Here
is a document hardly ever seen by ordinary Australian Catholics (or indeed any Catholics!!).
It is a
copy of the Questionnaire sent out to a very select group of people
seeking confidential advice about possibly candidates for the episcopate
in Australia.
We suggest you read the document first and then see the
commentary by Paul Collins that follows it.
APOSTOLIC NUNCIATURE
AUSTRALIA
QUESTIONNAIRE for EPISCOPAL CANDIDATES
A - This questionnaire is "SUB SECRETO PONTIFICIO": it must be returned to the Apostolic Nunciature with your answer.
B - Please state how long you have known the candidate and in what way you have come to know him.
I- PERSONAL
Appearance, health, application to work. Family's condition. Any predisposition to hereditary illnesses?
2- HUMAN QUALITIES
Intellectual abilities Temperament and character. Balance and Soundness of judgment. Sense of responsibility.
3- CHRISTIAN & PRIESTLY VIRTUES
Prudence, Fairness, spirit of faith and charity. Piety: daily celebration of the Eucharist and Liturgy of the Hours. Marian devotion.
4- BEHAVIOUR
Moral integrity. How does he relate to people and to public authorities in the exercise of his priestly ministry?
5- CULTURAL FORMATION
Is he competent and up to date in Theology and other Ecclesiastical Sciences? General cultural attainment. Foreign languages. Works published.
6- ORTHODOXY
Doctrinal orientation. Loyalty to the Doctrine and Magisterium of the Church. In particular: the attitude of the candidate to the Documents of the Holy See on the Ministerial Priesthood, on the Priestly Ordination of Women, on marriage, on sexual Ethics and on Social Justice. Fidelity to the genuine Tradition of the Church and commitment to the authentic renewal promoted by Vatican 11, and adherence to the "Statement of Conclusions, 1998".
7- DISCIPLINE
Devotedness to the Holy Father, the Holy See and the Episcopal Hierarchy. Support for Priestly Celibacy and general and particular Laws of the Church. In particular: as to Liturgical and Clerical Discipline.
8- PASTORAL EXPERIENCE AND ATTITUDES
Evangelization and Catechesis: preaching and teaching. Aptitude for public speaking. Readiness to administer the Sacraments. Promotion of Vocations. Interest in the Missions and Ecumenical activities. Formation of lay people in the Family and Social fields of apostolate: of young people, of workers, defenders of human rights?
9- QUALITIES OF LEADERSHIP
Does he have a capacity for leadership: for dialogue, for evoking and accepting collaboration, for analysis and programming, for making decisions and ensuring that they are carried through? Does he appreciate the
role and collaboration of religious and lay people ( men and women )?
Is he able to delegate and share responsibility? Has he shown an
interest in the problems of the Universal as well as the local Church?
10- ADMINISTRATIVE CAPACITY
Does he exercise due care of the Church's property? Ability in administration. Sense of justice. Readiness to enlist the help of those experienced in such affairs?
11- PUBLIC IMAGE Has he gained the respect of his fellow clergy? Of the people and of the public authorities?
12- GENERAL OVERVIEW
Give a comprehensive judgment on the personality of the candidate and of his suitability for the episcopate. Indicate, if affirmative, whether he is particularly suited for appointment to a residential See, or as an Auxiliary Bishop. Or for work in an urban, rural, industrial or in other social context.
13- CONSULTATION
Please
suggest the names of persons (ecclesiastic, religious, or lay) who can
provide pertinent and useful information about the candidate. Please
give names and addresses.
BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION
I- a. Full name of the candidate.
b. Date and place of birth.
c. Names of parents.
d. Was he born in lawful wedlock?
2- a. Condition of his family: religious, moral, civil, economic; bodily and mental health.
3- a. In what Seminaries and other Institutes has he studied?
b. What were the results?
c. What academic grades did he achieve?
--4- a. Is-he the-author of any publications? b. If possible, indicate titles and editions.
5- a. Does he speak, or in any way know, foreign languages?
6- a. Date and place of priestly ordination.
b. Diocese or Religious Institute for which he was ordained.
c. Diocese in which he was born.
d. Diocese to which he now belongs.
e. Diocese of actual residence.
f. If a Religious, indicate the province for which he was professed and the date of profession.
