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Vatican orders …

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Happy Friday friends,

And a happy first anniversary to our Holy Father, Pope Leo XIV, long may he reign.

Thinking back to the moment last year when Robert Francis Cardinal Prevost was announced from the loggia with the regnal name Leo XIV, I remember a definite mix of emotions.

I was pleased, superficially, to have my final pre-conclave pick come through. In our business it never hurts to be able to predict the weather on a big day.

But if I wasn’t surprised by the man, I do remember being wrongfooted completely by his choice of name. Prevost I may have predicted, Leo I most certainly did not — I had him pegged for a Paul VII.

Three hundred and sixty-five days later I suppose I still feel some version of the same mixture of reassurance and surprise at Pope Leo.

I have read a lot of commentary since the conclave touting the pope as the supposed beneficiary of a bunch of horse trading and political jockeying between rival camps of conservatives and progressives in the conclave.

Entire books have been written about who the next pope was “supposed to be” for this or that constituency of cardinals and that Prevost was a kind of pragmatic compromise between the two. Having had a year to digest and talk to people, I am not sure I subscribe to any version of that narrative.

With the benefit of hindsight, I think Leo’s appeal was far broader and more instinctive in the Sistine Chapel than popular narratives understand.

To be sure, there were discernable camps and candidates to the left and right. But my overarching sense heading to Rome on Easter week last year was that the conclave was a capable centrist’s election to lose, and that Cardinal Parolin was the man starting in that lane.

What happened during the general sessions of the cardinals over the following two weeks was the gradual realization that, on a range of issues and for a host of reasons, Parolin was not the man the cardinals were looking for. Meanwhile, it became apparent that the quiet American from Peru was a man of considerable spiritual and intellectual depth and personal charisma.

Prevost wasn’t a formally or informally brokered option, but a truly organic choice. And a year on, I think the wisdom of that choice is ever clearer. We have a pope who has brought clarity and charity to the most divisive issues in the Church and looks a good way towards fostering ecclesiastical unity - not a mood and vibe, but concrete communion in faith and discipline.

I’m encouraged enough by what I have seen so far that I might be tempted to doubt my own dispassion and suspect myself of mere enthusiasm. But I am in a way reassured that I can see some issues on which I remain genuinely concerned — like the state of the Vatican’s financial and judicial affairs. No pope can please everyone about everything, and any that tried would sow chaos in the attempt.

What I would say, looking ahead, is much what I felt this same day last year. I may not be able to tell you what Pope Leo will do next, but I think we have a decent sense of the man who took the name. And there’s a lot there to find reassuring.

Here’s the news.

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The News

The Vatican has ordered an investigation in the Diocese of Baton Rouge, over allegations that the Bishop Michael Duca discouraged a whistleblower from calling the police, after a local priest allegedly admitted to sexual contact with minors.

The priest denies the allegation against him, while the Baton Rouge diocese has not responded to questions about the case.

News of the Vos estis investigation comes after The Pillar reported last week that the Vatican had not yet responded to a whistleblower report filed more than two months ago, despite canonical norms requiring Vatican action within 30 days of receiving a complaint.

Read the whole story here.

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Two Vatican study groups tied to the synod on synodality released final reports on Tuesday, with one focused on “emerging issues,” including homosexuality, and the other on the selection of bishops.

The “emerging issues” group offered no concrete proposals, but included testimonies from two Catholic men in same-sex relationships. By contrast, the group on episcopal selection presented some of the most concrete proposals yet among the study groups.

You can read all about that proposal in our busy readers’ guide to the reports right here.

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Vatican doctrinal chief Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández cranked up the pressure on Germany’s bishops Wednesday with a new statement on the country’s guidelines on blessings for unmarried and same-sex couples.

Fernández told Vatican News May 6 that his November 2024 letter criticizing a draft of the German blessings guidelines — published earlier this week with Pope Leo XIV’s agreement — also applied to the final text issued in April 2025.

The Argentine cardinal explained that the 2024 letter was the doctrinal dicastery’s “one and only final response” to the German blessings document, in both its draft and final forms.

If you want to know what this means for the roiling standoff between Rome and Germany, you can’t do better than Luke Coppen’s analysis right here.

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In 1938, a young French couple approached their parish priest, Fr. Henri Caffarel, asking for advice on how they could grow together spiritually within their marriage.

After praying about the request, Caffarel – who had only been a priest for eight years — went on to form a group of four couples who committed to regular meetings where they would talk and pray together. The “Caffarel groups” multiplied as the word spread, eventually developing into Teams of Our Lady (TOL), a Catholic movement to provide spiritual growth to couples within their marriages.

This is a fascinating story from Filipe D’Avillez, read all about it right here.

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Azerbaijan and the Vatican signed an agreement on April 30 for the renovation of four statues at the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls, weeks after the Azerbaijani regime demolished an Armenian cathedral in an occupied region under dispute between both countries.

The announcement was made during a presentation at the Palazzo della Cancelleria in the Rome, in which a foundation widely considered to be a wing of the Azerbaijani regime’s “caviar diplomacy” showcased the various projects it has funded in the Vatican since 2012.

