian MiSSionarieS Fr. Fabio Baggio, CS, 59, was born in Bassano del Grappa in the Italian province of Vicenza. He joined the Scalabrian Missionaries in 1986 and took his perpetual vows in 1991. He was ordained in 1992.

Since the 1990s, Fr. Baggio has been active in various diocesan and university capacities dealing with migration, and in 2013 became dean of the Scalabrini International Migration Institute within the Faculty of Theology of the Pontifical Urbaniana University.

A member of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development since 2017, he was named one of three members of the Vatican’s COVID-19 commission in 2021.

In 2019 he described his section’s message: “So many people who arrive from outside, from cultures different from our own, from expressions of Christian or Catholic life different from ours, are a source of enrich-

Archbishop Angelo Acerbi, at 99 the only cardinal-elect ineligible to vote in the next conclave, was born in 1925 in Sesta Godano, in the Italian region of Liguria. After earning a degree in canon law and a licensure in theology, he was trained for and entered the Vatican’s diplomatic service.

He worked as nuncio in Columbia, Brazil, Japan, France, New Zealand, and Fiji, and was made Bishop of Zella, Tunisia, as well.

In 1978 Pope John Paul II appointed him nuncio to Colombia, where the next year he was taken hostage, along with more than 50 diplomats and others, by communist guerillas. He was one of the last released in Havana two months later. Acerbi was allowed to celebrate Mass daily in captivity.

In 1990, he was appointed the first apostolic nuncio to Hungary to be named after the establishment of Communism in that country. During his diplomatic assignment there, the Holy See concluded an agreement with the Republic of Hungary on religious assistance to the Armed Forces and prepared another relating to the financing of public and other purely religious activities carried out by the Catholic Church, in particular the financing of educational activities.

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bishop, ukrAiniAn cAtholic epArchy

ARGENTINA

Bishop Mykola Bychok was born in 1980 in Ternopil, Ukraine. In 1997, he entered the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer (Redemptorists). After religious, philosophical, and theological formation in Ukraine and Poland, he obtained a master and then a licensure in pastoral theology. He made his perpetual vows and was ordained priest in 2005.

He was a parish priest in Prokopievsk, Russia, and a superior and parish priest in Ivano-Frankivsk, Ukraine. From 2015 to 2020, he worked at St. John the Baptist parish in Newark, New Jersey, USA. He was then elected Ordinary of the Ukrainian Catholic Eparchy of Saints Peter and Paul in Melbourne, which was established in 1982 and covers Australia, New Zealand and Oceania.

Bishop Bycok sees his appointment as cardinal in terms of both Australia and the world, telling reporters it is “a great responsibility to the Catholic Church in Australia, where faith is gradually being lost and secularization is spreading.”

“This appointment gives me responsibility for the life and future of our entire Church,” he also noted. “Knowing what difficult times our Ukrainian people are going through because of the war, I will continue to inform the Catholic world about what is happening on our land...”

ViCente bokaliC igliC Archbishop of sAntiAgo del estero Archbishop Vicente Bokalic Iglic, CM, 72, was born in Lanús, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina, in 1952. He entered the Congregation of the Mission (Vincentians or Lazarists) in 1970. He studied philosophy at Jesuit Maximo College in San Miguel and theology at the Seminary of 30

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Fernando natalio CHomali garib Archbishop of sAntiAgo Fernando Natalio Chomali Garib, 67, was born in Santiago de Chile, one of five children; he has described himself as “a descendant of a Palestinian.” After earning a degree in civil engineering from the Pontifical University in Santiago, he entered the seminary and was ordained a priest in 1991.

Garib has a licentiate in moral theology, a doctorate in theology and a master’s degree in bioethics from the John Paul II Pontifical Theological Institute for Marriage and Family Sciences. A professor of both theology and bioethics in Santiago, Pope Benedict made him auxiliary bishop of Santiago, then archbishop of Concepción.

In 2014, Pope Francis named him as apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Osorno, during which assignment he met with Pope Francis to dissuade him, unsuccessfully, from appointing Juan Barros as Osorno’s new bishop. Chomalí Garib was a friend of Juan Carlos Cruz, who charged Barros with failure to protect him from sexual abuse.

In a 2018 pastoral letter he wrote that due to the abuse crisis, the Church had lost its reputation as “a voice for the voiceless.”

He decried clericalism and proposed a separate office to handle abuse cases, with new rules for transparency. Pope Francis appointed him Archbishop in 2023.

BRAZIL

Jaime Spengler Archbishop of porto Alegre Jaime Spengler, OFM, 64, was born on September 6, 1960, in the city of Gaspar, Brazil. He later joined the Order of Friars Minor and was ordained a Catholic priest.

He has a doctorate in philosophy from the Pontifical University Antonianum in Rome.

On November 10, 2010, he was appointed by Pope Benedict XVI as auxiliary of the Archdiocese of Porto Alegre, then named archbishop there by Pope Francis in 2013.

In 2023, he was elected President of the Episcopal Conference of Brazil (CNBB) for the 2023–2027 term.

At an October 8 briefing on the Synod on Synodality, the archbishop said that his archdiocese is “investing in permanent deacons: Maybe in the future these married men could also be ordained as priests for a specific community.”

“I don’t know if it could be the best solution to the shortage of priests, but…. we can and must face the issue with courage, keeping in mind theology but also grasping the signs of the times.”

Spengler has also supported an Amazonian rite of the Mass, something that has been under study since the 2019 Amazon Synod.

ECUADOR

mykola byCok

Buenos Aires. He took his final vows in 1976, and was ordained in 1978.

He worked in various capacities for the Archdiocese of Buenos Aires and at the Shrine of Our Lady of the Miraculous medal there, as well as holding posts in his order.

He was a missionary in the Territorial Prelature of Deán Funes from 1994 to 1997 and then superior of his order’s seminary in San Miguel from 1997 to 2000.

In 2003, he was made provincial superior of the Vincentians. Pope Benedict XVI appointed him auxiliary bishop of Buenos Aires in 2012, and Iglic received his episcopal consecration from then-archbishop of Buenos Aires, Jorge Mario Bergoglio.

In 2013, Pope Francis appointed him bishop of Santiago del Estero, which he elevated in 2024 to the rank of archdiocese, making Iglic its first archbishop, while also giving him the title “Primate of Argentina.”

CHILE

AUSTRALIA

SPECIAL neW cArdinAls

luiS gerardo Cabrera Herrera Archbishop of guAyAquil Archbishop Luis Gerardo Cabrera Herrera, OFM, 69, was born in the Ecuadorian city of Azogues.

He earned a bachelor’s degree and a doctorate in Philosophy from the Pontifical Antonianum University. In 1975, he entered the novitiate of the Order of Friars Minor in Quito, and made his solemn profession in 1982. His priestly ordination was in 1983.

He held various leadership positions in the

Archbishop of LimA Archbishop Carlos Castillo Mattasoglio, 74, was born in Lima, Peru. He earned a bachelor’s degree in social sciences from the University of San Marcos. At San Marcos, he joined the National Union of Catholic Students, led by Father Gustavo Gutiérrez, one of the principal voices in the Liberation Theology movement.

At the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome he earned bachelor’s degrees in philosophy and theology.

He was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Lima in 1984.

He obtained a licentiate in 1985 and a doctorate in dogmatic theology in 1987 at the Gregorian University.

He returned to Peru and began teaching, but he was suspended by Cardinal Cipriani Thorne in 2013 amid allegations of heterodoxy and “attacks on the ecclesiastical hierarchy.” He was given a pastoral assignment but refused it and continued teaching at the university.

Pope Francis named him to succeed Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne — the archbishop who once suspended him — as Archbishop of Lima in 2019. Cardinal Pedro Barreto said Castillo’s appointment “brings the Peruvian conference of bishops much closer to the reality of the church of which we all dream, a church that is poor and for the poor, a church that reaches out, a church that is closer to those who are suffering now.”

ITALY

bishop of nApLes Archbishop Domenico Battaglia, 61, nicknamed “Mimmo,” was chosen by Pope Francis in the 11th hour to replace another cardinal-designate who had declined the appointment. Replacing Indonesian Bishop Paskalis Bruno Syukur, OFM, on the Pope’s list of 21 new cardinals, Archbishop Battaglia’s name was announced November 7. He has headed the Naples diocese since 2020.

Ordained in 1988, he was a rector at a seminary, a parish priest, a member of the diocesan Peace and Justice Committee, and later became very involved in running Catholic drug addiction rehabilitation and residential care centers.

Pope Francis named him Bishop of Cerreto Sannita-Telese-Sant’Agata de 'Goti in 2016. He was the first priest of the diocese to become a bishop since 1960.

Even after becoming a bishop, Battaglia was known as a “street priest,” — even being called a “Bergoglio of the South” — and is coauthor of a 2010 book titled, The Poor Are Always Right: Stories of Street Priests. In a pastoral letter in April 2020, he said that the COVID-19 pandemic had “exposed the fragility of this world of ours... the weakness of that economy which, both locally and globally, was considered the single goal, and was seen and applauded as the only route, without any restraints, to human happiness on earth.”

tarCisio isao KiKuChi Archbishop of Tokyo Archbishop Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi, SVD, 65, was born in Iwate, Japan. He became a priest of the Divine Word Missionaries in 1986.

After six years as a missionary in Ghana, he returned to Japan and took on several positions of responsibility in his order, finally being elected provincial of his order’s Japanese province in 1999 and again in 2002.

He served as executive director of Caritas Japan from 1999 to 2004, after first gaining experience as a volunteer in the refugee camp in Bukavu, Zaire (now in the Democratic Republic of the Congo).

He was appointed Bishop of Niigata in 2004 by Pope John Paul II, taking as his motto, Vatietate Unitas (Unity in Diversity).

Pope Francis made him Archbishop of Tokyo in 2017.

Kukuchi attended the beatification for 16th-century samurai and Catholic convert Takayama Ukon in Osaka in 2017 and proposed the samurai “Blessed” as “a model for all.”

“Takayama Ukon showed his faith left no room for compromises,” he said. “In Japan today, we live a life full of compromises. We are easily attracted by easy money and the kind of lifestyles that lead us to forget about God... Anyone who gives up their comfortable lifestyle and wealth for the faith, is an example to everyone.”

PHILIPPINES

Carlos Castillo Mattasoglio

DoMeniCo battaglia

JAPAN

PERU

Franciscan order, most notably Provincial Minister of the Franciscans in Ecuador (2000-2003) and General Councilor of the Order of Friars Minor in Rome, and responsibility for the Franciscan provinces of Latin America and the Caribbean (2004-2009).

In 2015, Pope Francis appointed him Archbishop of Guayaquil, Ecuador. As vice president of the Ecuadorian Episcopal Conference (2017-2020), he played a crucial role in promoting dialogue and peace, especially in the 2019 demonstrations against the economic measures of President Lenìn Moreno. He has acted as mediator in two national strikes.

In 2020 and again in 2023, he was elected president of the bishops’ conference.

Pablo Virgilio DaViD bishop of kALookAn Bishop Pablo Virgilio David, 65, was born in Betis, Philippines, in 1959, the 10th of 13 children. He earned his bachelor’s degree in Pre-Divinity from Ateneo de Manila University, his master’s degree in Theology from the Loyola School of Theology, and both his licentiate and doctorate (summa cum laude) in Sacred Theology from the KU Leuven in Belgium.

He also trained at the École Biblique et Archeologique Française de Jerusalem, and is now considered one of the country’s leading Bible experts. David was ordained a priest in 1983, and in 2006 was appointed

by Pope Benedict XVI as auxiliary bishop of San Fernando. He became Bishop of Kalookan in January 2016. He was elected President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines in 2021. In 2023, David was chosen as the Asian representative to the Synod on Synodality.

David was a noted critic of former President Rodrigo Duterte’s “war on drugs.” On July 19, 2019, Duterte’s government filed charges against David, two fellow bishops and members of the opposition for “sedition, cyber libel, libel, estafa, harboring a criminal, and obstruction of justice.” The charges were dropped in 2020.

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN

31

neW cArdinAls

george JacoB KooVaKaD friAr, sTAff secreTAriAT of sTATe

of the national shrine of Saint Anthony of Padua in Brussels. He also served as president of the Central Europe Federation of the Friars Minor Conventual.

He moved to Lebanon in 2013 and served in several roles in the provincial Custody of the East and of the Holy Land.

Pope Francis appointed him Archbishop of Tehran-Isfahan in 2021; Mathieu told an interviewer that from the time he entered religious life he “almost always felt affinity with the Islamic world.” According to Vatican statistics, there are only 9,000 baptized Catholics in Iran.

Though Christian proselytism is outlawed, the Vatican has had uninterrupted diplomatic relations with Iran since 1954.

IVORY COAST

IRAN

Fr. George Jacob Koovakad, 51, is an Indian priest of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church who since 2020 has worked in the offices of the Holy See’s Secretariat of State where he has been responsible for organizing Pope Francis’ overseas trips. He was born in Changanacherry, Kerala state, India, and educated at St Thomas Minor Seminary, Kurichy, and St Joseph Pontifical Seminary, Aluva.

He was ordained a priest of the SyroMalabar Catholic Archeparchy of Changanacherry in 2004.

Moving to Rome, he obtained a doctorate in canon law in 2006 from the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross with a thesis on “The Obligation of Poverty for Secular Clerics in the Codes of Canon Law.” After completing the preparatory program at the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy, he joined the diplomatic service of the Holy See in 2006. He worked in the nunciatures of Algeria, South Korea, Iran, Costa Rica and Venezuela. In 2014 he was given the title Chaplain of His Holiness, and in 2019 that of Prelate of Honor of His Holiness.

