Rorate Caeli

Papal Meetings on March 23 and April 7

According to the Italian daily L'Indipendente, the papal meeting of reflection with all members of the College of Cardinals (including, probably, the men who will be made cardinals the following day) will discuss an open number of topics, though probably not relations with the SSPX, as it had been rumored.

But the real important meeting, for the future of the Roman Curia, will be on April 7 -- the second meeting of the Pope with the heads of dicasteries in less than two months. The discussions related to a possible reconciliation with the SSPX could be among the topics debated in the meeting (it was the only topic in the meeting of February 13), but this is far from certain.

The weeks which precede Easter will be marked Oltretevere [across the Tiber, i.e., at the Vatican] by two important moments of "dialogue" willed by Benedict XVI with the States-General of the Catholic Church. Next March 23, all cardinals, assembled in Rome to take part in the consistory of the following day, will meet the Pope to a common reflexion and a moment of free debate on the "hot" questions of the Ecclesial agenda.

The second summit of the Pope with all the heads of the dicasteries of the Roman Curia will take place next April 7. At the center of the previous meeting was the controversial question of the relations with the Traditionalist galaxy, with the prospect of a full reconciliation between the spiritual children of bishop Lefebvre and the Catholic Church. The great round of consultations willed by the Pope a year after his election will serve to make an evaluation of his first twelve months of pontificate and to collect suggestions and propositions on the priorities of the next Ecclesial period, in primis the reform of the Curia, already begun, and the ecumenical dialogue with the Orthodox Churches.