It’s the most recent in a growing line of projects in Rome funded by the Azerbaijanis, even — perhaps especially — as they continue to persecute Armenians in the occupied territory.

Read the whole thing here.

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While the fate of the Vatican’s criminal prosecution over the infamous London property deal appears to hang in the balance in the city state’s court, a number of legal developments in Rome and abroad suggest the case could be on the verge of collapse.

While that result would be a near-nightmare scenario for prosecutors in the Vatican, with a six-year legal process ending in humiliation, it could also leave the Holy See open to more financial losses stemming from a deal which has already cost the Vatican hundreds of millions.

Such a result seems like something the Vatican should be straining to avoid at all costs, but recent developments suggest the Secretariat of State is itself sabotaging its own legal efforts to claw back losses, potentially leaving itself exposed to millions more in liabilities in the process.

I cannot for the life of me understand the Secretariat of State’s game plan here, but I’ve done my best to unpack the what — and the consequences — while still trying to puzzle out the why of it all.

You can read that analysis here.

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India’s ruling Hindu nationalist party has failed to gain a foothold in the Syro-Malabar Church’s heartland in a closely watched election in the southern state of Kerala.

Despite fielding Christian candidates, the Bharatiya Janata Party failed to win in four pivotal constituencies in an area known as the Syro-Malabar Belt, though it made incremental gains elsewhere in the state.

The outcome marked a setback for the BJP’s strategy of reaching out to Christian voters in hopes of expanding beyond its Hindu base to make a major electoral breakthrough in a state dominated by the Left Democratic Front and the United Democratic Front.

Read the whole story here.

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Why Rome wins

As Luke observed in his analysis this week, for years the Vatican’s dealings with the German bishops has followed a predictable slow spiral: the Germans do something they shouldn’t (or can’t), Rome eventually tells them they may not, and cannot, and the Germans respond by saying things have already moved on and the Vatican’s nicht-nicht has been heard, but sadly ignored because it no longer accords with facts on the ground.

This has been the case for some seven years now, and under Pope Francis it developed into a kind of careful choreography in which the Germans carried on doing more or less as they liked while the Vatican was seen to say all the right things in response but, like ecclesiastical ships in the night, they just sadly kept passing each other.

As Luke noted, things have changed under the first year of Leo. What’s changed is Rome has become much more reactive, and much more willing to tell them nay in real time, essentially closing the time lag by which the bishops were able to claim they weren’t exactly ignoring or defying the Holy See, just unable to accommodate them in time.

Now, at the DDF Cardinal Fernandez suddenly seems to be feeling his oats a bit, publishing letters previously kept private and issuing real-time correctives to German obfuscations. Shortly after Luke’s analysis, things escalated still further, with Cardinal Parolin telling a press gaggle that it was “premature” to speak of some kind of direct Roman intervention in Germany.

“We have already for some time begun a dialogue, on this point expressing each our own points of view,” the Secretary of State said. “Let us see what happens.”

Whatever the result, Parolin said, “any decision must be in agreement with Canon Law, with the Second Vatican Council, with the tradition of the Church.”

While expressing his “hope” that the standoff will “never to have to reach sanctions, that problems may be resolved in a peaceful manner, as should be the case in the Church,” the cardinal said it would ultimately be up to Pope Leo to make the decision.

This is an absolute quantum leap by the Holy See in terms of strength of statement. In fact, in terms of Vatican messaging, I would say we should treat it as on par with, say, Marco Rubio saying something like “I think it’s premature to talk about invading Cuba, but it’s up to the president.”

Cardinal Parolin talking about it being “premature” to discuss “sanctions” against the German bishops — and official Vatican media making sure the world read the remarks — is the clearest and least ambiguous way possible to make it clear that Pope Leo is not prepared to tolerate the German bishops’ project, explicitly articulated, to federalize the Catholic Church in doctrine and discipline, and that the pope is absolutely willing to take previously unthinkable actions.

Indeed, I would argue the cardinal’s chosen wording suggests there is already advanced thinking about how this would be done.

Obviously, just saying the word “sanctions” out loud is something in itself — and calling the idea “premature” rather than “unthinkable” is simply not a sentence I could conceive of hearing during the last pontificate.

Pope Francis was, to be clear, demonstrably not shy about defenestrating bishops he thought were out of line. But the general wisdom around Rome under the previous pope was that the German bishops, as a conference, were simply too big a beast to go to open war with. The stakes were too high — a schismatic German Church is the stuff of nightmares, almost impossible to game out, and Francis had neither the plan nor the stomach for the fight.

The thinking here seems to have changed. And I think rightly so. In fact, while there are serious systemic challenges to bringing the Church in Germany into line (and into proper communion) my considered estimation has long been that, in an ultimate standoff with the Vatican for the highest stakes, Rome is holding all the cards and the German bishops will prove to be all mouth and no trousers.

Let me explain.

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I’m Luke Coppen and I aim to guide you each weekday morning to the most interesting Catholic news and commentary.

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Pope Leo XIV is expected to visit Paris and Lourdes in September.