In July 2020 he joined the staff of the Secretariat of State and since 2021 has organized several papal trips.

DomInIque mathIeu

Ignace BessI DogBo

Archbishop of TehrAn-isfAhAn

Archbishop of AbidjAn

Archbishop Dominique Mathieu, OFM Conv., 61, was born in Arlon, Belgium. He joined the Order of Friars Minor Conventual at 21, professed his solemn vows in 1987 and was ordained in 1989.

In 2013 he was incardinated in the Provincial Custody of the East and of the Holy Land. Within his Franciscan order he has held various positions, including rector

Archbishop Ignace Bessi Dogbo, 63, was born in Niangon-Adjamé, a village in the District of Abidjan, Ivory Coast. He was ordained in 1987; after study in Rome, he returned to work in Yopougon diocese and was a professor of biblical languages at Saint Paul major seminary.

In 2004, Pope John Paul II named him bishop of Katiola. In 2015, he represented

32

INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

ALGERIA

the Ivorian bishops in the Synod of Bishops at the Vatican.

Pope Francis appointed him Archbishop of Korhogo in 2020, and Archbishop of Abidjan in 2024. He was president of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of the Ivory Coast 2017-23.

Earlier this year Archbishop Dogbo explained that the Ivorian culture itself reflects the kind of synodality the Church proposes: “In this culture… the moderator launches the debate and it circulates according to an order; the youngest members are listened to first… The leader speaks only at the end when all members of the generational strata have expressed themselves freely.

“When the leader finally speaks, he is wise enough to move towards a consensus,” he said.

INDIA

SPECIAL

Jean-Paul Vesco Archbishop of Algier Archbishop Jean-Paul Vesco was born in Lyon, France. Educated in law, he practiced in Lyon for seven years before joining the Dominicans in 1995, taking his vows in 1996. He was ordained a priest of the Dominican order in 2001, following in the footsteps of his uncle, Jean-Luc Vesco (1934– 2018), a noted Dominican biblical scholar and provincial leader.

After studies at the École Biblique in Jerusalem, he moved in 2002 to Tlemcen, Algeria, in the Diocese of Oran, reestablishing the Dominican presence in that diocese six years after the assassination of its Dominican bishop, Pierre Claverie. He was elected head of the Dominicans in Tlemcen in 2007.

In 2010, Vasco was elected Prior Provincial of the Dominicans in France and took up his duties in Paris. In 2012, Pope Benedict XVI appointed him bishop of Oran.

In 2021, Pope Francis appointed Vesco archbishop of Algiers; in 2023, President Abdelmadjid Tebboune granted Vesco Algerian citizenship by presidential decree.

In 2015, he called for the Church to reevaluate its treatment of divorced Catholics who remarry, writing: “The Church’s discipline regarding divorced and remarried couples has long troubled me, even revolted me, because of the unnecessary suffering it inflicts on individuals without consideration for their unique situations.”m

NEWS

the “pope oF surprises” on indonesia-oceania trip Francis called government contraception programs a “law oF death,” and says all religions are “a path to god” n BY ITV STAFF

Grand Imam Nasaruddin Umar kisses Pope Francis on the top of his head after a group photo at the Istiqlal Mosque in Jakarta, Sept. 5, 2024 (Eko Siswono Toyudho/BenarNews)

P

ope Francis returned September 13 from his 45th pastoral trip abroad, a 12-day visit that took him from predominantly Muslim Indonesia to predominantly Christian Papua New Guinea, and from poverty-stricken Timor-Leste to super-affluent Singapore.

Among the Pope’s main themes, such as unity, respect for one’s culture, interreligious dialogue, and care for the poor and the environment, was the Pope’s insistent opposition to anti-natalist trends.

In Indonesia, he criticized government contraceptive campaigns aimed at easing poverty by saying, “Some people want to deal with this” by resorting to “a law of death, that is, limiting births, limiting the greatest wealth a nation has — new births.”

Francis returned to the theme when speaking of Timor-Leste to journalists in his September 13 in-flight press conference at the conclusion of the trip. Replying to The Straits Times journalist Pei Ting Wong’s question “What did you learn?” the Pope said, “You know, there’s always something to learn, because every person and country has different riches. That’s why fraternity in communication is so important. For example, in Timor-Leste, I saw many children, but in Singapore, not so many.

Perhaps that’s something to learn… The future lies with children; consider this.”

The next day, September 14, Pope Francis’ sentiments were echoed by tech and communications billionaire Elon Musk, who reacted on his social media platform X to a September 11 Los Angeles Times article titled, “It’s almost shameful to want to have children.”

Musk, a father of 12, posted, “Extinctionists want a holocaust for all of humanity.”

“EACH A DIFFERENT PATH TO GOD” The Pope’s determined pursuit of ecumenical dialog during his trip led to some controversial remarks at a gathering of Singaporean youth on September 13 when he said, “If we always say, ‘My religion is more important than yours’ or ‘My religion is true and yours is not,’ where will that lead us?”

“There’s only one God, and each of us has a language to arrive at God,” Francis continued. “Some are Sikh, Muslim, Hindu, Christian, and they are each a different path to God.” Francis doubled down on these statements 11 days later at an interreligious meeting in Paris organized by the ecumenism-driven Sant’Egidio Community, saying that the multi-faith group must be open to guidance “by the divine inspiration present in every faith” in order to establish peace in the world.

Is Pope Francis spouting heresy?

Catholic author of the book What Pope Francis Really Said and former execu-

tive editor of the National Catholic Register Tom Hoopes commented a few days later, “Often, the ‘troubling’ things Pope Francis says are just paraphrases of the Catechism.”

Quoting paragraph #846 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which says, “All salvation comes from Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body,” Hoopes went on to note, “What comes right before it and right after it are also important.”

Indeed, paragraph #843 says of other faiths, “… the Church considers all goodness and truth found in these religions as ‘a preparation for the Gospel and given by Him who enlightens all men that they may at length have life.’”

And paragraph #847 teaches that ‘Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart and, moved by grace, try in their actions do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience — those too may achieve eternal salvation.’”

What can become obscured, however, is the very next paragraph in the Catechism, #848, which tells us: “Although in ways known to himself God can lead those who, through no fault of their own, are ignorant of the Gospel, to that faith without which it is impossible to please him, the Church still has the obligation and also the sacred right to evangelize all men.”

And as theologian and writer Fr. Thomas Weinandy pointed out in a September 27 article in The Catholic Thing, failure to proclaim Jesus as the “singular” possessor of “the completeness of divine truth” threatens that evangelizing mission.m

INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

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CHRISTMAS ESSAY

Scenes from the life of Jesus Christ, triptych, Constantinople, crimson ivory, late 10th century.

In the central panel is the model used, from Giotto on, in the iconography of the nativity, both in the East and in the West

What shall we offer Thee, O Christ, who for our sake hast appeared on earth as man? Every creature made by Thee offers Thee thanks. The angels offer Thee a hymn; the heavens a star; the Magi, gifts; the shepherds, their wonder; the earth, its cave; the wilderness, the manger: and we offer Thee a Virgin Mother. O pre-eternal God, have mercy upon us Stichera from Lord I have cried…

T

he Feast of the Nativity of Our Lord, which we are preparing to celebrate on December 25, is a great and joyful feast for all Christians. And yet, the early Fathers of the Church remind us that the feast we are preparing to celebrate, the Feast of the Nativity of the Lord — Christmas — is inextricably bound up with the sad history of the human race: the fall of Adam, the disobedience of the children of God, and our own sinfulness.

Still, as Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, proclaimed with a joy that we, too, can experience, “In the tender compassion of our God, the dawn from on high shall break upon us,to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace.” (Lk 1:67-79) All of us at Inside the Vatican wish you and your families a holy and happy Christmas!

34 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

ST. BASIL THE GREAT (330-379) “On the Incarnation”

“GOD IS IN THE FLESH” God is on earth, He is among men, not in the fire nor amid the sound of trumpets; not in the smoking mountain, or in the darkness, or in the terrible and roaring tempest giving the Law, but manifested in the flesh, the gentle and good One dwells with those He condescends to make His equals!

God is in the flesh, not operating from a distance, as did the prophets, but through Him human nature, one with ours, He seeks to bring back all mankind to Himself.m

Adoration of the Magi, Giotto, c. 1320. The kneeling king picks up the Child; Mary looks on with concern, translating the biblical account into deeply human terms. Metropolitan Museum of New York

ST. JOHN CHRYSOSTOM (ca. 347-407) Christmas sermon in Antioch, 386 A.D.

“THE ANCIENT OF DAYS HAS BECOME AN INFANT”

What shall I say to you; what shall I tell you? I behold a Mother who has brought forth; I see a Child come to this light by birth. The manner of His conception I cannot comprehend.

What shall I say! And how shall I describe this Birth to you? For this wonder fills me with astonishment. The Ancient of days has become an infant. He Who sits upon the sublime and heavenly Throne, now lies in a manger. And He Who cannot be touched, Who is simple, without complexity, and incorporeal, now lies subject to the hands of men. He Who has broken the bonds of sinners, is now

bound by an infants bands. But He has decreed that ignominy shall become honor, infamy be clothed with glory, and total humiliation the measure of His Goodness.

For this He assumed my body, that I may become capable of His Word; taking my flesh, He gives me His spirit; and so He bestowing and I receiving, He prepares for me the treasure of Life. He takes my flesh, to sanctify me; He gives me His Spirit, that He may save me.

Come, then, let us observe the Feast. Truly wondrous is the whole chronicle of the Nativity. For this day the ancient slavery is ended, the devil confounded, the demons take to flight, the power of death is broken, paradise is unlocked, the curse is taken away, sin is removed from us, error driven out, truth has been brought back, the speech of kindliness diffused, and spreads on every side, a heavenly way of life has been in planted on the earth, angels communicate with men without fear, and men now hold speech with angels.m NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN 35

Nativity of Christ, St. Kirill Monastery, Cathedral of the Assumption, Moscow, Russia.

Opposite, The Nativity, Russian Orthodox icon, early 18th century

36 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

CHRISTMAS ESSAY ST. ATHANASIUS OF ALEXANDRIA (ca. 296-373) On the Incarnation, 10.14

ST. GREGORY OF NAZIANZUS (329-390) Oration 38, O strange conjunction!

“BY HIS POWER, HE RESTORED THE HUMAN RACE”

THE SELF-EXISTENT COMES INTO BEING; THE UNCREATED IS CREATED

The Word of God did not abandon the human race, his creatures, who are hurtling to their own ruin. By the offering of his body, the Word of God destroyed death which had united itself to them; by his teaching, he corrected their negligences; and by his power, he restored the human race.

Why was it necessary for the Word of God to become incarnate and not some other? Scripture indicates the reason by these words: “It was fitting that when bringing many heirs to glory, God, for whom and through whom all things exist, should make their leader in the work of salvation perfect through suffering.” This signifies that the work of raising human beings from the ruin into which they had fallen pertained to none other than the Word of God, who had made them in the beginning.

By the sacrifice of his body, he put an end to the law which weighed upon them, and he renewed in us the principle of life by giving us the hope of the resurrection. For if it is through ourselves that death attained dominance over us, conversely, it is through the incarnation of the Word of God that death has been destroyed and that life has been resurrected, as indicated by the Apostle filled with Christ: “Death came through one person; hence the resurrection of the dead comes through another person also. Just as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will come to life again.”

It is no longer as condemned that we die. Rather, we die with the hope of rising again from the dead, awaiting the universal resurrection which God will manifest to us in his own time, since he is both the author of it and gives us the grace for it.m

Christ is born: glorify him. Christ comes from heaven: go out to meet him. Christ descends to earth: let us be raised on high. Let all the world sing to the Lord; let the heavens rejoice and let the earth be glad, for his sake who was first in heaven and then on earth. Christ is here in the flesh: let us exult with fear and joy — with fear, because of our sins; with joy, because of the hope that he brings us.

Once more the darkness is dispersed; once more the light is created. Let the people that sat in the darkness of ignorance now look upon the light of knowledge. The things of old have passed away; behold, all things are made new. He who has no mother in heaven is now born without father on earth. The laws of nature are overthrown, for the upper world must be filled with citizens.

He who is without flesh becomes incarnate; the Word puts on a body; the Invisible is seen; he whom no hand can touch is handled; the Timeless has a beginning; the Son of God becomes Son of Man — Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and for ever.

Light from light, the Word of the Father comes to his own image, in the human race. For the sake of my flesh he takes flesh; for the sake of my soul he is united to a rational soul, purifying like by like.

In every way he becomes human, except for sin. O strange conjunction! The Self-existent comes into being; the Uncreated is created. He shares in the poverty of my flesh, that I may share in the riches of his Godhead.m

THE ICON OF THE NATIVITY (OPPOSITE)

baby is wrapped in strips of cloth reminiscent

Our eye is drawn first to Mary, the Theotokos. She

of the cloths that will wrap Him at his death.

is the largest figure, indicating her importance in our

The crib appears as a coffin. All this fore-

Lord’s incarnation. Our eye is drawn next to the color

shadows His death and reminds us He was

black behind Jesus. Black is rarely seen in icons,

born to die. Note the ox and donkey: they look

therefore, it has great significance. Jesus is the light

directly at the child, recognizing Him as the

born into the darkness of the world caused by sin. He

Messiah. We know from the Gospels this will

has come to conquer the darkness of sin and death.

not be the case of many in Israel. We read in

This cave also reminds us of the sacrifice Jesus will of-

Isaiah 1:3 “The ox knows its owner and the

fer. It resembles the tomb in which He will be laid. But,

donkey its master’s crib; but Israel does not

like this cave, His tomb will bring life, not death. The

know, my people do not understand.” .