Here is Paul Collins commentary on this secret Vatican document:
Sub Secreto Pontificio - 'subject to pontifical secrecy'
Recently
Catholics for Ministry received an unsolicited letter containing a copy
of a document that the vast majority of ordinary, practicing Catholics
would usually never see. Nevertheless it will have already had and will
continue to have a real influence on their membership of the church and
their faith lives. It is entitled 'Questionnaire for Episcopal
Candidates', and it comes from the Papal Nuncio (or ambassador) in Red
Hill, a rather up-market Canberra suburb. The questionnaire I received
is the one which is currently in use to seek opinions from bishops, a
small number of senior priests, and a very small number of carefully
selected lay people seeking advice on potential candidates for
ordination as bishops in Australia.
Under the heading it is marked in block letters 'SUB SECRETO PONTIFICIO'
which means 'subject to pontifical secrecy'. This attempts to suggest
that the recipient is bound to maintain an extremely high level of
confidentiality about the contents of the document and their comments
about the proposed candidate. According to one canonist it binds
recipients to maintain the secrecy 'under pain of mortal sin'. However,
in fact the threat is meaningless and no one takes a great deal of
notice of it. The questionnaire itself says that it 'must be returned to
the Apostolic Nunciature with your answer.'
Nevertheless,
these kinds of documents rarely see the light of day. As far as I know
the only other example in the public domain comes from Spain where a
questionnaire from the papal nuncio about prospective bishops was leaked
in November 2002. It is available on the excellent and helpful Women
Priests Web-Page at http://www.womenpriests.org/teaching/secretexam.asp .
To
see where this questionnaire fits into the appointment process, it is
important first of all to understand how bishops get chosen. Nowadays it
is a closed, opaque process in which all power is held by the Vatican
and very little by the local church. The Code of Canon Law
outlines the general process in canon 377, paragraph 2: 'At least every
three years the bishops of an ecclesiastical province … are to compose
in common counsel and in secret a list of presbyters … who are suitable
for the episcopacy and to send it to the Apostolic See'.
In
countries like Australia the process works like this: the papal nuncio
canvasses the names of priests for possible appointment and seeks the
views of the local bishops (e.g. the NSW bishops or the Victorian
bishops), including especially the bishop of the diocese. Selected
senior priests and a few very carefully chosen lay people are also
asked, usually through the questionnaire published below. A terna,
a list of three names, is compiled by the nuncio. Further checks are
made, and then the list is sent to the Congregation of Bishops in Rome.
Another investigation is made in the Vatican where they check whether
any of the priests on the terna have been reported to any Roman
congregation or office for things like 'unorthodoxy', or disagreement
with the prevailing Roman line on any issue, or any critical comments
about the pope or the Vatican. At the end of the process the list is
sent to the pope for decision. He would normally choose the priest at
the top of the list.
However,
this process is very modern by church history standards. Right up until
the nineteenth century bishops were usually nominated by the civil
ruler, or were elected by the senior priests of the diocese. At most the
pope and the Vatican got a say at the end of the process. In the first
millennium of church history most bishops were elected by the people of
the diocese with subsequent final approval by the Metropolitan (the
senior regional archbishop) and/or the pope. But as liberal democracy
spread in the nineteenth century and civil governments became less
interested in the appointments of bishops, Rome gradually gained
complete control of the whole process so that now there are only a
couple of dioceses left (in Switzerland and Austria) in which the canons
of the diocese get the right to nominate three names for bishop with
Rome making a choice from the canon's list.
The
questionnaire from the Canberra papal nuncio is part of the local
process whereby names are sorted out. Very little notice is ever taken
of the diocesan community or the majority of priests, and some times
even out-of-favour bishops are completely by-passed or ignored. One
archbishop was told by a previous nuncio: 'I don't need to consult you;
I know what you think'. A lot depends on the peculiar ecclesiastical
bias of the nuncio as to what names get nominated. For instance, it was
well known that Archbishop Franco Brambilla, Nuncio from 1986-98, was
conservative, whereas the American Archbishop Ambrose De Paoli, nuncio
from 2004-07, had far more sympathy with the pastoral orientation
favored by the majority of the Australian bishops. De Paoli is known to
have blocked the appointment of very reactionary priests to the
episcopate in a large metropolitan diocese.