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The priest denies the allegation against him, while the Baton Rouge diocese has not responded to questions about the case.

News of the Vos estis investigation comes after The Pillar reported last week that the Vatican had not yet responded to a whistleblower report filed more than two months ago, despite canonical norms requiring Vatican action within 30 days of receiving a complaint.

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Baton Rogue Catholic Luke Zumo told The Pillar that he was informed this week that the Vatican’s Dicastery for Bishops has authorized New Orleans’ Archbishop James Checchio to conduct an investigation into a report Zumo filed in mid-February with the Catholic Bishop Abuse Reporting Service, a third-party system established by the U.S. bishops’ conference to receive allegations of episcopal misconduct or neglect in office.

In his report, Zumo alleged that Bishop Michael Duca and Baton Rouge vicar general Fr. Jamin David failed to inform the Office of Child and Youth Protection and diocesan review board of a 2025 allegation that a priest serving in the diocese had attempted to sexually coerce a parishioner, and had admitted to sexual contact with minors.

Vos estis lux mundi, the 2021 procedural norms published by Pope Francis on the subject of investigating bishops, indicates that after receiving such a report, the Vatican’s Dicastery for Bishops is to “proceed without delay, and in any case within thirty days from the receipt of the first report by the Pontifical Representative or the request for the assignment by the Metropolitan, provid[e] the appropriate instructions on how to proceed in the specific case.”

But while Zumo filed the report in mid-February, he was informed in late April by officials in the Archdiocese of New Orleans that they had not received instructions on how to proceed with the case. Soon after a May 1 report from The Pillar on the Vatican’s delayed action in the case, Zumo was told that Checchio had been authorized to conduct an investigation.

Zumo told The Pillar that Checchio was told he should complete the investigation within 50 days, and send a report no later than 15 days after that.

The Archdiocese of New Orleans has not responded to requests for additional information from The Pillar.

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The situation began in September 2025. In that month, an adult Catholic male in the Baton Rouge diocese alleges that Fr. Charbel Jamhoury — a Lebanese Maronite priest who was then pastor of St. Isidore the Farmer parish in Baker, Louisiana — attempted to coerce him into a sexual relationship, reportedly holding the man’s hand, recounting a history of his own sexual activity, touching the man’s lips, kissing his fingers, urging the man to massage him, and proposing sexual contact.

The man alleges that at the same time, Jamhoury disclosed to him prior possible acts of child sexual abuse — specifically, oral sex with minors, allegedly recounting his preference for such activity in graphic detail.

Jamhoury has told The Pillar that he “absolutely did not” attempt to initiate sexual contact with the man, and did not recount to the man a history of oral sex with minors. Instead, the priest said that the man “was abusing me,” though he declined to elaborate on the nature of that abuse.

In October 2025, the man reported the alleged inappropriate conduct — and the alleged admission of sexual contact with minors — to the Baton Rouge diocese.

While diocesan officials reportedly conducted a preliminary investigation, the priest was not removed from office during it. The diocesan review board was not contacted, nor was the diocesan safeguarding office.

And Zumo, a frequent volunteer in the diocese, told The Pillar that in December 2025, Duca discouraged him from contacting the police, despite the priest’s alleged admission of sexual contact with minors.

While the diocese sent Jamhoury for a psychological evaluation, and removed him in February from his role as pastor, Zumo’s report alleges that the process undertaken in the case did not confirm to diocesan safe environment policies, and that it was wrong for Duca to discourage him from contacting the police.

Further, he argues, diocesan statements on the matter concealed the fact that the priest allegedly admitted to sexual contact with minors. That, he said, put minors at risk, and kept families in the dark.

For its part, the diocese of Baton Rouge told The Pillar by email that in response to a report of “serious boundary violations,” and “after extensive conversation with all parties involved and an investigation which also included interviews by law enforcement, the diocesan investigation, and the full health assessment of Father Jamhoury, Bishop Duca determined that Father Charbel be removed from his office as Pastor of St. Isidore effective immediately, and this was accomplished in early February.”

The diocese did not respond to follow-up questions from The Pillar.

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The “emerging issues” group offered no concrete proposals, but included testimonies from two Catholic men in same-sex relationships. By contrast, the group on episcopal selection presented some of the most concrete proposals yet among the study groups.

The groups are two of 14 study groups. Twelve were created by Pope Francis in March 2024, months before the second session of the synod on synodality, which ended in Oct. 2024. Two more groups were established by Pope Leo last year.

The groups are covering various topics including the Eastern Catholic Churches, episcopal ministry, the work of apostolic nuncios, environmental concerns, ecumenism, and the liturgy.

Some groups, such as a group on the digital mission, a group on the participation of women in the Church, and a special group on polygamy, formed exclusively by African bishops have already presented their reports.

The ‘emerging issues’ group

The “emerging issues” group, led by Cardinal Carlos Castillo of Lima, proposed in its a report a “paradigm shift” in how the Church approaches complex doctrinal, pastoral, and ethical questions.

While the group originally was called the study group on “controversial” issues, they decided to change it to “emerging” issues because “the aim is not merely to resolve problems but to build the common good through relational conversion, shared learning and transparency.”