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN 37

CHRISTMAS ESSAY Epiphany of the Lord, from around 1420-1430, surrounded by scenes showing the three wise men and King Herod.

Opposite page, Chorale from an illuminated manuscript of the King of Hungary Matthias Corvinus, dating back to 1400

38 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

ST. HIPPOLYTUS OF ROME (ca. 170- ca. 235) On the Refutation of All Heresies

“BY TAKING A BODY FROM THE VIRGIN, HE REFASHIONED OUR FALLEN NATURE” Our faith is not founded upon empty words; nor are we carried away by mere caprice or beguiled by specious arguments. On the contrary, we put our faith in words spoken by the power of God, spoken by the Word himself at God’s command. God wished to win us back from disobedience, not by using force to reduce us to slavery but by addressing to our free will a call to liberty.

The Word spoke first of all through the prophets, but because the message was couched in such obscure language that it could be only dimly apprehended, in the last days the Father sent the Word in person, commanding him to show himself openly so that the world could see him and be saved.

We know that by taking a body from the Virgin he refashioned our fallen nature. We know that his humanity was of the same clay as our own; if this were not so, he would hardly have been a teacher who ST. GREGORY OF NYSSA (ca. 335-ca. 394) Homily on the Nativity of Christ

“THE NOTABLE DAY OF OUR FEAST IS AT HAND” “Sound the trumpet at the new moon,” says David, “even in the notable day of your feast.” The commandments of Divinely-inspired teaching are assuredly a law for those who hear them. Therefore, since the notable day of our feast is at hand, let us, too, fulfill the law and become heralds of the solemnity. The trumpet of the law, as the Apostle bids us understand, is the word. For the sound of the trumpet, he says, should not be uncertain, but its notes should be distinct so that the hearers may clearly perceive it. So let us produce a clear and audible sound, brethren, one that is no less noble than that of the trumpet.

For the Law, prefiguring the truth in the shadowy types, enjoined the sounding of the trumpet at the Feast of Tabernacles. Now, the theme of the present Feast is the mystery of the true Tabernacle. For on this day did He Who vested Himself with humanity for our sake pitch His human tabernacle; on this day our tabernacles, which had disintegrated through death, are reconstituted by Him

could expect to be imitated. If he were of a different substance from me, he would surely not have ordered me to do as he did, when by my very nature I am so weak. Such a demand could not be reconciled with his goodness and justice.

No. He wanted us to consider him as no different from ourselves, and so he worked, he was hungry and thirsty, he slept. Without protest he endured his passion, he submitted to death and revealed his resurrection.

In all these ways he offered his own humanity as the firstfruits of our race to keep us from losing heart when suffering comes our way, and to make us look forward to receiving the same reward as he did, since we know that we possess the same humanity.

When we have come to know the true God, both our bodies and our souls will be immortal and incorruptible.

We shall enter the kingdom of heaven, because, while we lived on earth, we acknowledged heaven’s King.

Friends of God and co-heirs with Christ, we shall be subject to no evil desires or inclinations, or to any affliction of body or soul, for we shall have become divine. It was because of our human condition that God allowed us to endure these things, but when we have been deified and made immortal, God has promised us a share in his own attributes.m Who constructed our habitation from the very beginning.

Let us utter the words of the Psalm, joining in chorus with the loud-voiced David: “Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” How does He come? He crosses over into human life, not by boat or by chariot, but through the incorruption of a Virgin. This is our God, this is our Lord, Who appeared to us to ordain a Feast with thick branches, even unto the horns of the altar.

We are assuredly not unaware, brethren, of the mystery contained in these words: that all of creation is a single temple of the Master of creation. But since, when sin intervened, the mouths of those overcome by evil were stopped, the voice of rejoicing fell silent and the harmony of those who keep festival was interrupted, as human creation no longer celebrated with celestial Angel-kind, for this reason there came the trumpets of the Prophets and the Apostles, whom the Law calls horns, because they are formed from the true Unicorn (Numbers 23:22).

By the power of the Spirit they made the word of truth resound with piercing clarity, so that the ears of those who had been made deaf by sin might be opened up and so that there might be one harmonious celebration, echoing in unison through the thick covering of the tabernacle of the lower creation with the sublime and preëminent Hosts that stand around the Heavenly Altar.m NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN 39

CHRISTMAS ESSAY In the tender compassion of our God, the dawn from on high shall break upon us,to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace.

Lk 1:67-79

Illuminated page from The Book of Hours, commissioned by the ruler of Milan, Gian Galeazzo Visconti, in Italy, 1400.

Right, Adoration of the Magi by Gentile da Fabriano, Uffizi Gallery in Florence, 1423

ST. JOHN DAMASCENE (ca. 675-749) Exposition of the Orthodox Faith

“WE STAND TO HIM IN THE RELATION OF BROTHERS” He who is first begotten is called firstborn(1), whether he is only-begotten or the first of a number of brothers. If then the Son of God was called firstborn, but was not called Only-begotten, we could imagine that He was the first-born of creatures, as being a creature(2). But since He is called both firstborn and Only-begotten, both senses must be preserved in His case. We say that He is first-born of all creation(3) since both He Himself is of God and creation is of God, 40 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

but as He Himself is born alone and timelessly of the essence of God the Father, He may with reason be called Only-begotten Son, first-born and not first-created.

For the creation was not brought into being out of the essence of the Father, but by His will out of nothing. And He is called First-born among many brethren, for although being Only-begotten, He was also born of a mother.

Since, indeed, He participated just as we ourselves do in blood and flesh and became man, while we too through Him became sons of God, being adopted through the baptism, He Who is by nature Son of God became firstborn amongst us who were made by adoption and grace sons of God, and stand to Him in the relation of brothers.

Wherefore He said, “I ascend unto My Father and your Father.”m

ST. AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO (354-430), Sermon 191.1

“HE WISHED TO HAVE ONE DAY SET ASIDE FOR HIS HUMAN BIRTH” The Word of the Father, by Whom all time was created, was made flesh and was born in time for us.

He, without whose divine permission no day completes its course, wished to have one day set aside for His human birth.

In the bosom of His Father, He existed before all the cycles of ages; born of an earthly mother, He entered upon the course of the years on this day.

Man’s maker became Man that He, Ruler of the stars,

might be nurse at His mother’s breast; that He, the Bread, might hunger; the Fountain, might thirst; the Light, might sleep; the Way, might be wearied by the journey; the Truth, might be accused by false witnesses; the Judge of the living and the dead, might be brought to trial by a mortal judge; that He, Justice, might be condemned by the unjust; that He, Discipline, might be scourged with whips; that He, the Foundation, might be suspended upon a cross; that Courage might be weakened; that Healer might be wounded; that Life might die.m NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN 41

SCRIPTURE

whaT do you see?

The eyes of The hearT and The darkness wiThin n BY AnTHOnY ESOLEn*

Sermon on the Mount by Henrik Olrik, Altarpiece from St. Matthaeus Church in Copenhagen, Denmark

S

uppose you are attending a concert, and you are listening to an intricate work of musical genius, such as Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. You are expecting to hear it all the way through, and to hear its themes and motifs played upon, modified, expanded, and set in a variety of musical contexts, all building up to a grand culmination. You expect to hear it as a coherent whole, and to experience its mystery also as such.

But suppose this is what you get instead. Suppose that at several dozen points in the work, the conductor stops, turns to the audience and says something on this order: “This is now a whimsical Turkish air,” or, “This is a resumption of the leading motif in the second movement,” or, “The composer here uses the kettledrums to interrupt the melody.” In one sense, you are receiving some instruction, and if you are not familiar with classical music, you may believe that it has benefited you.

But you do not actually hear the symphony. You hear instead a series of fragments, and you hear them as interpreted and labeled by the conductor, who narrows your focus, and actually prevents you from having a deeply human encounter with the music.

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That is what the editors of Bibles risk doing when they divide the text into small pieces and label them with headings. They do so, at best, for the convenience of the reader. But there is a cost. Let me take an example from the Sermon on the Mount, from the generally acceptable Revised Standard Version (Mt. 6:19-24): COnCERnInG TREASURES “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

THE SOUnD EYE “The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is not sound, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!

SERVInG TWO MASTERS “No one can serve two masters; for either he will

It is a terrible sentence we thus lay upon ourselves. hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to The vision is inverted. We would be better off seeing the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and nothing at all, but, as Jesus says to the Pharisees after his mammon.” cure of the blind man, we say that we see, so that our sin When we read the text in this way, which the edition remains. Those men saw Jesus with the eyes of malevomakes almost inevitable, we read the three sayings as lence in action. Better had they been living on the banks separate, as obiter dicta, the kinds of things Jesus might of the Indus River, and never heard his name. have tossed out on the wayside in many a sermon, here Now we can understand why Jesus turns to the worcollected in a convenient place, with a vague sense that ship of Mammon. No man can they should be near one another. serve two masters. No one can But what if we remove the labels commit himself both to light and to and the indentations? What if we darkness. Men hate the light, says assume that this is one tapestry of Jesus elsewhere, because their thought? deeds are evil. The human heart Jesus says that we should not must choose. lay up for ourselves treasures on We can serve God, and we earth, which moths and rust can should always remember that in corrupt, and thieves break in and Greek, Hebrew, and Latin, there steal. The moths, the rust (in are no separate words for servant Greek, brosis, suggesting someand slave; or we can slave for thing that eats, that gnaws away), wealth, prestige, and so forth, and the thieves all work in darkearthly things, mutable, corruptness. That is, of course, because ible, and eventually to be lost forthey are not seen, but it is also ever. If we serve God, we will see because of the nature of the treathat those other things are to be sure concerned and where it is laid. despised, that is, we can look down The Greek thesauros is a treasure upon them with a bit of healthy box. We put rich clothes aside, in a scorn. Why be a slave for what the cedar chest, perhaps, to keep them ultimate thief will steal? sweet-smelling and, we hope, to But if we serve Mammon, we keep the vermin away. We put gold will not want to hear about God, in a locked chest to hide it from and we may go so far as to despise thieves. Jesus is not saying that we should strew money around the “WE ARE MEANT TO LOOK TO HEAVEN his true servants, as fools who canfloor and hang woolen robes from BECAUSE WE ARE MEANT TO SEE WHAT not get on in the world.

So we must choose between the window.

REALLY IS TO BE TREASURED” sight and an acute blindness that But if things like these are what sees all things wrong. we treasure most in life, we will have much to do with To serve Mammon is to have the eye full of darkness, darkness, and with the creatures of darkness, and no to see wrongly by means of the darkness within. matter how hard we try, the moths and the rust and the Such is what I see when I shut my eyes to the editors. thieves will come. Death, that great silent bat, will come.

So then, it is a fool’s investment to set all your hopes * Dr. Anthony Esolen, currently a faculty member at on the things of earth. But it is also what a blind man Thales College in North Carolina, has been a does. There are glories all round us, and God directs our professor of literature and humanities for 35 years eyes to heaven, where no good thing is lost, where nothand is the author or translator of more than 30 books, ing whole and sound can be corrupted, and where no evil which include a range of English translations, can break the peace. We are meant to look to heaven analyses of culture, literary and Biblical criticisms, because we are meant to see what really is to be treameditations on modern education, meditations on the sured. If we are dazzled by gold or silk or fame or presChristian life, and original poetry. Dr. Esolen also tige or power, even if it is but a golden coin or two, a silk serves as a senior editor and regular writer at scarf, a notice in the newspaper, a name-plate on a door, Touchstone magazine, has published well over or the mayoralty of a village, we will be blind to what 1000 articles in various journals, and publishes is truly good and beautiful. The eye, which Jesus a web magazine dedicated to language, music, calls the lamp of the body, will not be sound. It will poetry, and classic films called Word and Song see, but it will not see. Instead of filling the body with his wife, Debra.m with light, it will fill the body with a kind of active darkness.

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN

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SPIRITUALITY BEHIND BARS

struck down, But not dEstroyEd ExErcising thE couragE of thE childrEn of god n BY MARCELLUS ALLEn ROBERTS *

Peter Martyr Enjoins Silence, by Fra Angelico, c.1441 (fresco inside a monk’s cell), Museo di San Marco, Florence, Italy

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mysterious figure stands in the kind of attention that collects the foreground of a fresco in deep wells within a servant’s in the Museo di San heart.

Marco in Florence, Italy. Fra Chuck, the luckier one, Angelico’s genius is on full got both her home and display. His “St. Peter Marwork numbers that day. tyr Enjoins Silence” adorns He called Esther four a lunette like a sacred days later, calming her guardian commanded to unwarranted worries turn back every unnecesthat she would never sary movement of mental hear from him again. chatter. It admits only The two of them quickone meditation to perly discovered that they fume the Holy Place, a were a pair of matchquestion to be contemplated silently ing ensembles cut from the same “NOTHING HAPPENS WHICH within the heart. That question: What cloth. They both cared about doing GOD HAS NOT FORESEEN happened? what was right; they both cared about The artist depicts the Dominican people. It was the springtime of their FROM ALL ETERNITY” saint as gesturing with a universal young love and they spent it talking sign of stillness — one finger positioned before pursed on the phone for hours, sharing how their days had gone, lips. Or, is St. Peter Martyr directing our attention venting their young adult frustrations and empathizing upward, toward the curdling blood that has transgressed with one another. It wasn’t long before they were going the boundary of his tonsured head? Is that the hilt of a to Mass together, and by December of 1985, they were dagger with its blade buried in his back? How much married. blood is racing down his right shoulder? Wait! What’s During the next thirty years of a fruitful marriage, going on here? What happened?

