Perhaps, perhaps not. Are the changes in the higher ranks of one of the most delicate and problematic Congregations, the Congregation for Bishops, made with the Pontiff's consent? Or are they merely an administrative choice of Cardinal Re? The Italian daily Il Foglio in its edition of this Wednesday notices some interesting facts:
With the arrival of the new Annuario Pontificio, the departure from the Congregation for Bishops of American Monsignors Daniel E. Thomas and James D. Conley, both considered solidly conservative, has been made official.
Churchmen of an opposite tendency remain in the same dicastery, such as the head of department Monsignor Giovanni Sonda, who was the private secretary of the omnipotent Sebastino Baggio, prefect of the Congregation between 1973 and 1984, and also Chilean Monsignor Fernando Ramos Pérez, true dominus of the dossier of the episcopal nominations in Latin America and the Mexican priest Juan Espinoza Jiménez, who was made known by the marked sympathy he feels for the former bishop of Chiapas, privileged interlocutor of the [Marxist-Indian] Comandante Marcos and a great exponent of Indian theology and of Latin-American Catholic liberalism [progressismo].