In
many ways both the Spanish and Australian Questionnaires are similarly
unimpressive documents. The Australian one, for instance, leave out the
words 'God', 'Jesus', 'Christ', 'Holy Spirit', 'hope', 'ministry',
'belief', 'spirituality', 'prayer', let alone references to fundamental
statements of belief like the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed, are
all omitted. There is no reference whatsoever to the Bible and not a
single reference, let alone a quotation, from any part of Scripture. The
whole emphasis is on loyalty to the pope, the Vatican and the Holy See.
The
questionnaire nowhere mentions the candidate's primary obligation to
care for the diocese or to show loyalty and accountability to the
priests and people of the diocese. In fact, it turns the Catholic
tradition on its head. In the past the emphasis was on the bishop being
primarily committed to the local church, but this is entirely omitted in
the questionnaire. As a result the document is completely out of kilter
with the ancient tradition of the church, in the sense that the
ecclesiology of the first millennium talked about a bishop's
relationship with his diocese in terms of marriage. That is why bishops
could not be moved from diocese to diocese.
Looking
at the questionnaire in detail: firstly it completely ignores the
prospective candidate's right to privacy. For instance, in the section
headed 'Personal' (1) the questionnaire asks about the candidate's
family 'condition', and about any predisposition to hereditary
illnesses. Any prospective employer in Australia asking for such
information would be immediately challenged legally. And what does the
word 'condition' refer to here: is it asking about their economic
condition, or whether a brother is an alcoholic or a sister an
epileptic? This is re-enforced in the section on p 2 where the
questionnaire asks for 'biographical information'. It asks the
respondent to describe the 'condition of his family: religious, moral,
civil, economic; bodily and mental heath'. So the question has to be
asked what right does the papal nuncio (a non-citizen in Australian who,
as a foreigner, is here on sufferance) have to ask for such information
which no Australian prospective employer would dare to ask for fear of
litigation.
Another
area of real concern is the section on 'Orthodoxy' (6). Here the
questionnaire is slanted away from the creeds and the traditional
theology of the church toward complete, myopic loyalty to the papacy and
the Vatican without any theological feeling for a bishop's many other
roles and functions in the church, let alone any sense of accountability
toward the diocese to which he is to be appointed. Despite one mention
of 'Vatican II', this account of the role of bishops is entirely rooted
in the First Vatican Council (1870) and is focused completely on
secondary theological issues to do with the priesthood, the ordination
of women, marriage and contraception. Social justice is thrown in as a
kind of optional extra. It uses terms like 'genuine tradition' and
'authentic renewal' which actually give the game away. This is the kind
of rhetoric used by the Vatican to convey their idea of what Vatican II
was all about. What they are trying to achieve is what they call 'a
reform of the reform', but what they really mean is 'a winding back of
the reform'.
The most extraordinary demand of all in the questionnaire is 'adherence to the "Statement of Conclusion, 1998"'. This
rather odd document was imposed on the ambushed Australian bishops by a
group of senior Vatican bureaucrats at the Synod for Oceania in
October-November, 1998. Not a single one of these Vatican clerics who
composed the Statement was even a natural English-speaker, let alone an
Australian. Six of them were Italians, four were Latin Americans and one
was German. Few of them had any pastoral experience anywhere in
parishes. It is a safe bet that not a single one of them had ever
visited Australia, but this did not inhibit them from informing the
bishops that Australian Catholics were suffering from ‘a crisis of faith
... manifested by the rise in the number of people with no religion and
the decline in church practice ... [which was due to] Australian
tolerance and openness’. The bishops were told this ‘can lead to
indifference, to the acceptance of any opinion or activity as long as it
does not impact adversely on other people’. The document went on to
assert that the Australian church was suffering from a series of crises
about ‘Christology’, ‘anthropology’ and ‘ecclesiology’, words that left
most local Catholics gobsmacked. The source of these clichés about
Australian Catholicism, although it was never admitted by the Vatican,
was a tiny, totally unrepresentative group of local, theologically
illiterate reactionaries, possibly tacitly and secretly supported by no
more than a couple of Australian bishops.
The
vast majority of the bishops were furious and frustrated when this
totally twisted and distorted view of the church in Australia was simply
forced on them at the end of the Synod. While no one pretends that
Australian Catholicism is in particularly good shape, the view presented
in this quite silly document is so wide of the mark as to be ludicrous.