Chuck and Esther worked hard to be a good mother and “Nothing is done, nothing happens, either in the father. They raised four happy children together, and material or in the moral world, which God has not foreEsther turned out to be an excellent hostess of their home seen from all eternity, and which he has not willed, or at — by turns, a little bit of St. Martha and of St. Mary, she least permitted.” (Preface to Abandonment to Divine was always prepared for visitors and always eager to lisProvidence, preface by Rev. H. Ramiere S.J.) ten.

So it was for Chuck and Esther. They met on SeptemBut, beneath it all, there was a real friendship, a virber 8, 1984; Chuck was then an Air Force Academy tuous friendship, such a one as Catholic philosophy prograduate, reorienting his life away from his childhood fessor John Cuddeback describes in his book, True dream of becoming a pilot. Instead, he was focusing on Friendship, when two souls love one another “for the a career that would allow him the quality time he wanted other’s sake and because of who the other is in himself.” to spend with the future family that was becoming his Chuck recounted to me, in tears, how Esther had sincere desire. Esther was young and lovely. At 5’5” and loved holding his hand. Once, she exclaimed in that gen115 lbs., her slender frame radiated a wholesome femiuine and innocent way friends do when they want to ninity which brought out the mystery in her eyes, so dark emphasize that it’s the small things that matter most, they could appear to be black. Her presence was always “Holding hands! It’s so nice to have a friend like you, my punctuated by a loving attention to the needs of others, love. Just to have this friendship.”

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INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

They learned Latin hymns together, sang in the choir chotropic drugs, of which Prozac was one — and told together, and through the tough times, they supported there were no side effects. Less than three weeks later, one another in mutual sacrifice. So why is Chuck, a Esther lost her life to Chuck’s “paradoxical” reaction to devoted husband and father, with no prior history of vioProzac. lence, serving a 20-year sentence for the murder of his It’s difficult to digest this story. Like a wildfire ravwife, Esther? What’s going on here? What happened? aging a Northern California forest, or a hurricane indisTo answer that question, we’ll have to turn back the criminately distributing destruction along the Gulf clock to the year 1990.

Coast, the catastrophe concealed within the chemical “In early 1990, two Harvard Medical School psychicompounds of those tiny capsules forever altered the atrists, Martin Teicher and Johnathan Cole, reported in landscape of Chuck and Esther’s life together. They the American Journal of Psychiatry that Prozac could were no more in control of the outcome than had it been induce intense, violent suicidal preoccupaa natural disaster. tion...” (Prozac Backlash by Joseph GlenFor a while afterward, Chuck refused to mullen, M.D.) When I first came across the communicate with God. He spent the next book Prozac Backlash, I was unprepared for three years wading through, and at times, the descriptions of psychosis suffered by submerged beneath, a turbulent sea of depatients as a side effect of serotonin boosters pression, despair and self-hatred. like Prozac, Paxil, etc. I was even less preIn April of 2018, he pled no contest and pared for the accounts of their deadly effects accepted a 20-year sentence. and the sheer number of documented cases “We make mental prayer in order to be from the 1990s alone. converted from evil to good, from good to These reports presented polar opposites better, from better to perfection... mental of the smiling faces, serene settings, and prayer, by its very nature and its diverse choreographed social gatherings panacts, is pre-eminently the source of this tomimed to attract potential consumers on transformation.” (The Ways of Mental pharmaceutical commercials. Researches Prayer

by Rt. Rev. Dom Vitalis Lehodey) The book Prozac Backlash by Joseph Glenmullen have found that prescribing these comBy the time I met Chuck in late 2022, he pounds is a dangerous gamble, says was a devout, rosary-praying, LatinDr. Glenmullen: “Teicher and Cole hymn-singing, lay Dominican.

“PRAYER: labeled the suicidal and violent imHe credits submitting himself to THE CHURCH’S MENTAL pulses a ‘paradoxical’ reaction to God in the Prayer of Quiet RecollecHEALTH REMEDY” Prozac, estimated it might happen in tion as the genesis of his spiritual 3.5% of patients, and warned physicians to prescribe the recovery — a mental health remedy that has been in the drug with caution.” Maybe this statistic should be added Church’s medicine cabinet for centuries. to the laundry list of side effects listed in small print in As we turn our gaze back to Fra Angelico’s painting the product literature. of St. Peter Martyr, a new question arises, the only logThe most chilling parameter of all is the speed at ical question at this point: Lord, why? Why the wounds, which these “suicidal and violent impulses” seize a the loss, the brokenness? patient as if they’d been overcome by sorcery. As Rev. H. Ramiere, S.J., answered this question well described by Dr. Glenmullen, “The two psychopharmawhen he said, “All these things are only sent to exercise cologists at McLean Hospital described a number of the courage of the children of God, and when their virtue patients who became severely anxious, agitated, and is proved and confirmed, He permits them to overcome obsessed with violence within two to seven weeks of these monsters, and continues to send new warriors into starting Prozac... the reactions were sudden and dramatthe field. So that this life is a continual warfare which ic.” Phrases like, “Just weeks after starting Prozac…”, exercises the courage of the saints on earth, and causes “Within days of starting the drug…”, “Ten days after joy in heaven and confusion in hell.” starting Prozac…” preceded accounts of horribly vioLet us offer a prayer for the repose of all those souls lent acts committed under the influence of Prozacwho lost their lives to the adverse effects of psychotropic induced psychosis. prescription drugs: “Eternal rest grant unto them, O So, what happened? Tragically, in December 2015, Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they after being admitted to the hospital without health insurrest in peace. Amen.” ance and receiving a diagnosis of severe depression, anxiety and suicidality, Chuck was detained for two and *Marcellus Allen Roberts is a 40-year-old Prison a half days without therapy or counseling, then sent Oblate of St. Benedict’s Abbey, Atchison, Kansas. He home with prescriptions for a cocktail of four psyis serving a 25-year penance in the state of Texas.m NOVEMBER-DECEMBER INSIDE THE VATICAN

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C AT H O L I C I S M A n D O R T H O D O X Y E D I T E D B Y: C H R I S T I N A D E A R D U R F F

The Message of the Icon

BY ROBERT WIESnER

THE CREED: THE CHURCH “I BELIEVE IN ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC AND APOSTOLIC CHURCH”

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hese four marks of the Messiah’s Church have tians may be, the Church is yet the extended mystical been a part of Christian belief from early times Body of Christ on earth. As such, it partakes not only without any notable dissent; their inclusion in the of fallible humanity but also of the total infallibility Creed was therefore something of a foregone concluand sacred character of divinity. Divine life and light sion. Still, their exact definitions have been subject to permeate the Church and impart the very holiness of various interpretations, especially in the age of God despite the sinfulness of some of its members.

Protestant denominational chaos.

The universal reach of the Church is explained by There is a tendency among some Roman Catholics the loving divine intention that all might achieve their to see the unity of the Church salvation. Some modern thesubsisting in strict union with ologians have come to the the Roman papacy; at the doubtful conclusion that even other end of the spectrum, the demons might be forgiven some liberal theologians exand welcomed back into the tend Christian unity to include sheepfold, but the nature of free virtually everyone who at will would seem to contradict some time may have had a that possibility; we do, after all, charitable thought or two! have the example of Judas.

As a rule, virtue lies someSurely if he were eventually to where in the middle: the one enjoy eternal life it would be a principle which denotes memgreat thing for him to have been bership in the Church is the born! Alas, we have it on good indivisible Person of Jesus authority that his fate was not Christ. To the extent that a perso happy. But the Truth Himself son or a group professes or has taught the total applicabili”The Divine Trinity” in this 1905 Neo-Gothic back of the practices adherence to Jesus ty of Christianity to the entire Klaren Altar in Cologne’s Dom by artist Wilhelm Mengelberg and His teachings, to that exhuman race, whether or not tent they belong to the one Church. individuals choose to embrace it.

This could include those who never even heard of Authority in teaching, loosing and binding, the Christianity but who follow the common moral law structural details of the Church and the guidance of “written in the hearts of men.” The Church bodies God’s family on earth were clearly given to the twelve which enjoy the fullness of Christian teaching are the closest followers of Jesus. The early history of the closest branches to the Vine Himself. A great many Church finds this authority passed along to a new genChristian sects have done away with most of the eration of leaders in the consecration of bishops. sacramental system or various other aspects of full The unbroken line of bishops continues to this day belief in the teachings of Jesus. These “branches” in the fully sacramental Churches, acknowledged to exist at some further distance from the Vine roots and be the Catholic communion and the various Orthodox thus enjoy only a partial unity; some of their roots lie bodies throughout the world. only in principles of purely human invention. The Though the tragedy of schism has inflicted a grievexact parameters of this partial unity cannot be preous wound upon full unity, the authority of the Aposcisely known and thus must be left to the mercy and tles yet lives in the sacramental life lived in these wisdom of God for proper sorting.

Churches. Protestants, alas, no longer maintain episThe holy character of the Church is more obvious. copal continuity, which goes some distance in exHowever wayward and fractious individual Chrisplaining their theological incoherence.m page 46

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East-West Watch

BY PETER AnDERSOn

UKRAInIAn GOVERnMEnT MOVES TO OUTLAW UKRAInIAn ORTHODOX CHURCH Building of the Verkhovna Rada, the Ukrainian parliament.

(Photo: Wikipedia)

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n Sunday, August 25, Pope Francis at the end of his Angelus address expressed his concerns about a law recently adopted in Ukraine. He stated: “I continue to follow with sorrow the fighting in Ukraine and the Russian Federation. And in thinking about the laws recently adopted in Ukraine, I fear for the freedom of those who pray, because those who truly pray always pray for all. A person does not commit evil because of praying. If someone commits evil against his people, he will be guilty for it, but he cannot have committed evil because he prayed. So let those who want to pray be allowed to pray in what they consider their Church.

Please, let no Christian Church be abolished directly or indirectly. Churches are not to be touched!”

On the prior day, August 24, the World Council of Churches (WCC) had stated that it was “deeply alarmed by the potential for unjustified collective punishment of an entire religious community and violation of the principles of freedom of religion or belief under a new law.”

Both Pope Francis and the WCC were referring to Law 3894, which was passed by the Ukrainian parliament on August 20, 2024, and signed by President Zelensky four days later. Under Law 3894, the Russian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate) was banned in Ukraine on the grounds that the Russian Church was supporting the armed aggression against Ukraine.

However, even more importantly, the new law subjects to termination Ukrainian religious organizations which are “affiliated” with the Russian Church and fail to sever their affiliation. The law also requires termination of Ukrainian religious organizations whose “authorized persons” commit certain crimes relating to national security. Further-

more, termination is mandated where there are “repeated facts” that the Ukrainian religious organization is used to propagate the doctrine of Russkiy Mir [“the Russian world”].

If a religious organization is terminated, the penalties are severe. All of its assets are subject to confiscation by the government. “Cult property [such as churches and monasteries] is transferred to other religious organizations.”

Comments by members of the Ukrainian parliament make it clear that the primary target of the new law is the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC). The UOC has more than 8,000 parishes and more than 250 monasteries. Historically, it has been the largest church in Ukraine and has been part of the Russian Church.

After the invasion of Ukraine, the UOC held a Council and deleted from the Charter of the UOC all references to the Russian Church except for two relating to the creation of the UOC in 1990. At the Council, the UOC also declared its independence from the Russian Church. Since the Council, there is no evidence that the Russian Church has exercised any actual control over the UOC. The Ukrainian government maintains that the UOC is still “affiliated” with the Russian Church. In Law 3894 an affiliation is defined by the existence of any one of seven “signs.” If any of the signs exist with respect to the UOC, the law requires that the UOC be “terminated” unless it eliminates the signs. Because some of the signs are based solely on the provisions of the Charter of the Russian Church, which the UOC is powerless to change, it appears relatively certain that the UOC will be terminated under the new law and will lose all of its churches and monasteries.m

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C AT H O L I C I S M A N D O R T H O D O X Y E D I T E D B Y: C H R I S T I N A D E A R D U R F F

NEWS from the EAST

BY MATTHEW TROJACEK

POPE FRANCIS MEETS MIDDLE EAST CATHOLIC said Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako, the patriarch of the BISHOPS AMID FEARS OF ALL-OUT WAR IN REGION Chaldean Catholic Church during a Mass on September 28, the Pope Francis met August 28 with the Latin-rite Catholic leadanniversary of St. Meskenta’s martyrdom, at the Saint Hannah ers of some of the Middle Eastern and Arabic-speaking countries Monastery for Chaldean nuns in Karada, Baghdad. amid fears of an escalation of the Israel-Hamas war.

According to tradition, St. Meskinta was martyred along He encouraged the bishops to “bear witness to faith in [the with her two children by the Persians during the anti-Christian Lord], also through respectful and sincere dialogue with everypersecution by the Sassanian king Yazdgerd II (438-457). one.”

Sako urged the faithful to endure pain to produce work of The meeting took place as part of the plenary assembly of the human, spiritual, and social value despite being small in numConference of the Latin Bishops of the Arab Regions (CELRA), bers. which covers Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Iraq’s Christian population has drasLebanon, Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Cyprus, Djitically declined since the 2003 US-led bouti, Somalia, and the countries of the invasion, dropping from more than 1.5 Arabian Peninsula. million people to around 400,000 today.

