VATICAN CITY (RNS) Pope Francis on Monday (Feb. 9) began what could be a key week for his reformist papacy, starting with meetings with his hand-picked kitchen cabinet of nine senior cardinals, who are developing plans to overhaul the Roman Curia, the papal civil service that has been plagued with crisis and dysfunction.
The three-day gathering was preceded by intense talks among his economic advisers, who are trying to revamp the scandal-plagued Vatican bank as well as instituting other reforms aimed at cleaning up the Vatican’s tangled finances.
At the same time, the commission Francis set up to tackle the clergy sex abuse crisis held its first full meeting over the weekend, with its 17 members vowing to find ways to finally hold bishops accountable if they look the other way on abuse.
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“The bishops and the Holy Father have to begin the change,” Marx said. “I was very often in seminars or courses for heads of companies, and that was always clear: the stairs are cleaned from above, not from below — from the top down, not the bottom up.
“So the leaders must begin; the chiefs must begin. The mentality must change. The church is not a business, but the methods are not so different. We have to work more in teams, in projects.”
The pope and the Curia will have more time for developing their teamwork — and focusing on spiritual reform — when he leads them on a weeklong retreat for Lent later this month at a religious house 18 miles outside of Rome. No distractions, just themselves and their “spiritual exercises.”