The Roman view simply does not reflect the overwhelming experience of
local church leadership, let alone the vast majority of church
membership. Despite the fact that they had a vast knowledge of
Catholicism in this country, and were on the spot in Rome for an
extended period, the Australian bishops were completely ignored. The
view of a tiny group of theologically illiterate reactionaries and
unaccountable, unresponsive bureaucrats prevailed.
The
bishops were caught between loyalty to Rome and loyalty to the local
church when they returned to a storm of protest in Australia; there was
even a Four Corners programme on the issue. Most of them
reacted by retreating into sullen silence. Even those who did speak out
were put under pressure to shut-up by the Bishops’ Conference which
acted, as it so often does, as a kind of controlling ‘club’ that makes
sure that no one stands out or offers any form of individual leadership.
It is astonishing that such a superficial and ignorant document is now
made a normative prerequisite for the episcopate in Australia when the
Bible, the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed are simply ignored.
The
questions on discipline (7) are also quite defective. The whole focus
is on the hierarchical church, canon law and 'liturgical and clerical
discipline' as though nothing else mattered. Note also the reference to
'support for priestly celibacy'. No room for married priests here!
Pastoral experience (8) is defined very narrowly with no sense of the
breadth of the Catholic ministerial tradition. However, the discussion
of leadership (9) is better, especially with the emphasis on 'dialogue',
'evoking and accepting collaboration', and delegation and sharing
responsibility. It even has an emphasis on planning, something sadly
missing in many Australian dioceses.
Essentially the key problem with the document is that the idea
of a bishop's accountability to his diocese is completely omitted.
There is a real sense in which this distorts the traditional
relationship between the bishop and his diocese on the one hand and his
duty to participate collegially in the government of the universal
church through the college of bishops (presided over by the Bishop of
Rome) on the other. The questionnaire actually reflects the ecclesiology
of the First Vatican Council rather than the Second.
A
final note: some weeks after Catholics for Ministry received a copy of
the questionnaire we informed the present Papal Nuncio, Archbishop
Giuseppe Lazzarotto, that we had a copy of the document and we detailed
some of the criticisms that I have already outlined. Archbishop
Lazzarotto replied pointing out that the questionnaire was 'one among a
number of elements in the enquiry process and cannot be understood or
appreciated in isolation. At an earlier stage of the process other
aspects are thoroughly examined through a widespread consultation of
priests, religious men and women and lay people. Obviously this includes
in particular the situation of the Diocese and its particular needs.'
The Archbishop goes on to day that he has been impressed 'by the very
high quality of the contributions that I receive from those whom I
consult.'
Catholics
for Ministry appreciated the openness and courtesy of Archbishop
Lazzarotto's reply, which contrasted with that of Archbishop Philip
Wilson's terse reply to the 16,800 Catholics who signed the Petition
last year. However, the problem remains that it is the Vatican and the
Nuncio who hold all the trump cards and the process remains secretive
and non-accountable. That is why we are trying to engage the Papal
Nuncio and the Congregation for Bishops in Rome in a process that might
lead to us all developing a better approach to the election of bishops
in the Australian church. We realize that this will be a very difficult
task, but we think that one way of engaging the Holy See might be to get
Australian Catholics to develop an alternative to this document.
We
have begun the process of trying to do this within Catholics for
Ministry, but we are a tiny group and we feel the need for broader
consultation. So we are approaching a number of representative Catholic
bodies as well as the wider Catholic community. Specifically, what we
are seeking are suggestions concerning (1) the process through which
bishops ought to be appointed in Australia, and (2) what issues ought to
be canvassed and emphasized in the selection process. We are deliberately leaving this fairly open so that you will feel free to suggest whatever you think is important and relevant.
Catholics
for Ministry will draw this material together in the coming months and
send it back to you for further comment. Substantially what we are
trying to mount is a consultation that will have some influence on the
Nuncio, the Bishops' Conference and the Vatican because it is broad
based. Please feel free forward anything you send to us to the Nuncio.
Feel free to inform the Catholic community what we are doing. Also Please feel free to distribute our letter and the questionnaire as widely as possible within the Catholic community.
You can send your suggestions or comments to
Catholics for Ministry,
PO Box 4053,
Manuka. ACT. 2603
or to
pco77760@bigpond.net.au
The Nuncio's address is
Apostolic Nuncio,
PO Box 3633,
Manuka. ACT 2603.
And, yes, you're right: the two boxes are just across from each other at Manuka Post Office!!!!