“This situation has caused thousands (UCANews) and thousands of deaths, enormous destruction, immense suffering, and the YOUNG RUSSIAN CATHOLICS spread of feelings of hatred and resentGATHER TO CELEBRATE “HOPE” ment, which prepare the ground for new “Hope is not just the expectation of tragedies,” he said. something longed for and far away: it is “May you keep hope alight,” Francis a foretaste in which we can already find added. “Be yourselves… a presence that, what we want,” said Father Denis August 28, 2024. Vatican. Led by Cardinal Pierbattista in itself, invites reason, reconciliation, Pizzaballa (above left), Pope Francis met with the Latin rite Malov, CMF, to the participants of the Catholic leaders of several Middle Eastern overcoming with goodwill the divisions youth meeting of the Archdiocese of the and Arabic-speaking countries and enmities stratified and hardened over Mother of God in Moscow, which took time, which are becoming increasingly inextricable.” (CNA) place in early August in Kaliningrad, a Russian exclave between Poland, Lithuania and the Baltic Sea. POPE AGREES TO APPOINTMENTS OF TWO BISHOPS The event was attended by about a hundred young people, CHOSEN BY SYRO-MALABAR CHURCH FOR INDIA mostly between the ages of 14 and 30, including seven faithful The Synod of Bishops of the Syro-Malabar Church, an Eastof the Russian Orthodox Church and three catechumens. During ern Catholic rite in full communion with Rome, appointed two these intense days they were accompanied not only by several new bishops for Changanacherry and Shamshabad in India on priests, but also by the auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese, August 30.

Nikolai Dubinin. The participants, who came from 23 cities in The appointments come after years of internal tensions the territory of the Catholic archdiocese, stayed as guests of the among Syro-Malabar Church leaders regarding a unified liturCatholics of Kaliningrad. gy.

The event was entitled “Rejoice in Hope” (Romans 12:12) In May, Pope Francis warned the Church’s leaders that diviafter the letter that Pope Francis sent to the youth of the world sion is the work of “the devil, the divider” and that unity with for the XXXVIII World Youth Day in Lisbon in 2023.

Rome is essential. “Apart from Peter, apart from the major archThe event in Kaliningrad, conceived as an intermediate stage bishop, there is no Church,” he said. between WYD 2023 and the Holy Year 2025, took place one On the July 3 feast day of St. Thomas the Apostle, the patron year after the Russian Catholic Youth Meeting, held in St. of the Syro-Malabar Church, a compromise was reached to Petersburg two weeks after WYD in Lisbon (see Fides, resolve the liturgical feud.

6/7/2023), and precedes the Holy Year of Youth 2025, also under “The Holy Qurbana [Mass] should not be the reason for divithe theme of hope. sion in the Church,” Syro-Malabar Church spokesman Father The Ecclesiastical Province of the Catholic Church in Russia Antony Vadakkekara told CNA in July. “That is why the synod consists of the Archdiocese of the Mother of God in Moscow made the compromise proposal to say at least one synodal Mass and its three suffragan dioceses: the Diocese of St. Clement in in each of the parishes [in India].” (CNA) Saratov, the Diocese of St. Joseph in Irkutsk and the Diocese of the Transfiguration in Novosibirsk. Since Catholics in the RussIRAQI CARDINAL URGES CHRISTIANS TO GIVE ian Federation represent less than 1% of the total population, ‘TESTIMONY OF LIFE’ communities are usually small and scattered over a wide area, “Today, Christians do not need martyrdom, but what they so the presence of a priest is sometimes quite rare during the need is the testimony of [a] life that positively affects society,” year.m page 48

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OBITUARY: Orthodox Mystic Vassula Rydén The controversial Greek Orthodox self-proclaimed mystic and alleged conduit of messages from the Persons of the Trinity, the Virgin Mary and her guardian angel, Vassula Rydén, 82, died in Switzerland on September 24 of complications after surgery. Her funeral was on October 1 on the Greek isalnd of Rhoddes.

Vassula, as she was commonly known, was born Vassiliki Claudia Pendakis on January 18, 1942, in Heliopolis on the outskirts of Cairo, Egypt, the daughter of Greek Orthodox parents.

When she was 15, her family emigrated to Europe. During her childhood and teens, she said that she experienced waking nightmares attributed to Satan trying to kill her, dreams of a “spiritual marriage” between her and Jesus, and the cries of dead people asking for her help. Nevertheless, she remained indifferent to religion through her youth and earlier adulthood. She married a Lutheran man in a Greek Orthodox church 1966, had two sons, and was divorced in 1980. In 1981, she married another Lutheran, did some modeling, painted in oils and played competitive tennis.

Then in 1985, while living in Bangladesh, while writing a shopping list for a cocktail party, she suddenly experienced “an invisible force” that “pushed my hand.” She added: “ I was not afraid, I do not know why.” She later said the force was her guardian angel, Daniel.

After three months of preparation by “Daniel,” she said she started receiving messages from Jesus Christ, from God the Father, from the Holy Spirit, and from the Virgin Mary, all written in the manner of her hand being guided, she said, by her interlocutors.

The messages were centered on repentance, love of God, and

unity of the Churches, and were in English.

Some of the messages she changed slightly — often making them more doctrinally correct — after their initial publication, claiming God had authorized her to do so.

In 1995, the Catholic Church’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), under Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, issued a “Notification” on the writings of Rydén. The CDF said an “attentive examination” had found “several doctrinal errors.” It questioned the “suspect nature of the ways in which these alleged revelations have occurred” and called the subsequent editing of these errors “a sign that the alleged heavenly messages are merely the result of private meditations.”

On March 16, 2011, the Greek Orthodox Church and synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople issued a disapproval of her teachings and instructed all Orthodox Christians not to associate with her and her organization, “True Life in God.” Rydén continued to produce new volumes of messages in the series True Life in God up until her 12th in 2003.

In 2013, Rydén published Heaven Is Real, But So Is Hell.

Several priests, including Fathers Rene Laurentin, Robert Faricy, and Michael O’Carroll as well as Archbishop Frane Franić, who are major promoters of Our Lady of Međugorje, also actively support Rydén.

In 2005 Bishop Felix Toppo, S.J., D.D., granted the Nihil Obstat and Archbishop Ramon C. Arguelles, STL, DD, granted the Imprimatur to the “True Life in God” books.

In 2014, Cardinal Prosper Grech called Heaven Is Real But So Is Hell an autobiography and apologia in the apocalyptic genre. Grech said that he does not know the origin of Rydén’s visions but that if they bring more people to God then “there is no reason to reject them outright.” (ITV staff)

AnALYSIS: A CRITICAL OPPORTUnITY FOR THE ORTHODOX OF UKRAInE

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he passage of Law 3894, officially outlawing activities of any Church that is “affiliated” with the Russian Orthodox Church, may provide a critical opportunity to reassess the relationship between Ukraine’s two most important Orthodox religious bodies, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (“UOC”) and the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (“OCU”), as well as the relationship of the two with the Ecumenical Patriarchate. At the time of the law’s final passage on August 24, a delegation of the Ecumenical Patriarchate — all three delegation members being ethnic Ukrainians — was in Kyiv to explore the opportunities that may now exist for improving the religious situation in Ukraine. During its visit, the delegation met with the top representatives of the UOC, the OCU, and other religious organizations in an effort to establish a dialogue to help resolve the religious situation in Ukraine. The present may be an opportune time for seeking solutions because the UOC is the primary target of Law 3894 and may now be considering ways to avoid being terminated by the Law. One option the delegation may be considering is the establishment of a temporary structure of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Ukraine to receive parishes, and even dioceses, of the UOC seeking to escape the effects of Law 3894. The OCU is strongly opposed to this option and argues that the Ecumenical Patriarchate has given the OCU exclusive jurisdiction over Ukraine. However, having granted such exclusive jurisdiction, the Ecumenical Patriarchate should have the power to create a structure, limited in duration, which seeks to provide relief in an unusual and urgent situation.

The OCU argues that the solution is for the UOC parishes and dioceses to transfer to the OCU. This would be a complete capitulation by the UOC to the OCU. A considerable number of UOC

parishes have already transferred to the OCU. Often parishes have transferred to the OCU without their pastors, but the OCU does not have sufficient priests to staff all of these parishes. A majority of the UOC parishes will probably not transfer because of their great animosity toward the OCU. The animosity between the UOC and the OCU has become so great that many UOC parishes would prefer to be terminated and to continue their existence without their buildings and governmental recognition rather than join the OCU. The reasons for this animosity include the following: (1) the belief that the OCU does not have apostolic succession and that the ordinations of the OCU are not valid; (2) the belief that the OCU is responsible for the violence and “seizure” of UOC churches; (3) the fact that the OCU has vigorously campaigned for the elimination of the UOC through Law 3894 and through other means.

Although the UOC has severed eucharistic communion with the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the Patriarchate does have apostolic succession, has not been involved in the “war” over churches, and has not vigorously campaigned for Law 3894.

There are now some indications that parts of the UOC, which would find joining the OCU completely unacceptable, would seriously consider joining a temporary structure under the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Because the UOC is not united in its views, this option may involve only part of UOC. In any event, the delegation in considering solutions should be prepared to “think outside of the box”; now may be a unique opportunity for improving the present religious crisis in Ukraine.

(Peter Anderson)

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page 49

TradiTion and BeauTy

sacred music relegaTed To concerTs The sad expulsion of greaT and beauTiful liTurgical music from our worship of god n BY AURELIO PORFIRI *

U

ntil a few hundred years ago, sacred music concerts were not held, simply because sacred music was practiced daily within the liturgy.

There was no need to showcase those pieces of music, as they could already be frequently heard in their proper setting. Certainly, there may have been performances for particularly illustrious individuals or for a small circle of friends, but music was tied to the act of doing something very specific, not to a generic performance in a concert.

There is nothing wrong today with holding sacred music concerts, but it brings us to a painful reflection: those works can now only be heard in this setting and have been almost entirely excluded from their proper context. I do not intend to fuel fanaticism, and I understand that there were understandable reasons behind the liturgical reform, yet I do not think it is wrong to point out that liturgical music has likely gone in a direction that was not originally intended. Many identify Monsignor Annibale Bugnini as the cause of the current situation, but I believe that is not entirely correct. I have spoken with various collaborators of Monsignor Bugnini, and all of them more or less told me that he would have been horrified by the current state of liturgy and sacred music.

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Whatever the truth may be, it is certain that relegating the great heritage of sacred music to concert performances has, in practice, betrayed the directives of Vatican II. Let us recall that the then-Congregation for Divine Worship issued an instruction on concerts in churches on November 5, 1987. Among other things, it stated: Sacred music, both vocal and instrumental, deserves positive recognition. By this we mean ‘that music which, composed for the celebration of divine worship, is endowed with sanctity and goodness of form.’ The Church considers it as ‘a heritage of inestimable value, which excels among other expressions of art,’ recognizes its ‘ministerial role in divine service’; and recommends that ‘the heritage be preserved and carefully cultivated.’ When the performance of sacred music occurs during a [liturgical] celebration, it must adhere to the rhythm and the proper modalities of the same. This often requires limiting the use of works created in a time when active participation of the faithful was not proposed as a source of the true Christian spirit.

This change in the performance of musical works is analogous to that carried out for other artistic creations in the liturgical field, for the sake of celebration: for example, the presbyteries have been restructured with

the presidential seat, the ambo, and the altar ‘versus populum.’ This did not mean disdain for the past but was aimed at a more important goal, which is the participation of the assembly. Any limitation that may occur in the use of these musical works can be compensated by the complete presentation of them outside of [liturgical] celebrations, in the form of sacred music concerts.

Unfortunately, what may seem like a reasonable argument in theory turns out to be flawed in practice, because I don’t believe that encouraging the participation of the assembly should have meant devastating the music in our liturgies. Initiatives should have been encouraged that would elevate the faithful to the beauty of the liturgy, rather than bringing the liturgy down to our level. In this way, true sacred music would have been an important instrument for spiritual elevation. Sacred music was not born for concerts but for the liturgy, and only within it does it have a true reason for existence.

Again, one can understand that performing those compositions in concerts is a way to save them from oblivion, but in another sense, it is also to decree their expulsion from the context where they truly belong and make sense.

Ultimately, this is a great loss, especially for the assembly of the faithful, who are deprived of a form of spiritual nourishment of the highest value.

Many do not see this problem and, certainly in good faith, think that by promoting an intense concert activity, they are saving the great sacred music from abandonment. Indeed, there are pieces that can now only be performed in concerts, even for reasons of excessive length—take, for example, Handel’s marvelous Dixit Dominus. However, much of Renaissance music or music from other periods could still, if desired, find a place in the liturgy. The problem is that there is no desire to do so.

And thus, the concert becomes convenient for easing one’s conscience, even though reality would tell an entirely different story. In reality, concerts do not provide as much help as one might think, because often, the same musical pieces are repeatedly performed.

There is an immense heritage of art and music that lies dormant in dozens and dozens of archives or in books that no one uses anymore. Many of these works could still be used, but it seems that a door is closed to them.

Sacred music was born for the liturgy; this must be made very clear, and we must never think, I repeat, that a concert performance can replace its primary purpose,

which is liturgical. The fact that it no longer finds a place in the liturgy does not justify concerts; rather, it makes it all the more urgent to ask why we are in the present situation. The issue is often flipped, but this is done to avoid facing the real problem. The refusal to call things by their name does not help us find a necessary final solution, but instead, we continue to accept a state of affairs in our churches that does not help the faithful rise to the beauty of the supernatural. When I see prestigious choirs performing certain repertoires in concerts because they are effectively prevented from doing so in the liturgy, I feel a certain sadness, especially because a piece in its appropriate liturgical context has a different effect than a concert performance of the same piece. It is, after all, the same effect one experiences in museums when hundreds of paintings are stacked one above the other, leaving us unable to fully grasp the distinctive beauty of each one.