The report is broken down into an introduction, three sections and three annexes with testimonies from two men in same-sex relations in Portugal and the US and a non-violence initiative in Serbia.

The first section focuses on a “paradigm shift” in evangelization based on the practice of relational conversion, shared learning and transparency. The second section discusses the principle of pastorality as the interpretative key of the paradigm shift, and the third offers guidelines to aid pastoral discernment with regards to two “emerging” issues: the experience of homosexual Catholics and the practice of active non-violence.

Introductory section

The document starts by explaining its own methodology, saying that “the topic entrusted to us, even in the way it was formulated, raises a related set of issues that call for careful consideration and a courageous commitment. In this light, we have noted the inadequacy of our current categories and operational paradigms.”

The report talks of a series of methodological difficulties, such as reconciling different sensibilities, expertise, and viewpoints, and clarifying definitions. It also says that after a first draft, they underwent a process of consultation “with people engaged in different ecclesial contexts and with diverse areas of expertise.”

Then, it proposes “synodal discernment” as the methodological key for the report, “starting from [individual] accounts, with attentive and open listening both to the Word of Jesus – made alive and relevant by the Holy Spirit within the space of ecclesial communion and with attention to the “signs of the times” – and to what the People of God have experienced in diverse cultural contexts and in relation to various life situations.”

“Listening to these experiences, in order to be authentic and fruitful, requires careful integration and appreciation of what we are able to learn about them thanks to the contribution of the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences,” it adds.

First section: A paradigm shift

The section starts by explaining that after Dei Verbum’s understanding of Revelation as “historical and dialogical,” practicing synodality in the Church implies a“paradigm shift “from the prevalent paradigms of past centuries as regards the way of interpreting and expressing the proclamation of the Gospel and the mission of the Church.”

According to the document this shift is a return to “the saving truth of the Gospel as originally presented in Jesus: the reliable testimony of the agape of God, who is Abbà, present here today for all his sons and daughters, each and every one.”

Then, the document proceeds to define the synodal process as “the unfolding of three dynamics promoting a paradigm shift,” which are relational conversion, shared learning and transparency.

The report spends several pages explaining each of those dynamics, but the executive summary defines them in more concrete terms.

It says that relational conversion are “the processes by which all baptized men and women are able to learn through practices (ecclesial, liturgical, and social).”

Then it adds that shared learning means that ‘“through these practices, people… contribute to co-shaping the linguistic, symbolic, and cultural scene within which problems can emerge, be named, and be worked on together.”

Lastly, it says that “an ecclesial culture of transparency is not only attributable to a need that is felt in contemporary society, but must be understood in light of the evangelical and ethical imperative of ‘speaking and acting in truth.’”

Second section: the principle of pastorality

The document uses “the principle of pastorality” as the main interpretative key of these issues, defining it as “there is no proclamation of the Gospel without taking responsibility for the interlocutor, in whom the Spirit is already at work.”

“This principle, in fidelity to the Magisterium of Vatican II, derives from taking Dei Verbum as the foundational horizon of proclamation, Gaudium et spes as the interpretive horizon of its multiple recipients and spheres of incarnation, and Ad gentes as the contextualizing horizon of its diverse places and actors,” it says.

Then the document discusses the place of authority within the principle of pastorality, saying that “we are dealing not with problems to be solved, but with the construction of the common good,” and therefore, it says that the main focus of the principle is not the doctrinal, pastoral and ethical correction “of situations evaluated as problematic in the concrete experience of faith,” but the prioritization of “the recognition and discernment of the instances that faith practices express and show in action, often through unthematic knowledge.”

Therefore, according to the report, the proper role of authority is “first and foremost, that of listening, setting the discernment process in motion, and accompanying it to reach the expression of a consensus... Thus, the exercise of authority… [takes] particular responsibility for guarding and safeguarding the identity and contribution of each person, especially those who are less visible or less able to express their voice.”

The section then concludes by explaining the methodology of “conversations in the Spirit” used in the synod on synodality as a way to practice the principle of pastorality.

Third section: emerging issues

The report then applies its methodological steps to two emerging issues: “the experience of homosexual persons who are believers, and the experience of active non-violence.”

The report included three appendices: testimonies from two men identifying as gay, one from Portugal and another from the United States, and from a non-violence movement in Serbia..

In the testimony of a Portuguese man in a same-sex relationship and active in a community based on Ignatian spirituality called thr Christian Life Community, the report criticizes the alleged attempts at so-called reparative or conversion therapies.

“The positivity of this journey coexists with significant difficulties, as seen in the devastating effects of reparative therapies aimed at recovering heterosexuality, and in the contradictory advice received: from those who suggest marriage to a woman in order to “find peace” to those who instead invite the person not to leave “dark or hidden areas” in their relationship with Christ.”

Then, the report says that sin “at its root, does not consist in the (same-sex) couple relationship, but in a lack of faith in a God who desires our fulfilment.”

In the second testimony, a man now also living in a homosexual relationship said that he spent time in college in a group of Courage International, an apostolate focused on accompanying same-sex attracted people with an approach that is in line with Catholic teaching, but that it did “little to help my spiritual and psychosexual development.”

