THINGS IN ROME GET CURIOUSER AND CURIOUSER

The news from Rome gets curiouser and curiouser.

A delegation from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) met with Pope Francis today, Monday.

Curious because no mention of this long-scheduled meeting (as the Press Office describes it) was made at the time of last month's meeting between the Holy Father and a USCCB delegation which requested that Pope Francis approve an Apostolic Visitation to the United States to investigate the scandal involving the disgraced McCarrick.

On hand for that meeting were President Cardinal Daniel DiNardo; Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles, Vice president of the USCCB; Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston in his role as President of the Vatican’s Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors; and Monsignor Brian Bransfield, Secretary-general of the USCCB.

Today’s meeting featured some of the same characters including  DiNardo, Gomez and Bransfield, along with another USCCB official. Cardinal O’Malley was not on hand, since he does not have an official role in the Bishops’ Conference.

Readers will recall that Pope Francis turned down the August request for an Apostolic Visitation.

However, on Saturday, the Holy See Press Office indicated that the Vatican had launched its own internal review of its files on McCarrick stating that a  “thorough study of the entire documentation present in the archives of the dicasteries and offices of the Holy See”  is underway in order to ascertain “all the relevant facts, to place them in their historical context and to evaluate them objectively”.

What should be noted is the fact that this so-called “thorough study” will take place by way of an “internal review” of the files which the Vatican has in its possession.

The Holy See’s claims at thoroughness notwithstanding, the fact that the investigation will not be open and transparent, conducted in association with independent investigators, means that no one is going to take the findings of such a study with any depth of assurance or certitude.

And the Vatican continues to amaze with its total lack of comprehension regarding the need for such transparency.

A dear friend of mine called to share his exasperation over this latest Vatican spin and said:  “They just don’t get it.  They don’t understand that the scandal isn’t over the just the abuse but the concerted effort by Church leaders to cover up and protect the abusers, leaving even more innocents to be assaulted.  People have lost confidence in the leadership within the Church, going all the way up the chain of command to the Pope himself.  No one is going to trust any claim that a ‘thorough study’ was conducted by the very people who abused the trust of the faithful already.”

The Vatican could benefit from my friend’s wisdom.

But it appears the new modus operandi of the Holy See Press Office is spin.

On Sunday, Canadian Cardinal Marc Ouellet, Prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for Bishops, released personal statement charging that Archbishop Vigano is guilty of “blasphemy” and a “political frame-job,” suggesting his accusations are “devoid of a real foundation.”

What were the headlines?   Vatican Defends Pope Against “Blasphemous” Cover Up Claims.

The Holy See offered no official statement.  

Cardinal Oullet’s letter was a personal rebuke to Archbishop Vigano. 

And, as I stated in a previous post, His Eminence's attempt to refute the Archbishop’s allegation by semantic slight of hand backfired as his letter confirmed the fact that McCarrick was indeed under order to curtail his public activities and retreat into a life of “discernment, penance and prayer” well over a decade ago, an order which both McCarrick and Pope Francis appear to have ignored.

As I said at the outset, things from Rome get curiouser and curiouser.