I realize that the nonsensical opposition we witness, often from priests, forces much music still suited to the liturgy into a context that is not truly its own, as I have tried to explain. All of this can only communicate great sadness, prompting us to reflect deeply on where the liturgical reform is heading. Russian writer Leo Tolstoy said, “What effect does music have? And why does it evoke certain sensations? They claim that music ennobles and refines the spirit. What nonsense! It’s not true at all that it elevates the soul. It does have an effect on it, but it’s an exciting effect. What do you want? Music makes me forget my conditions and my existence; it transports me to a world that is not real.

Under its influence, I seem to feel sensations that I don’t actually feel at all, to think things different from what I commonly think. I am convinced that music has the same effect as yawning or laughter; even if I’m not sleepy, I yawn when I see someone else yawning; even if I have no reason to laugh, I laugh when I see someone else laughing.”

I would add that music makes us delve even deeper into the real and sublimates everything, leading us into a world that is too real, despite what Tolstoy says, for us to see with our wretched human faculties. * Maestro Aurelio Porfiri is a composer, conductor, master organist, writer and educator in Rome. His blog on music, Cantus, is available on Substack, and his latest book, The Right Hand of the Lord Is Exalted: A History of Catholic Traditionalism from Vatican II to Traditionis Custodes, is now available from Sophia Institute Press.m NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN

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Of Books, Art and Peolple

“The Treasure of The holy land” on display in florence n BY LUCY GORDAn The Altar of Calvary before being sent to Florence for Restoration (Courtesy of Brother Stéphane Milovitch)

In the circle, Brother Stéphane Milovitch (Courtesy of Terra Sancta Museum)

Tapestry showing the construction of Cosimo I de' Medici's hospital on Mount Zion (Courtesy of the Marino Marini Museum)

T

he 109 spectacular masterpieces on display until January 8, 2025 at the Marino Marini Museum in Florence chronicle more than five centuries of sacred art. They’d been commissioned by European Catholic courts — Spain, Portugal, France, and the Holy Roman Empire, as well as Genoa, Venice, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, and the Kingdom of Naples, and mostly donated to the Basilica of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, founded in the 4th century AD and considered the holiest site of Christianity. The treasures include jewels, ornaments, chalices, tapestries, liturgical vestments and vessels, codices, icons, paintings, and canopies.

Proclaimed by two papal bulls as the custodians of Christian sacred places in the Holy Land in 1342, since 2013 the Franciscan Order of Friars Minor has been cataloging their share of what’s on display: 87 works of these sacred art treasures, several of which were made in Tuscany. After their donation, none have ever left the Holy Land before this exhbition 52 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

and have ever even been exhibited in Jerusalem.

The remaining some 20 sacred artworks are on loan from Italian Museums: the Uffizi, the Palazzo Reale in Naples, Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte in Naples, Biblioteca Centrale di Firenze, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana in Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana in Florence, Archivio di Stato di Firenze, Fondazione Banco di Napoli, and private collections.

The choice of the exhibition’s Florentine location is for a specific historical reason. From the Middle Ages to the early 19th century, it was the site of the Church of San Pancrazio behind the Palazzo Rucellai. In the mid15th-century, the very wealthy wool merchant and close friend of the Medici family, Giovanni di Paolo Rucellai (1403-1481) commissioned the architect Leon Battista Alberti (1404-72), whom he had met during the Ecumenical Council held in Florence in 1439, to build him a tomb in the family chapel of the Church. Completed in 1467 this sepulcher was inspired by the Holy Sepulcher’s Anastasis in Jerusalem. Its exterior is decorated with green and white marble intarsia; inside, decorated with frescoes by Giovanni da Piamonte, a student of Piero

della Francesca, are the basin (one is on display), betombs of Giovanni Rucellai fore they were served a meal, and his family. Napoleon deafter which they sang the Te consecrated the Church in Deum in the cloister. They cel1805, but not the Rucellai ebrated mass in the morning chapel, which today is in the and visited the Holy Sepulcher Marino Marini Museum, in the early afternoon. The founded in 1986 and the only night was usually spent in the museum of contemporary art Basilica praying. Besides proin a deconsecrated church to viding hospitality the Francishouse a still consecrated cans cared for the sick, both chapel, visitable since Februpilgrims and local Christians, The Cappella Rucellai (Courtesy of the Marino Marini Museum). ary 2013. so on display here are some of Below, portrait of Ferdinand I de' Medici (Courtesy of The Uffizi Museum).

According to Leyla Bezzi, Bottom, a silver bas-relief showng the Resurrection of Christ (1736), their pharmaceutical a gift of the Kingdom of Naples (Courtesy of the Terra Sancta Museum) executive curator, the exhibiequipement. tion is intended to be a jourOn display, country by country, in the ney to Jerusalem in three parts. The third section-located in what had been first part opens with a splendid model of the Church’s crypt-are the artworks and Jerusalem’s Basilica of The Holy Sepultreasures donated by Europe’s royalty. cher made of wood, mother-of-pearl The star of the exhibiton is the Altar of and camel bone in Bethlehem around Calvary from the Holy Sepulcher in Jeru1700 and on loan from Bethlehem-born salem. This masterpiece and its the mascollector and researcher George Alsive gilded bronze Ornament, now an inAma, who recently became a member tegral part of the Altar of Calvary, were of the scientific committee of the Frandonated by Grand Duke of Tuscany Ferciscans’ Terra Sancta Museum. It prodinand I de’ Medici (1549-1609) to ceeds to recount the history of the Holy guard the Stone of Unction, but the stone Sepulcher, the church which contains was too large. Nonetheless it shouldn’t both the site where Jesus was crucified be omitted that Ferdinand had been made at Calvary and the location of his empty cardinal at age 13, though he was never tomb as well as the history of the Rucelordained, and was Protector of the Franlai Chapel. ciscans until he abandoned religious life in 1587 to sucThe second section displays a geographic pilgrimceed his brother as Grand Duke. age where visitors will retrace the itinerary followed The Ornament was made in Florence between 1587 by pilgrims to Jerusalem. Here there are engravings and 1588 under the direction of Father Domenico Portifrom Breydenbach’s “Book of Chronicles” depicting giani of the Convent of St. Mark. It contains six splenthe ports of Venice, Ancona and Jaffa and ending with did bas-reliefs atrributed to Pietro Francavilla and his a panoramic view of the master the sculptor GiamHoly City. The pilgrims arbologna. These six bas-reliefs rived in The Holy Land at each represent an episode of Jaffa, some 40 miles from Christ’s passion and resurrecJerusalem. Accompanied by tion: The Elevation of the the Franciscan Custodian, on Cross, The Crucifixion, The the way they stopped at the Deposition from the Cross, Ramieh Hospice before The Anointing of Christ’s climbing the Judean mounBody, The Burial and The tains and entering Jerusalem Resurrection. (These bas-rethrough the Jaffa gate. They liefs are comparable to bas-rewere received in the Convent liefs by these same artists on of St. Savior, where some the bronze doors of Pisa’s 300 Franciscans still live toCathedral.) Now for the first day. Here the Custodian time in nearly five centuries, washed their feet in a silver the Ornament, like many of NOVEMBER-DECEMBER INSIDE THE VATICAN 53

Of Books, Art and Peolple the artifacts made in Italy, has left Jerusalem to return to Italy for restoration and display. For a complete chronology of the altar click on www.terrasanctamuseum.org.

Another de’ Medici artifact illustrating the dynasty’s religious devotion and affinity for Jerusalem is a splendid tapestry by Jan van der Straet (1523-1605) (design and cartoon) and woven in Florence by Cosimo Squilli in c. 1571. It’s on loan from the Uffizi. Van der Straet was born in Bruges but worked in Florence as a painter, designer of tapestries, draughtsman, designer of prints and pottery decorator most of his professional life. Commissioned by Cosimo I de’ Medici (15191574), Ferdinand I’s father, the tapestry depicts the construction of a hospital for pilgrims on Mount Zion.

Other highlights are a gold and silver altar frontal, a gift of Charles of Bourbon, King of Naples, made in 1731 by the Neapolitan master goldsmith Gennaro De Blasio as well as three previously unknown canvases depicting St. Francis, St. Anthony of Padua, and St. Joseph and the infant Jesus. All three had been painted

by Francesco De Mura (1696-1782), considered the greatest Neapolitan painter of the 18th century. They were commissioned in 1732 by Giovanni Antonio Yepes, Commissioner of the Holy Land in Naples, for

54 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

the Church of the Annunciation in Nazareth.

Before arriving in Florence several of these sacred objects (in particular the Portuguese liturgical objects), were displayed at the Museo Calouste Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon from November 10, 2023 to February 26, 2024 and then another selection at the Cidade da Cultura in Santiago de Compostela in Spain from March 22 to August 4, 2024, “since,” as a wall panel tells us, “until the end of the 18th century, Spain had been the main supporter of the Custody of the Holy Land, regulary sending large sums of money and precious gifts.”

(It should not be forgotten that the Kingdom of Naples was under Spanish rule during the 17th century.)

“After Florence,” Brother Stéphane Milovitch, Director of Cultural Heritage of the Holy Land and Superior of the Francsican Monastery of St. Savior in Jerusalem, e-mailed me a few days ago, “the exhibition will travel to three destinatons in 2025. One will be New York [I read the Frick collection on the Internet], the other two in Europe, but no venues or dates have yet been confirmed. The treasure will return to Jerusalem in 2026 to go on permanent display in a new section of the Terra Sancta Museum in St. Savior’s Convent in 2027.”m

THE END EXCERPTS fRom LoRD of THE WoRLD

“GoD WaS man, THEn, afTER aLL” MORE THAN A CENTURY AGO, MONSIGNOR ROBERT HUGH BEnSOn FORESAW THE RISE OF SECULAR HUMANISM, THE CONTRACTION OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, AND THE COMING OF THE ANTICHRIST n BY ITV STAFF Editor’s Note: The passage below is from the novel Lord of the World, written by the English Catholic convert Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson (the son of the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury) in 1907. He attempts a vision of the world more than a century in the future — in the early 21st century… our own time… predicting the

LORD OF THE WORLD

BY ROBERT HUGH BENSON (1907) BOOK II, THE EnCOUnTER, CHAPTER VIII, SECTIOn I (Note: After the fall of Rome to the forces of the President of Europe, Julian Felsenburgh, and violence against Christians in the London streets, crowds gather at Westminster Abbey in anticipation of Felsenburgh’s personal appearance. Mabel, in the crowd, tells herself that “God was man, and Felsenburgh his Incarnation!”)

A

t about a quarter to ten the crowd at the west end of Victoria Street began to raise its voice in a song, and by the time that was over, and the bells had burst out from the Abbey towers, a rumour had somehow made its entrance that Felsenburgh was to be present at the ceremony. There was no assignable reason for this, neither then nor afterwards; in fact, the Evening Star declared that it was one more instance of the astonishing instinct of human beings en masse; for it was not until an hour later that even the Government were made aware of the facts. Yet the truth remained that at half-past ten one continuous roar went up, drowning even the brazen clamour of the bells, reaching round to Whitehall and the crowded pavements of Westminster Bridge, demanding Julian Felsenburgh. Yet there had been absolutely no news of the President of Europe for the last fortnight, beyond an entirely unsupported report that he was somewhere in the East.

And all the while the motors poured from all directions towards the Abbey and disappeared under the arch into Dean's Yard, bearing those fortunate persons whose tickets actually admitted them to the church itself. Cheers ran and rippled along the lines as the great men were recognised—Lord Pemberton, Oliver Brand and his wife, Mr. Caldecott, Maxwell, Snowford, with the European delegates—even melancholy-faced Mr. Francis himself, the Government ceremoniarius, received a greeting. But by a quarter to eleven, when the pealing bells paused, the stream had stopped, the barriers issued out to stop the roads, the wire palisadings van56

INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

rise of Communism, the fall of faith in many places, the advance of technology (he foresees helicopters) and so forth up until... the Second Coming of the Lord, with which his vision ends. For this reason, and also because Pope Benedict and Pope Francis have repeatedly cited the book, saying its clarification of the danger of a type of humanitarianism without God is a true danger that we do face, we print a selection from it in ITV, now and in the months ahead.

ished, and the crowd for an instant, ceasing its roaring, sighed with relief at the relaxed pressure, and surged out into the roadways. Then once more the roaring began for Julian Felsenburgh.

The sun was now high, still a copper disc, above the Victoria Tower, but paler than an hour ago; the whiteness of the Abbey, the heavy greys of Parliament House, the ten thousand tints of house-roofs, heads, streamers, placards began to disclose themselves.

A single bell tolled five minutes to the hour, and the moments slipped by, until once more the bell stopped, and to the ears of those within hearing of the great west doors came the first blare of the huge organ, reinforced by trumpets. And then, as sudden and profound as the hush of death, there fell an enormous silence.

II As the five-minutes bell began, sounding like a continuous wind-note in the great vaults overhead, solemn and persistent, Mabel drew a long breath and leaned back in her seat from the rigid position in which for the last half-hour she had been staring out at the wonderful sight. She seemed to herself to have assimilated it at last, to be herself once more, to have drunk her fill of the triumph and the beauty. She was as one who looks upon a summer sea on the morning after a storm. And now the climax was at hand.