The report says of this that “the testimony… describes the problematic membership in a Catholic group (Courage) which, by pushing for “reparative therapy,” had the effect of separating faith and sexuality.”

After discussing the testimonies, the document discussed the issue of striking a balance between pastoral practice and Catholic doctrine.

“It is not a matter of devising a strategy to hide real difficulties or of forcing the issue to assert a new doctrine: it is a matter of starting from the listening to experiences and fostering pastoral and ecclesial practices of mutual knowledge, collaboration, inclusion, and dialogue among believers,” the document says.

“For it is only in this way – in the light of the lived and shared experience of the Gospel within the Christian community – that one can come to discern and promote the “good” inscribed in experiences and practices.”

The document then criticizes the “theoretical model that derives praxis from a “pre-packaged” doctrine, “applying” general and abstract principles to the concrete and personal situations of life.”

“The task, therefore, is to rediscover a fruitful circularity between theory and praxis, between thought and experience, recognising that theological reflection itself proceeds from the experiences of “good” inscribed in the sensus fidei fidelium,” it concludes.

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The study group on the selection of bishops

The drafting report of the study group on the selection of bishops was led by Bishop Felix Glenn of Münster, and had then-Cardinal Robert Prevost among its members before he was elected pope last May.

The report is one of the shortest so far: only nine pages, and offered some of the most concrete proposals in any report.

Synodal bishops and nuncios

After stating that personal dignity and suitability for pastoral ministry in a specific local Church are the two main criteria to select episcopal candidates, the report says that “moral integrity, doctrinal orthodoxy, pastoral sensitivity, leadership ability, and the capacity to administer the Church’s goods” should be some of the main qualities sought in an episcopal candidate.

The group then recommends that special attention should be paid to the “synodal competencies” of episcopal candidates.

“Sensitivity to the needs of a synodal and missionary Church requires in a bishop openness to complexity, a disposition toward innovation, the ability to adapt to new situations, a deep knowledge of local cultures, and a willingness to integrate into them constructively ,” it says.

The document extends the criteria to apostolic nuncios, saying that they “must themselves possess a synodal and missionary profile, so that they can seek these same qualities in those proposed to them as potential bishops.”

The report also mentions by passing that it hopes that “lay men and women may be welcomed in the future” will in the future be welcomed as part of the Vatican diplomatic staff.

Episcopal succession

The document proposes a synodal discernment involving the local church and the bishops’ conference to better understand a diocese’s own state and needs, “processes that can allow, on the one hand, the identification within the Diocese of Priests to be proposed as candidates for the Episcopate and, on the other hand, the formulation of the profile of the future Pastor of that local Church,” the document adds.

The center of the group’s proposals is the creation of a “Committee for the Provision of the Local Church,” to be comprised of “two diocesan priests elected by the Presbyteral Council, two consecrated men/women and two laypersons elected by the Diocesan Pastoral Council, along with the Diocesan Administrator or Apostolic Administrator.”

According to the document, the nuncio should rely on the Committee to “clarify the state of the diocese, the profile of the new Pastor, and to receive opinions on possible candidates.”

“The Group proposes that the Bishop convene at least the Presbyteral Council and the Diocesan Pastoral Council, so that each of the members may submit to the Bishop, in a sealed envelope, the names of Priests operating in the Diocese whom he judges suitable for the Episcopate, and an opinion regarding the profile of the future Bishop of their own local Church, with the names of Bishops or Priests whom they consider suitable for succession,” it adds.

Then, according to the document, the bishop should present the result of these consultations to the bishops of his ecclesiastical province or the bishop’s conference, “who will draw up a list of candidates for the Episcopate that is as much as possible an expression of their consensus.”

Then, after receiving these findings, the nuncio must also consult “a group of informants,” that, according to the report shouldn’t be limited to clergy, “clergy but also a possibly equivalent number of consecrated persons and laity, avoiding risks such as clericalism, politicization or polarization of views, and familial, tribal, or ethnic influences.”

“Informants should include a suitable number of women and young people, representatives of ecclesiastical universities and faculties, members of ecclesial movements, individuals recognized for special charisms, the poor and marginalized, and members of Indigenous communities or ethnic/linguistic minorities.,” it says.

According to the document, having such a varied consultation helps to “bring to light the truth as fully as possible – both regarding the state and needs of the diocese and the dignity and suitability of potential episcopal candidates.”

Then, the document calls on the dicasteries of the Roman Curia with a role in the appointment of bishops - the Dicastery for the Bishops, the Section for First Evangelization and New Particular Churches of the Dicastery for Evangelization, and the Dicastery for Eastern Churches - to review their procedures, so that “the method of ecclesial discernment may increasingly shape their ordinary operations.”

The report concludes by calling for an independent commission to evaluate the application of these criteria within the dicasteries in question.

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After praying about the request, Caffarel – who had only been a priest for eight years — went on to form a group of four couples who committed to regular meetings where they would talk and pray together. The “Caffarel groups” multiplied as the word spread, eventually developing into Teams of Our Lady (TOL), a Catholic movement to provide spiritual growth to couples within their marriages.

