A little more than a year after the election, the Pope brings together the cardinals divided into working groups. A clear discontinuity compared to past years. From the reform of the “just war” to the management of migrants: this is what the 178 cardinals gathered in Rome are deciding.
“War is never worthy of man, and is never blessed by God, because the Creator has endowed us with intelligence and will to resolve conflicts as human beings and not as beasts, perhaps equipped with hyper-technological weapons”, those are very strong words pronounced yesterday by Pope Leo XIV it was quite clear yesterday, in the homily at mass Saint Peter which in fact opened the Extraordinary consistory.
The pontiff also recalled that «the unity of the human family precedes individual peoples and states. It’s not just a biological fact: it’s an ethical principle.” After this warning, yesterday morning 178 cardinals took part in the Consistory, which was opened by another significant intervention by the Pope, preceded by a greeting from the cardinal John the Baptist King.
The ecclesial meaning and agenda of the four thematic focuses
But before dwelling on this intervention, it is worth remembering the ecclesial significance of this Consistory, which is already the second convened by Provost: just over a year after his election, which is certainly not marginal. Even more so if we consider that, during the pontificate of Pope Francis, the cardinals spent several years without meeting in Rome. Coming more specifically to the two days that began yesterday, the cardinals were divided into two sets: one of 9 groups of ordinary cardinal electors – including nuncios and cardinal electors who concluded their service as ordinary – and the other of 11 groups of cardinal electors of the Roman Curia and non-electoral cardinals; each group with a president and a secretary.
As anticipated in a letter from the cardinal dean John the Baptist Kingthe agenda has four thematic focuses: the international situation, peace and overcoming the “just war” theory, the encyclical Magnificent humanity and the implementation of the Synod. To address these issues, yesterday morning the cardinals – in the first session, entitled “In which world are we called to announce the Gospel?” – they reflected on two questions. The first wondered “what sufferings, tensions and questions” are affecting “today with greater force the peoples and ecclesial communities entrusted to your care”; the second focused on “which signs of hope, of fidelity to the Gospel and of possible reconciliation it is important to bring to common listening”.
By developing these questions, the cardinals highlighted “the need to deal in a Christian way with the migration phenomenon” and the “need for real integration policies”. Faced with this, and also with contexts of mistrust and degradation, it has also emerged “how necessary it is for the Church to show itself as a mother, a welcoming place, also by restructuring the parishes”. In the afternoon, however, the cardinals – in the second session, entitled “The culture of power and the civilization of love” – reflected on the way in which “the tensions, divisions and conflicts that cross the world today affect the life of our Churches and our peoples” and on “which languages, attitudes and practices can help build reconciliation, coexistence and peace”. However, all these works were anticipated by an intervention by Pope Leo XIV very significant, and not only for the consistory.
The games on the Vatican table and the risk of schism
In fact, after the singing of the Veni Creator Spiritus and the greeting of Cardinal Re – who said he was “pleased” to participate in the Consistory in a “difficult moment for humanity” -, Provost took the floor for an introductory speech to the proceedings, in which there were several significant passages. The most relevant were two. First of all, the Pope asked the cardinals for “strong, explicit, public” support. Three adjectives – especially the last one – difficult to reduce to a practice; therefore talk about a simple request for help (although, in effect, the same Provost said: «I would like to ask you for special help»), risks being misleading or, at least, partial. Also because it makes you wonder why on earth Leo XIV – an undisputed religious leader as well as a monarch – needs “public” support. The feeling is that behind this last term there is, in the Pope, the awareness that complex days lie ahead for the Church.
There are at least two games on the table. On the one hand, in a few days they will be carried out by Fraternity of Saint Pius the announced appointments of bishops without mandate and agreement with Rome – which could lead to a risk of schism -, on the other hand, no less serious stomach aches continually arise from Germany, where the establishment of the Synodal Path (Synodaler Weg) has long been calling for more “openness” on various issues. Secondly, in his speech yesterday, Leo XIV he also made a second significant exhortation: “We are not here primarily to reflect on the internal life of the Church.” Words that reflect the interpretation that the pontiff gives not only to the current assembly but also to the Church, which – from his point of view, and hopefully not only from his – has a main mission: to announce Christ to the world. «The mission is not one of the many tasks of the Church. It is its very reason for being,” he insisted Provost. Which, not without some difficulty, is working not only to preserve the unity of the Church in the face of the aforementioned pressures that shake it, but also to bring it back to its original “mission”. A challenge in which the Pope does not lose sight, as was said at the beginning, of a theme today on which the future of the entire human family depends: peace.
