Word: curiae
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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What is more, the Pope has another task that can be daunting to a non-Italian: running the Vatican Curia, with its 1,200 ecclesiastical bureaucrats. Despite Paul's infusion of foreigners at top levels, Italians still dominate the middle-management echelon, particularly in the all-powerful Secretariat of State. Some liberals calculate that only a fellow Italian can really control the Curia and complete Paul's program of internationalization...
Another old distinction is fading, too - the line between a "pastoral" Pope, like John XXIII, and the statesman-diplomat, like Pius XII. Though bred to the Curia, Paul VI so cherished his nine years as Archbishop of Milan that he determined that future Cardinals, even career Curia men, should have at least one good stretch of pastoral work. Most of the leading contenders are men with both pastoral and Curial experience...
...should give up the principle of centralism in the church, revise the system of nunciatures and renew the Curia not only externally and organizationally, but in the spirit of the Gospel, granting leadership positions to different nationalities and also to different mentalities, to the aged and to the young, to men and to women...
Paul became a study in anguish-wanting reform but fearing the consequences of too much too fast, trying to please progressives while placating conservatives. He said yes to more changes than any Pope since the 16th century Council of Trent: a thoroughgoing revision of liturgy, a streamlining of the Curia, an unprecedented rapprochement with other faiths. But his no could be emphatic and crucial: no to any genuine sharing of power with his fellow bishops, no to married priests, no to the ordination of women, and no-a still-reverberating no-to artificial birth control. The late Jesuit Theologian John...
...some, his reform of the rusty machinery of the Curia was similarly disappointing. He internationalized the once overwhelmingly Italian bureaucracy, but only very gradually was real power transferred from Italian hands. The internationalization of the College of Cardinals was far more dramatic. The conclave that elected Paul in 1963 numbered 29 Italians out of the 80 Cardinals present. After his last consistory in 1977, there were only 36 Italians out of 137 Cardinals...