From end to end and side to side the interior of the Abbey presented a great broken mosaic of human faces; living slopes, walls, sections and curves. The south transept directly opposite to her, from pavement to rose window, was one sheet of heads; the floor was paved with them, cut in two by the scarlet of the gangway leading from the chapel of St. Faith—on the right, the choir beyond the open space before the sanctuary was a mass of white figures, scarved and surpliced; the high organ gallery, beneath which the screen had been removed, was crowded with them, and, far down beneath, the dim nave stretched the same endless pale living pavement to the shadow beneath the west window. Between every group of columns behind the choirstalls, before her, to right, left, and behind, were platforms con-

God as depicted by British poet William Blake as the “architect of creation,” now in the British Museum, London

trived in the masonry; and the exquisite roof, fan-tracery and soaring capital, alone gave the eye an escape from humanity. The whole vast space was full, it seemed, of delicate sunlight that streamed in from the artificial light set outside each window, and poured the ruby and the purple and the blue from the old glass in long shafts of colour across the dusty air, and in broken patches on the faces and dresses behind. The murmur of ten thousand voices filled the place, supplying, it seemed, a solemn accompaniment to that melodious note that now pulsed above it. And finally, more significant than all, was the empty carpeted sanctuary at her feet, the enormous altar with its flight of steps, the gorgeous curtain and the great untenanted sedilia. **** Mabel needed some such reassurance, for last night, until the coming of Oliver, had passed for her as a kind of appalling waking dream. From the first shock of what she had seen outside the church, through those hours of waiting, with the knowledge that this was the way in which the Spirit of Peace asserted its superiority, up to that last moment when, in her husband's arms, she had learned of the Fall of Rome, it had appeared to her as if her new world had suddenly corrupted about her. It was incredible, she told herself, that this ravening monster, dripping blood from claws and teeth, that had arisen roaring in the night, could be the Humanity that had become her God. She had thought revenge and cruelty and slaughter to be the brood of Christian superstition, dead and buried under the new-born angel of light, and now it seemed that the monsters yet stirred and lived. All the evening she had sat, walked, lain about her quiet house with the horror heavy about her, flinging open a window now and again in the icy air to listen with clenched hands to the cries and the roarings of the mob that raged in the streets beneath, the clanks, the yells and the hoots of the motor-trains that tore up from the country to swell the frenzy of the city—to watch the red glow of fire, the volumes of smoke that heaved up from the burning chapels and convents.

She had questioned, doubted, resisted her doubts, flung out frantic acts of faith, attempted to renew the confidence that she attained in her meditation, told herself that traditions died slowly; she had knelt, crying out to the spirit of peace that lay, as she knew so well, at the heart of man, though overwhelmed for the moment by evil passion. A line or two ran in her head from one of the old Victorian poets: You doubt If any one Could think or bid it? How could it come about?… Who did it? Not men! Not here! Oh! not beneath the sun…. The torch that smouldered till the cup o'er-ran The wrath of God which is the wrath of Man! She had even contemplated death, as she had told her husband — the taking of her own life, in a great despair with the world.

Seriously she had thought of it; it was an escape perfectly in accord with her morality. The useless and agonising were put out of the world by common consent; the Euthanasia houses witnessed to it. Then why not she?… For she could not bear it!…

Then Oliver had come, she had fought her way back to sanity and

confidence; and the phantom had gone again.

How sensible and quiet he had been, she was beginning to tell herself now, as the quiet influence of this huge throng in this glorious place of worship possessed her once more—how reasonable in his explanation that man was even now only convalescent and therefore liable to relapse. She had told herself that again and again during the night, but it had been different when he had said so. His personality had once more prevailed; and the name of Felsenburgh had finished the work.

“If He were but here!" she sighed. But she knew He was far away. **** It was not until a quarter to eleven that she understood that the crowds outside were clamouring for Him too, and that knowledge reassured her yet further. They knew, then, these wild tigers, where their redemption lay; they understood what was their ideal, even if they had not attained to it. Ah! if He were but here, there would be no more question: the sullen waves would sink beneath His call of peace, the hazy clouds lift, the rumble die to silence. But He was away—away on some strange business.

Well; He knew His work. He would surely come soon again to His children who needed Him so terribly.

She had the good fortune to be alone in a crowd. Her neighbour, a grizzled old man with his daughters beyond, was her only neighbour, and a stranger. At her left rose up the red-covered barricade over which she could see the sanctuary and the curtain; and her seat in the tribune, raised some eight feet above the floor, removed her from any possibility of conversation. She was thankful for that: she did not want to talk; she wanted only to control her faculties in silence, to reassert her faith, to look out over this enormous throng gathered to pay homage to the great Spirit whom they had betrayed, to renew her own courage and faithfulness. She wondered what the preacher would say, whether there would be any note of penitence. Maternity was his subject—that benign aspect of universal life—tenderness, love, quiet, receptive, protective passion, the spirit that soothes rather than inspires, that busies itself with peaceful tasks, that kindles the lights and fires of home, that gives sleep, food and welcome….

The bell stopped, and in the instant before the music began she heard, clear above the murmur within, the roar of the crowds outside, who still demanded their God. Then, with a crash, the huge organ awoke, pierced by the cry of the trumpets and the maddening throb of drums. There was no delicate prelude here, no slow stirring of life rising through labyrinths of mystery to the climax of sight—here rather was full-orbed day, the high noon of knowledge and power, the dayspring from on high, dawning in midheaven. Her heart quickened to meet it, and her reviving confidence, still convalescent, stirred and smiled, as the tremendous chords blared overhead, telling of triumph full-armed. God was man, then, after all — a God who last night had faltered for an hour, but who rose again on this morning of a new year, scattering mists, dominant over his own passion, all-compelling and allbeloved. God was man, and Felsenburgh his Incarnation! Yes, she must believe that! She did believe that! (to be continued) NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN

57

VATICAN WATCH

By Matthew Trojacek with CNA Reports - Grzegorz Galazka and CNA photos

AUGUST FRIDAY 9

POPE FRANCIS CONVEYS “MESSAGE OF HOPE” TO CHINESE CATHOLICS, DESIRE TO VISIT CHINA Pope Francis conveyed a “message of hope” to Chinese Catholics and expressed his desire to one day visit the Basilica of Holy Mary, the Help of Christians, in Shanghai, China, during an interview conducted May 24 but released on August 9.

In an interview at the Vatican with Father Pedro Chia, the director of the press office of the Chinese Province of the Society of Jesus, the Pope said he would “really want to” conduct an apostolic visit to China to visit the shrine and meet with bishops and Catholics in the country.

“Show the way to God through the spiritual exercises and discernment,” Pope Francis said in his message to Chinese Jesuits. “Walk with the poor [and with] those whose dignity has been violated in a mission of reconciliation and justice and… accompany young people in the creation of a hope-filled future and… take care of our common home.”

At the end of the interview, the Pope bestowed a blessing on the Chinese people and prayed for the intercession of Our Lady of Sheshan. (CNA)

Port of Beirut explosion in a private audience at the Vatican on August 26, expressing his sorrow and closeness with families suffering due to the ongoing political turmoil in Lebanon.

“I continue to keep you and your loved ones in my prayers, and I join my tears to your own,” the Holy Father shared. “Together with you, I think of all those whose lives were taken by that enormous explosion.”

Four years since the deadly blast that killed more than 220 people and injured some 6,500 people in the country’s capital, investigations into the actual cause of the explosion remain stalled due to political wrangling. (CNA) TUESDAY 27

WHY CHINA’S RECOGNITION OF AN 95-YEAR-OLD BISHOP COULD BE A VERY BIG DEAL “The Holy See has learned with satisfaction that today, August 27, 2024, Bishop Melchior Shi Hongzhen has been officially recognized under civil law as bishop of Tianjin,” according to a Vatican press office statement.

Bishop Shi Hongzhen, 95, has led the Diocese of Tianjin since 2019 — having previously been coadjutor of the diocese since 1982. He is believed to be the first Catholic bishop government authorities have recognized who has not formally joined the state-sponsored Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association.

With the Vatican’s agreement with THURSDAY 22 An image of the Our Lady of Sorrows in the Beijing on episcopal appointments set VATICAN APPROVES DEVOTION Catholic Shrine of Chandavila, Spain for renewal in the fall, Shi’s recogniTO 1945 APPARITION OF OUR tion by the state has been hailed by some China-watchers LADY OF SORROWS IN SPAIN as a sign of real progress for the Holy See. The Vatican has accepted the decree of an archbishop In fact, Shi’s acceptance as a bishop by state authoriapproving the spiritual activities of the Catholic Shrine of ties — and crucially his acceptance of a formula for acChandavila in the town of La Codosera in Badajoz, Spain, cepting state recognition — could provide a template for where Our Lady of Sorrows is alleged to have appeared resolving an impasse which has plagued Vatican-China to two young girls at the end of World War II. relations since 2018, and kept dozens of bishops underAn August 22 letter from the Dicastery for the Docground and subject to state harassment. (ThePillar) trine of the Faith (DDF) called Our Lady of Sorrows of Chandavila a “beautiful devotion” with “many positive WEDNESDAY 28 aspects,” including conversions, healing, and other visiPOPE FRANCIS CONDEMNS SYSTEMATIC ble signs of the action of the Holy Spirit in the pilgrims PUSHBACK OF MIGRANTS AS A “GRAVE SIN” who visit the shrine.

Pope Francis announced that he was “postponing the The letter, signed by DDF prefect Cardinal Víctor usual catechesis,” given every Wednesday, to renew his Manuel Fernández and approved by Pope Francis in an plea in favor of welcoming migrants, “who — even at this audience on the same day, said the shrine “may continue moment — are crossing seas and deserts to reach a land to offer to the faithful who wish to approach it a place of where they can live in peace and safety,” he said. interior peace, consolation, and conversion.” (CNA) This new appeal, made August 28 in St. Peter’s Square, comes the day after the Italian Ministry of the InMONDAY 26 terior released statistics showing a 65% decrease in the POPE FRANCIS MEETS WITH FAMILIES OF 2020 BEIRUT BLAST VICTIMS number of illegal migrants entering the country compared Pope Francis met with 30 relatives of victims of the to 2023 (40,138, down from 113,469 last year).

58 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

The entrance of the Pontifical John Paul II Theological Institute for Marriage and the Family (Photo G. Galazka). In the circle, Father Maurizio Chiodi.

Below, a statue of Blessed Carlo Acutis next to that of St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta in a religious goods shop in Rome (Photo Paolo Fucili)

While the Pope made no direct reference to these figures or the restrictive immigration policy pursued by Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, he strongly condemned “those who work systematically and with every means possible to repel migrants.”

“This, when done with awareness and responsibility, is a grave sin,” said Francis, quoting a verse from the Book of Exodus (22:20): “You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him.” (LaCroix)

SEPTEMBER TUESDAY 17

POPE FRANCIS TELLS YOUNG PEOPLE TO PRIORITIZE THE EUCHARIST LIKE CARLO ACUTIS Pope Francis in his youth message released on September 17 encouraged young people to imitate Blessed Carlo Acutis in prioritizing “the great gift of the Eucharist.”

“As Blessed Carlo Acutis said, the Eucharist is the highway to heaven,” the Pope wrote in his message for diocesan World Youth Days.

Pope Francis pointed to how Blessed Carlo made praying before the Eucharist “his most important daily appointment,” which gave him the strength to persevere in his journey of faith. “I encourage all of you to rediscover the great gift of the Eucharist!” the Pope said.

Francis approved the second miracle attributed to Acutis’ intercession this past spring, paving the way for his canonization during the Catholic Church’s 2025 Jubilee Year. (CNA) THURSDAY 19

VATICAN APPROVES DEVOTION AT MEDJUGORJE WHILE NOT PRONOUNCING ON AUTHENTICITY OF “ALLEGED MESSAGES” In a highly anticipated report on the alleged decades-long apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Medjugorje, the Vatican’s doctrinal office endorsed prudent devotion to Mary at the popular pilgrimage site in Bosnia-Herzegovina yet withheld any declaration on whether the alleged visions are supernatural in origin.

The September 19 note from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF), signed by prefect Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández and approved by Pope Francis in an August 28 audience, grants a “nihil obstat” to the spiritual experience at Medjugorje. The authoritative judgment means that pilgrims may continue to visit and

pray at the site, as some 40 million people from around the world have done since the apparitions allegedly first began 43 years ago. While it offers no definitive judgment on the supernatural authenticity of the alleged apparitions, the Vatican’s report highlights the abundant good fruits that have come from Medjugorje. (CNA) MONDAY 23

POPE FRANCIS NAMES CONSULTANTS TO VATICAN DOCTRINE OFFICE, INCLUDING CONTROVERSIAL THEOLOGIAN Pope Francis has named 28 new consultors to the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, including moral theologian Father Maurizio Chiodi, who has expressed opinions contrary to Church teaching. Chiodi, a moral theologian, has come under media scrutiny in recent years for suggesting contraception use in marriage could be morally permissible in some circumstances.

