Cardinal Kevin Farrell, prefect of the Vatican Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life. / Lucia Ballester/CNA.
Vatican City, Jun 7, 2022 / 05:49 am (CNA).
Cardinal Kevin Farrell will chair a new committee to oversee investments, the Vatican said on Tuesday.
The 74-year-old Irish-American cardinal will lead a committee of four finance professionals.
Since 2020, Farrell has also led a committee to monitor internal Vatican financial decisions that fall outside other accountability norms.
The investment committee was established by the Vatican’s new constitution, Praedicate evangelium, to ensure “the ethical nature of the Holy See’s movable investments according to the social doctrine of the Church and, at the same time, their profitability, appropriateness, and riskiness.”
The apostolic constitution went into effect on June 5, the feast of Pentecost.
Pope Francis appointed the former Dallas bishop as camerlengo, or chamberlain, of the apostolic chamber, in 2019.
The camerlengo’s responsibilities include overseeing the preparations for a papal conclave and managing the administration of the Holy See in the period between a pope’s death or resignation and the election of a new pope.
Farrell will be joined on the investment oversight committee by John J. Zona, the chief investment officer of Boston College.
The other committee members are Jean Pierre Casey, founder and manager of RegHedge; John Christian Michael Gay, managing director of Union Investment Privatfonds GmbH; and David Harris, portfolio manager of Skagen Funds.
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A picture taken on March 27, 2019, shows a scaffold during the restoration of Notre-Dame de Paris Cathedral, in Paris. / Credit: LUDOVIC MARIN/AFP via Getty Images
Aboard the papal plane, Sep 13, 2024 / 14:28 pm (CNA).
Pope Francis definitively… […]
Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Square, Sept. 28, 2022 / Pablo Esparza / CNA
Rome Newsroom, Sep 28, 2022 / 03:41 am (CNA).
Prayer is the first element of discernment, Pope Francis said in his general audience message on Wednesday.
“To discern we need to be in an environment, in a state of prayer,” he said Sept. 28 in St. Peter’s Square.
“We resume our catecheses on the theme of discernment,” the pope said, “because the theme of discernment is very important to know what is going on inside of us — feelings and ideas — we have to discern where they come from, where they lead me, to what decision.”
Francis emphasized that discernment does not lead to absolute certainty, because “life is not always logical” and humans are not machines, but “prayer is an indispensable aid.”
“It is not enough to be given instructions to carry out,” he said. “We would like to know precisely what should be done, yet even when it happens, we do not always act accordingly. How many times have we, too, had the experience described by the apostle Paul: ‘For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want.’”
He pointed out that the first miracle Jesus performs in the Gospel of Mark is an exorcism. In the synagogue in Capernaum, Jesus delivers a man from the devil, “freeing him from the false image of God that Satan has been suggesting since the beginning: that of a God who does not want our happiness.”
Pope Francis blessed a child at the general audience on St. Peter’s Square, Sept. 28, 2022. Pablo Esparza / CNA
Pope Francis noted that this is a trap many people, even Christians, can fall into: they may believe that Jesus is the Son of God, “but they doubt that he wants our happiness.”
“Indeed, some fear that taking his proposal seriously means ruining our lives, mortifying our desires, our strongest aspirations. These thoughts sometimes creep up inside us: that God asks too much of us, or wants to take away what we hold most dear. In short, that He doesn’t really love us,” Francis said.
But, he explained, meeting the Lord in prayer should produce joy, not fear or sadness, which are signs of distance from him.
He encouraged people to pray to God with simplicity. Just like they would greet a friend, they can say “hello” to God throughout the day.
Prayer “is knowing how to go beyond thoughts, to enter into intimacy with the Lord, with an affectionate spontaneity,” he said, adding that “true prayer is familiarity and confidence with God. It is not reciting prayers like a parrot, blah blah blah, no.”
“To be in prayer,” he said, “is not to say words, words, no; to be in prayer is to open my heart to Jesus, to draw closer to Jesus, to let Jesus come into my heart and let us feel his presence.”
This, the pope continued, is how we can discern when it is Jesus speaking to us and when it is just our own thoughts.
Francis said familiarity with the Lord also helps us to overcome the fear or doubt that God’s will is not for our good, “a temptation that sometimes runs through our thoughts and makes the heart restless and uncertain.”
“Discerning is not easy, for appearances are deceptive, but familiarity with God can melt doubts and fears in a gentle way, making our lives increasingly receptive to his ‘gentle light,’ according to the beautiful expression of Saint John Henry Newman,” he said.
“It is a grace we must ask for each other: to see Jesus as our friend, our greatest friend, our faithful friend, who does not extort us, who, above all, never abandons us, even when we turn away from him,” he said. “He remains at the door of the heart.”
Pope Francis speaking at the general audience on St. Peter’s Square, Sept. 28, 2022. Pablo Esparza / CNA
In his final greeting at the end of the audience, Pope Francis recalled that Thursday, Sept. 29, the Church celebrates the feast of the Archangels Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael.
These saints “arouse in each one of us a sincere adherence to the divine plans. Know how to recognize and follow the voice of the inner Master, who speaks in the secret of our consciousness,” he said.
A view of the facade of St. Peter’s Basilica from the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace. / Lauren Cater/CNA.
CNA Newsroom, Jul 22, 2022 / 03:02 am (CNA).
The Holy See intervened in the German “Synodal Way” on July 21, 2022, warning of a “threat to the unity of the Church”.
Below is the full text of the statement in a working translation into English, provided by CNA:
“In order to safeguard the freedom of the People of God and the exercise of the episcopal ministry, it seems necessary to clarify that the ‘Synodal Way’ in Germany does not have the power to compel bishops and the faithful to adopt new forms of governance and new orientations of doctrine and morals.
It would not be lawful to initiate in the dioceses, prior to an agreed understanding at the level of the universal Church, new official structures or doctrines, which would constitute a violation of ecclesial communion and a threat to the unity of the Church. In this sense, the Holy Father called to mind in his letter to the pilgrim people of God in Germany: the universal Church lives in and of the particular Churches, just as the particular Churches live and flourish in and from the universal Church. If they find themselves separated from the entire ecclesial body, they weaken, rot and die. Hence the need always to ensure communion with the whole body of the Church.”[1] Therefore, it is desirable that the proposals made by the Particular Churches in Germany may be incorporated into the synodal process on which the universal Church is undertaking, in order to contribute to mutual enrichment and to bear witness to the unity with which the Body of the Church manifests its fidelity to Christ the Lord.”
Putting McCarrick’s former Auxiliary Bishop in charge of Vatican finances shows that Francis is neither serious about sexual abuse coverups nor about financial transparency.
Putting McCarrick’s former Auxiliary Bishop in charge of Vatican finances shows that Francis is neither serious about sexual abuse coverups nor about financial transparency.