How Pope Francis Plans to ‘Fix’ the Curia

by Kilian SC · November 29, 2018

Pope Francis speaks during his annual pre-Christmas meeting with top Vatican officials last year. The pope is preparing to issue a new apostolic constitution which is intended to change the culture of the Vatican’s bureaucracy. (Photo: Claudio Peri/Reuters/CNS)

A new constitution to rule the Roman curia, as the bureaucracy of the Vatican is known, will reflect Pope Francis’ call for a missionary Church that is focused on preaching the Gospel.

This is according to Bishop Marcello Semeraro, the secretary of the pope’s international Council of Cardinals.

Addressing students and staff at Rome’s Pontifical Lateran University, Bishop Semeraro said that the document will also focus on the need for subsidiarity and “a healthy decentralisation”, which will strengthen the Church’s mission to serve others.

“Subsidiarity” is the principle that matters ought to be handled by the smallest, lowest or least centralised competent authority where that is possible.
“The Roman curia is not only an instrument at the service of the Roman pontiff, but also an instrument of service to the particular churches,” Bishop Semeraro said.

The current draft of the document, titled Praedicate Evangelium (“Preach the Gospel”), was reviewed by the international Council of Cardinals — the so-called C9 — and a final draft was given to Pope Francis in June.

Currently, Bishop Semeraro said, the draft is undergoing “stylistic revision” and a “canonical re-reading”, which are two necessary stages of development before its release.

The bishop did not say when its publication is expected.
“A stylistic revision means giving the text the best ‘literary’ coherence possible after the work has been completed. The same can be said for the canonical re-reading, given the legal nature of the document,” he explained.

The Italian prelate said that the key to understanding the pope’s vision of the reform of the Roman curia lies in his apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium (“The Joy of the Gospel”), in which Pope Francis called for a “missionary option” in the Church that is geared towards “the evangelisation of today’s world rather than for her self-preservation”.

Changes to the structure of the Roman curia are made in the light of Church tradition and must be in keeping with “the principle of fidelity to history and continuity with the past”, the bishop emphasised.

“It is precisely according to this principle that it would be misleading to think of a reform that would upset the entire structure of the curia,” Bishop Semeraro said.

While the existence of the various dicasteries must be preserved, like any “structure of service, it always needs a permanent sort of maintenance”.
For Pope Francis, he said, the path towards curial reform “is much more than any structural change”.

Reform, Bishop Semeraro said, is about doing what “is necessary so that in the course of time and in changing situations, the Church may preserve her ‘sacramentality’, that is, her transparency towards God who makes her exist and dwells in her”.—By Junno Arocho Esteves, CNS