In a 2017 lecture in Rome, the priest also said that homosexual relationships “under certain conditions” could be “the most fruitful way” for those with same-sex attraction “to enjoy good relations.” Chiodi was made a theology professor at the Pontifical John Paul II Theological Institute for Marriage and the Family Sciences in 2019 following its refounding by Pope Francis. He has also been a member of the Pontifical Academy for Life since 2017. (CNA) SUNDAY 29

CATHOLIC INSTITUTE FOR NONVIOLENCE LAUNCHES IN ROME Cardinal Charles Maung Bo, Archbishop of Yangon, Myanmar, and Cardinal Robert McElroy, Bishop of San Diego, California, took part on September 29 in the inauguration of the new Catholic Institute for Nonviolence, founded by Pax Christi International, a movement that promotes peace and consists of 120 organizations from all around the world. The Rome-based Institute will be dedicated to promoting nonviolence as a central teaching of the Catholic Church, embarking on the mission of making research, resources, and experiences in nonviolence more accessible for Church leaders and global institutions. The event was held at the “Istituto Maria Santissima Bambina” in Rome. Sister Teresia Wachira, from the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and renowned author and researcher Dr. Maria Stephan, moderated the event and conversation. (VaticanNews)n NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN 59

PEOPLE B M Y

ATTHEW TROJACEK with G. Galazka photos

SWISS GUARDS SEND SUPPLIES TO UKRAINE The Pope’s charity has arrived once again at the epicenter of the conflict in Ukraine, extending his solidarity to the devastated region of Kharkiv, one of the areas most stricken by Russian bombings. On August 12, after an arduous four-day trip from Rome, trucks loaded with essential supplies, such as food, medicine, clothes, and hygiene products, reached their destination, giving respite to the population.

This humanitarian effort, organized by the Dicastery for Charity, under the direction of Polish Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, is a continuation of the aid that the Vatican has been carrying out since the beginning of the war.

On this occasion, young members of the Pontifical Swiss Guard, the Pope’s personal bodyguard, played a crucial role, dedicating hours to load the trucks manually in the Roman parish of Saint Sophia.

The aid, which was not only received by the local community but also shared with the Greek-Catholic Church of the region, was welcomed with profound gratitude.

In an emotive message captured on video, Greek-Catholic Bishop Vasyl Tuchapets, of the Kharkiv Eparchy, expressed his gratitude to Pope Francis and the Holy See for their constant support. (Zenit) POPE FRANCIS MEETS WITH AMAZON FOUNDER JEFF BEZOS In an unexpected meeting, Pope Francis welcomed Amazon founder Jeff Bezos to Casa Santa Marta for a private audience on August 15.

Bezos, one of the world’s wealthiest individuals with a fortune estimated to exceed $200 billion, was accompanied by his fiancée, Lauren Sánchez.

The visit, unannounced by the Vatican and kept off the official agenda, has sparked curiosity and speculation about the topics discussed.

Sánchez offered a glimpse into the meeting through her social media, expressing the couple’s deep honor at being received by the pontiff.

She described the encounter as profoundly moving, highlighting Pope Francis’ wisdom, warmth, and humor.

According to Sánchez, one of the key subjects of discussion was the urgent need for climate action — a cause close to the hearts of both Bezos and the Pope. (Zenit) ARCHBISHOP SAYS AFRICA’S OPPOSITION TO “LGBTQ+” RIGHTS NOT “CULTURAL” BUT BIBLICAL Archbishop Andrew Nkea Fuanya of Cameroon’s Bamenda archdiocese addressed this topic during the August 23 session of the ongoing week60 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

POPE OFFERS REFUGE TO MYANMAR’S JAILED SUU KYI

Pope Francis meets Aung San Suu Kyi in Myanmar (2017)

P

ope Francis has offered to give refuge on Vatican territory to Myanmar’s detained former leader Aung San Suu Kyi, Italian media reported on September 24.

“I asked for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi and I met her son in Rome. I have proposed to the Vatican to give her shelter on our territory,” the Pope said according to an account of meetings with Jesuits in Asia during his trip there earlier this month.

The Corriere della Sera daily published an article by Italian priest Antonio Spadaro giving extracts from these private meetings, which took place in Indonesia, East Timor, and Singapore between September 2 and 13.

Suu Kyi, 78, is serving a 27-year prison sentence on charges ranging from corruption to not respecting Covid pandemic restrictions. In 2015, her National League for Democracy won Myanmar’s first democratic election in 25 years.

She was arrested by the military when it staged a coup in 2021 and is said by local media to be suffering health problems in detention. (UCANews) ly synodal discussions, organized by the Pan-African Catholic Theology and Pastoral Network (PACTPAN) in collaboration with the Conference of Major Superiors of Africa and Madagascar (COMSAM).

“When we went to the Synod, it was clear that Africa had to take responsibility for its own destiny,” Nkea said.

“We knew we had to make our voice heard in the first phase of the Synod.”

He explained that making Africa’s voice heard was “not talking purely from a cultural background.”

The archbishop said Africa was talking “from the background of the traditions of our fathers and from the background of the teachings of the Church.”

“In presenting our points at the Synod, therefore, we did not want to be seen as presenting points of Africa because of the culture from which we came.

“Our stand had nothing to do with culture; it was about fidelity to the truth; fidelity to what Christ taught; it was about fidelity to what the Apostles handed down to generations,” he said. (Crux)

SISTER AGNES SASAGAWA, OUR LADY OF AKITA DENVER PARISH AT HEART VISIONARY, DIES AT 93 OF SCANDALS INVOLVING PERU-BASED LAY GROUP Sister Agnes Sasagawa, a Japanese Ten key members of a controversial nun of the Handmaids of the Holy Eulay movement in Peru, the Sodalitium charist whose purported visions of the Christianae Vitae (SCV), have been exVirgin Mary under the title of Our pelled from the group as part of an onLady of Akita included stark warnings going Vatican investigation of charges for humanity and instructions to pray the of abuse and misconduct, including alrosary and repent of sin, died August 15 at age 93. leged financial irregularities.

She famously received a purported series of mesThe announcement comes after over sages from Mary and witnessed other supernatural a year of inquiry by the Vatican’s top inphenomena beginning 50 years ago. vestigating duo, Maltese Archbishop Bishop John Shojiro Ito of Niigata, Charles Scicluna, an adjunct secretary who founded Sasagawa’s order and died in 1993, gave the to the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the faithful in his diocese permission to venerate Our Lady of Faith, and Spanish Monsignor Jordi Akita in April 1984 after eight years of investigation, finding Bertomeu, an official in the same dethat her messages contain “nothing contrary to Catholic docpartment. trine or morals.”

The expelled members include EdThe Vatican, which earlier this year issued new norms mandatuardo Regal, superior of the SCV’s ing that the Vatican’s top doctrinal office “must always be consulted and give Denver-based community; Father final approval” to alleged Marian apparitions, has not officially ruled on Our Daniel Cardó, pastor of the SCV-run Lady of Akita. (CNA) Holy Name parish in Denver; and Alejandro Bermúdez, a journalist and forThe expulsions, announced by the Peruvian Episcopal mer head of the EWTN-owned ACI Group, an international Conference (CEP), were personally approved by Pope media conglomerate that includes the English-language Francis.

(Crux) Catholic News Agency website.

He lives in the SCV Denver community house and now CHURCHES SHELTER PEOPLE ESCAPING runs Tilma Strategies LLC and is a consultant for Catholic VIOLENCE IN LEBANON media, including the website Catholic Vote.

Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon meant to target Hezbollah militants have led to JAPANESE SCULPTOR TO RECEIVE over 550 deaths, including 50 children PRESTIGIOUS RATZINGER PRIZE and 94 women, the Lebanese Health Ministry said. Christian churches in the or the first time, a native of Japan will be awardcountry are sheltering people escaping vied the Ratzinger Prize, begun in 2011 to recogolence. nize scholars whose work demonstrates a signifi“People are now living in church cant contribution to theology in the spirit of Cardihalls, so they will need food, sanitary nal Joseph Ratzinger, the Bavarian theologian products, mattresses, blankets, and if it who became Pope Benedict XVI. continues, we will need heating for winWhen Etsurō Sotoo, born in 1953 ter, though of course, we hope it will not in Fukuoka, Japan, visited Spain in last that long,” said Marielle Boutros, 1978, his life changed. In Barcelona, project coordinator in Lebanon for the impressed by the Sagrada Familia pontifical charity Aid to the Church in basilica then under construction, he Need. asked to work on the project as a sculptor. FollowAccording to The Associated Press, ing instructions left by Antoni Gaudí, the the Lebanese Health Ministry told jourrenowned Spanish architect of the monument, Sotoo began his nalists on September 24 that 16 parawork on the basilica’s Nativity façade. During his stay in medics and firefighters were among those Barcelona, Sotoo converted to Catholicism and was bapkilled, and 1,835 people had been woundtized. Sotoo became an enthusiastic advocate of the cause of ed in the attacks. canonization of Gaudí, known as “God’s architect.” Sotoo’s Despite concerns by world leaders of handiwork is found in various parts of the Basilica escalating violence in the Middle East, of the Sagrada Familia and in other places in Spain as well as Israel has expanded its attacks against in Japan and Italy, in the Cathedral of Florence. Cardinal Hamas by targeting its closest ally in Pietro Parolin, Secretary of State of the Holy See, is schedLebanon.

(UCANews)m uled to present the prize on Friday, November 22. (CNA)

F

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024 INSIDE THE VATICAN 61

Food FoR THoUGHT n BY MOTHER MARTHA

O

n July 31, UNESCO proclaimed the Via Appia, or Appian Way, Italy’s 60th World Heritage Site.

Running about 500 miles from Rome south to Brindisi and lined with cyAND presses and umbrella pines, the Via Appia was begun in 312 BC by its namesake, the blind Censor Apppius Claudius Caecus, for military reasons. Nicknamed regina viarum or “queen of the roads”, it’s the oldest of Rome’s consular roads and widely considered the world’s first highway.

The ancient Romans, first the pagans and later the Christians, didn’t bury their dead within the city limits, but instead along extra-urban roads. Thus, the monuments along the Via Appia’s first 5 miles from its starting point at the Porta San Sebastiano are mainly pagan tombstones and family tombs, the Christian catacombs of Calixtus, of Domitilla, and of St. Sebastian, and even a Jewish catacomb. Secular sights here include the Museum of the 3rdcentury Aurelian Wall in the Porta, a circus built by the Emperor Maxentius, baths, and a patrician villa.

In 2023, some 60,000 tourists visited this first stretch. The internet suggests several types of tour: by public transport, bicycle, e-bike, on foot or the most restful — and my favorite — the hop-on, hop-off buses. To plan your visit in advance consult the Appia Antica Service Center, tel. +395135316, e-mail: puntoappia@parcoappiaantica.it or website: www.infopointappia.it. Other practical hints: Sunday is the best day to visit because private motor vehicles are banned; wear comfortable shoes and a sun hat; and bring a water bottle and sunscreen. If you’re tired at your tour’s end and opt for a taxi to return downtown, make sure it’s an official white one with its meter on and write down its logo before entering to avoid a fare misunderstanding at your destination.

If you decide to linger instead, the three best restaurants, all in or next to ancient monuments, are: The closest to downtown is at Via Appia no. 68 — Priscilla, at the foot of the 1st-century AD sepulcher of Priscilla, the wife of Titus Flavius Abascanus, a freedman of the emperor Domitian. It’s also across from the Chiesa del Domine Quo Vadis, a small 17th-century church. Here St. Peter, who was fleeing persecution by the Emperor Nero, had a vision of the risen Christ.

According to tradition, Peter asked: “Lord, where are you going?” Christ answered, “I’m going to Rome to be crucified

again.” So Peter understood and turned back to face his death.

Priscilla was founded in 1902 by Margherita and her husband Nazzareno, both from near Rieti, who were the grandparents of present owner Alessandro Ratini. However, it was first documented on a cadastral map as a post station and restaurant in 1436. My favorite Roman specialties here include: home-grown fried artichokes, tonnarelli cacio pepe, and pappardelle al cinghiale.

Closed Sunday evenings.

Also on Via Appia, at no. 139, is Archeologia, originally a grandiose tomb for a wealthy Roman official and his family. Like the pyramids of ancient Egypt, it was built not just to house the dead, but to dazzle passers-by and boost the owner’s reputation. Founded in 1804, Archeologia is the perfect dining location after a day of walking or bicycling.

Only its location is ancient; its contemporary menu is very imaginative, if a bit overly sophisticated and pricey. I recommend the fish stew and the homemade gnocchi with calamari and cherry tomatoes. Open only in the evening. Closed Tuesday.

I already mentioned Hostaria Antica Roma in my June 2015 “Food For Thought”, but it’s moved to no. 176 — across from the round tomb of noblewoman Cecilia Metella, whose father and husband were rich patricians and successful generals of late Republican Rome, and near the Church of San Nicola and the St. Sebastian catacombs. Since the move owners Massimo and Norina have passed it down to their affable son Paolo.

Hostaria Antica Roma continues to feature family recipes and a menu of ancient dishes attributed to Apicius, like patina cotidiana, Latin for “daily dish”, a mixture of omelet and tomato-free lasagna, pullum oxizomum, pieces of chicken cooked with leeks, olive oil, vinegar and garum (the ubiquitous ancient Roman salty seasoning made from macerated fish interiors), and tiropatina, Apicius’ version of crème caramel, to name a few. Obviously, no dishes include ingredients like tomatoes, potatoes or chocolate which Columbus brought back from the New World. With advance notice, owner Paolo will organize an ancient Roman banquet — not to mention that the hostaria’s beautiful garden is a favorite venue for school graduations, private parties, and weddings. Closed Sunday evening and Monday. Reservations recommended.m

THE APPIAN WAY:

DIRECTIONS, SIGHTS, GASTRONOMY

From left: the church of Domine Quo Vadis, the catacombs of St. Calixtus, where in the 3rd century AD 500,000 Christians were buried, early photo of Priscilla, the garden of Hostaria Antica Roma with the Tomb of Cecilia Metella in background; and Pullum oxizomum

62 INSIDE THE VATICAN NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2024

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