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Caffarel believed firmly that those called to marriage should seek sanctity within that vocation.

“There is no need to look elsewhere in order to progress towards the Lord: marriage is a sacred way and the Christian family is a living cell of the Church,” he once said.

Decades later, the movement has become truly global.

“Currently, there are teams in 92 countries, for a total of 74,635 couples. In the United States, we have close to 800 teams, and it’s growing,” said TJ Holt, who is part of the International Leading Team along with his wife Ellen.

The Holts, who live in Texas, are tasked with accompanying the movement in English-speaking countries.

In a conversation with The Pillar, they explained the origin of the movement’s name: “A good team supports each other. People bring their strengths for the benefit of others. And that is embodied in the name of Teams of Our Lady, because it is really intended that we help each other.”

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The building block of the TOL movement is the base team, which is composed of about six or seven couples and a spiritual counselor, who is usually a priest or religious. The team gathers once a month at one of the couple’s homes for a meal, prayer, and discussion.

“You come together for a very simple meal – the host couple has a main dish, another couple brings a salad, another couple brings dessert; you share things that have been going well and things that have not been going so well, we call that the ‘highs and lows’; there is a time for prayer, and finally discussion of a study topic,” Ellen said.

Between meetings, couples are expected to pray together and read Scripture together. They are also expected to go on a yearly retreat and have a “sit-down,” where the husband and wife set aside some time to talk about the issues affecting them, their family, and their spiritual life.

“The purpose of those is really for the couple to grow in holiness. That is the foundation of the movement,” said Ellen.

Over time, the Holts explained, what may have begun as a group of disparate couples with little in common coalesces into a strong community.

“Our team has been together for 26 years. We’ve supported each other in good times and in bad,” TJ said. “The team has become a place where we can talk about challenges that we’ve been having, whether it be about raising our children, helping with aging parents or financial problems – things we all face.”

“And one of the things that’s comforting is understanding that it’s not always easy. Our sacrament of marriage is not always easy. There’s always challenges,” he said.

“Couples that don’t have that understanding think they’re the only ones in that situation, and that if they’re fighting, they can’t reconcile. But when they hear about other people who have gone through the same struggles, they don’t feel like they’re isolated and that it’s unusual. It’s important that they know that it is a challenge, but it’s worth working on. Fr. Caffarell used to say that marriage has a soul and it is love. And to neglect love is to condemn marriage.”

TJ and Ellen believe that the persistent focus on sanctity in their marriage has borne fruit.

“We have couples come to us and say: ‘We don’t know what you’re doing, but we want whatever you have.’ That’s weird for us, because we don’t feel like we’re anything special. But we share about how we’re part of TOL.”

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The vast majority of teams around the world are accompanied by a priest. Though his main role is to provide advice and spiritual guidance, he is a full member of the team, expected to share his highs and lows during meetings as well.

Fr. Nuno Coelho, a parish priest in Cascais, Lisbon, currently accompanies four teams, as well as being on the TOL board that serves Portuguese-speaking countries.

While in seminary, he told The Pillar, his superiors -- starting with the former Patriarch of Lisbon, Cardinal Manuel Clemente -- would encourage new priests to join a team.

“He said it was important for us to build family-based relationships. As priests, of course we have our own family, but our personal and pastoral lives can lead away from regular family life. We can find that in TOL,” Coelho said.

“In my case, I have teams with older couples, some my age, and some younger, so it is a fun mix. With the ones my age, we’ve been in the same team for over 20 years, since I was ordained, so we are like brothers, we’ve been through a lot, they know me very well and we are good friends. With the younger ones it’s more of a pastoral relationship, but still very close.”

“Over the years I’ve done baptisms, funerals, 20^th wedding anniversaries, birthday celebrations, and I’ve become just one more member of their families.”

Being close to families has been a blessing in his own priestly ministry, Coelho said.

“When we reflect on the Word of God, we do so from life experience, and the more familiar we are with the lives of those around us, the better we can connect with them,” he said. “Having this experience of family life, learning about the difficulties of educating children, family illness, the dramas and the joys, the stress, the struggle to take three restless kids to Mass... These are perspectives of Church life that we [priests] are not used to, and with TOL we learn to experience them through the couples.”

The children within the group often form deep bonds of friendship as well.

“One Fourth of July, our team met, and we were going to watch the fireworks,” Ellen recalled, “the adults were talking, and we looked over and the kids had formed a circle on a blanket and they were basically doing the highs and lows, sharing things that had been going well, or not so well. We were all just so surprised.”

Coelho said the children in his group see him as a friend.

“I’ve been asked to be a confirmation sponsor, some just come around to the parish to chat, it’s been such a fruitful experience.”

One of the particularities of the movement, he said, is that couples will often find themselves in the same team as others who have a very different spiritual background.

“My teams have people who are involved in Opus Dei, and others who are closer to the Jesuits; some are active in the Scouts, others in the Neocatechumenal Way, and there are others who are new to the faith or had no connection to a particular charism,” he said.

“And this is a richness for the team, because nobody is there to defend their particular vision, they are there to prayerfully help and support each other. That helps to build personal bridges which then become spiritual bridges.”

The priest added that in his experience, couples who are active in TOL tend to be more service-oriented than other families.

“We find them teaching Sunday School, guiding youth groups, on the boards of charities, doing baptism or marriage preparation courses,” he said.

The Holts agreed, saying many members of their team are active at the parish.

“Some are on vocations committees, some are supporting OCIA and prison ministries, and some do the perpetual adoration ministry, and things of that nature. That’s why we pray the Magnificat [the official prayer of the movement] every day, so that we can be like our Holy Mother and say yes.”

The inclination to serve is not a coincidence, but is a natural fruit of the movement, according to Caffarel, who said that “if the Teams of Our Lady are not a seedbed of men and women ready to take on courageously all their responsibilities in the Church and in society, they lose their raison d’etre.”

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During the Second Vatican Council, Caffarel was appointed a consultant to the Apostolate of the Laity. In this role, he addressed the Council Fathers, asking them to give attention to the importance of family and married life.

“Married Christians are, for the most part, convinced that Christian perfection is not for them. This, once again, is the view of too many priests. That error is fatal: the person who is not aiming at perfection soon slides into mediocrity, into sin. One has here one of the explanations for the current decline of Christian marriage,” he said in one address.

“Against this, what an impetus would one not create if one brought to the notice of couples Christ’s call to perfection, if one taught them that the essence of this perfection is to be found in Love, and not [only] in the vows of the religious life, and that in itself marriage not only is not an obstacle but is a means of arriving at the perfecting of that Love.”

Caffarel died in 1996. On March 23 this year, the Vatican officially recognized his heroic virtues, granting him the title Venerable.

The news came as no surprise for many who have had close contact with his charism. In recent years, in an effort to highlight his legacy, the movement has been asking TOL members to revisit some of his writings, which often contain practical recommendations and advice on prayer and marriage.

Though some of these writings are over 80 years old, couples are often surprised by how they still resonate today, TJ said.

“What we’ve come to find out is that it doesn’t really matter where you are in the world; as married couples, we all face many of the same challenges, and we all want the same thing: we want what’s best for our spouse and what’s best for us as a couple.”

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Fernández told Vatican News May 6 that his November 2024 letter criticizing a draft of the German blessings guidelines — published earlier this week with Pope Leo XIV’s agreement — also applied to the final text issued in April 2025.

The Argentine cardinal explained that the 2024 letter was the doctrinal dicastery’s “one and only final response” to the German blessings document, in both its draft and final forms.

“What was said in that letter also applies to the text of the current Vademecum [guidelines], which does not have the approval of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith,” he commented.

What specifically does the Vatican object to in both versions of the German guidelines? To answer that, it’s useful to know something about the history of couples’ blessings in Germany and why the practice has taken on such symbolic significance in the country.

A brief history of blessings

It’s hard to identify a precise date on which blessings for unmarried and same-sex couples became a major topic in the German Church. But one contender is May 9, 2015.

That was the day that members of the Central Committee of German Catholics — the influential lay umbrella body known by its German initials, ZdK — adopted a declaration calling for “the further development of liturgical forms, particularly blessings for same-sex partnerships, new partnerships involving divorced individuals, and for important milestones in family life.”

It was arguably at this point, two years into the pontificate of Pope Francis, that blessings became what German Catholics call a “Church-political” (kirchenpolitische) issue. This might be roughly translated as an internal Church policy debate: a subject that’s up for grabs, that fires up activists, and generates resistance.

The reaction to the ZdK declaration is interesting in hindsight. Munich’s Cardinal Reinhard Marx — who arguably triggered the most recent Vatican intervention with his endorsement of the 2025 guidelines — strongly criticized the declaration.

“The call for the blessing of same-sex partnerships and a second marriage not recognized by the Church is incompatible with the Church’s doctrine and tradition,” said Marx, the then-chairman of the German bishops’ conference.

For years before the ZdK declaration, individual Catholic parishes in Germany had offered blessing ceremonies aimed at unmarried and same-sex couples. But the lay body’s formal endorsement brought more media attention to the practice, giving it added momentum as a kirchenpolitische issue.

The practice caught Rome’s attention too, prompting the Vatican’s doctrinal office to declare in 2021 that the Church did not have the power to bless same-sex couples.

In response, German priests and pastoral workers organized a day of protest, conducting blessing ceremonies attended by same-sex couples.

Critics of the initiative included Bishop Georg Bätzing, Marx’s successor as bishops’ conference chairman, who said it was not a “helpful sign,” although he supported blessing ceremonies in principle.

Same-sex blessings were one of the central topics at Germany’s “synodal way,” a multi-year initiative that brought together the country’s bishops and select lay people to discuss sweeping changes to Catholic teaching and practice.

In March 2023, synodal way participants adopted a resolution on “blessing ceremonies for couples who love each other,” which called for the official introduction of blessing ceremonies in all German parishes.

The resolution noted that the bishops’ conference and the ZdK were preparing a handout that would include “suggested forms for blessing celebrations for various couple situations (remarried couples, same-sex couples, couples after civil marriage).”

The resolution argued that this step was necessary because of a demand for blessings among civilly remarried and same-sex couples.

“The assessment of the diversity of lasting relationships and the mutual responsibility perceived in them has changed in Germany,” it noted.

“Partnerships that are binding and loving are met with a high level of social acceptance — irrespective of a previous union or the gender of the two partners. This esteem must also find a convincing expression in the liturgy of the Church.”

It added: “Often same-sex couples and remarried divorcees have experienced exclusion and depreciation in our Church. The possibility of publicly placing their partnership under God’s blessing does not make up for these experiences. However, it offers the Church the opportunity to show appreciation for the love and values that exist in these relationships and thus make reconciliation possible.”

Blessings had by now become a litmus test of the Church’s acceptance of changing mores in Germany. If blessing ceremonies could be officially instituted, then other adaptations to changing social values would be easier to adopt.

In May 2023, the Working Group for Catholic Family Education, a professional association promoting pastoral care for families in the Church in Germany, published a template for blessing ceremonies. The 52-page document included liturgical texts that, according to critics, resembled a church wedding ceremony.

It seemed at this point that the handout requested by the synodal way would take up this template. But the German couples’ blessing project was unexpectedly thrown into disarray in December 2023.

That month, the Vatican’s doctrine office adopted an unexpected new position on blessings, announcing in the declaration Fiducia supplicans that spontaneous “blessings of couples in irregular situations and of couples of the same sex” were permissible.

Following a backlash against the document, led by Catholics in Africa, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith specified that the blessings should last “a few seconds, without an approved ritual and without a book of blessings.”

The German bishops’ conference and the ZdK realized they couldn’t publish the blessings handout requested by the synodal way without taking the new Vatican text into account.

It was around this point that Trier’s Bishop Stephan Ackermann, the chairman of the German bishops’ liturgy commission, corresponded with Vatican doctrinal czar Cardinal Fernández.

In a letter dated Nov. 24, 2024, Fernández said the draft German blessing guidelines were incompatible with Fiducia supplicans. Although the draft said blessings should be conferred with “spontaneity and freedom,” it also offered a blessing formula. The German draft guidelines therefore endorsed “a kind of liturgy or para-liturgy” at odds with the Vatican’s 2023 declaration.

The finalized German blessing guidelines were ultimately published in April 2025, but in a rather curious way. They were not issued by the German bishops as a whole, but rather by a body known as the Joint Conference, which periodically brings together a representative group of bishops and ZdK members.

An official press release presented the text merely as a recommendation from the Joint Conference “that the diocesan bishops proceed in accordance with the guidelines.”

Most controversially of all, the document was announced on April 23, 2025, two days after the death of Pope Francis. Critics accused German Church leaders of taking advantage of a papal interregnum to publish a document at odds with the Vatican’s stance on blessings.

The bishops’ conference rejected the claim, pointing out that the document was dated April 4, when Pope Francis had returned from hospital to the Vatican. The text’s supporters also denied that it strayed beyond the limits of Fiducia supplicans, noting the handout said that “no approved liturgical celebrations or prayers are provided for the blessings.”

That did not satisfy the critics. The German Catholic group New Beginning insisted the overall tenor of the document encouraged “a ritual practice,” while “Fiducia supplicans explicitly called for a non-ritual practice.”

German dioceses were split over guidelines. Some formally promulgated it, while others publicly rejected it, creating a confusing patchwork of policies across the country.

Following the publication of the 2024 letter and Cardinal Fernández’s statement to Vatican News, it is now abundantly clear that Rome sides with the dioceses that distanced themselves from the guidelines.

Explaining why the Vatican believes that the criticisms in the 2024 letter also apply to the finalized document, Vatican News said this week: “Indeed, although the final text differs from the original draft, it does not actually incorporate what was written in the 2024 letter because, although it speaks of spontaneity and freedom regarding blessings for extramarital couples, it proposes a kind of liturgy or para-liturgical ritual that is not permitted by the declaration Fiducia Supplicans which was issued in December 2023.”

“That declaration states that with regard to blessings that ‘the Church has the right and the duty to avoid any rite that might contradict this conviction or lead to confusion’ regarding marriage.”

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Beyond ‘nein’

German Catholic officials have been noticeably quiet since the Vatican stepped up its criticism of the 2025 guidelines.

After Cardinal Fernández published the 2024 letter on May 4, the German bishops’ conference could have launched a public relations offensive, arguing that the letter applied only to a draft and not the final document.

A German Church spokesman did suggest this to German Catholic media, but seemingly not in a way intended to challenge the Vatican narrative head-on.

Two days after publishing the letter, Fernández shut down that possibility by underlining that the Vatican’s nein to the draft guidelines applied equally to the final text.

Why has the cardinal seemingly adopted a new strategy of rapid rebuttal?

He’s not going out on a limb. He has Pope Leo XIV’s support to press the issue, as the May 6 Vatican News report made clear.

Perhaps it is because Rome has finally tired of the modus operandi of the synodal way’s architects, of establishing “facts on the ground” in Germany and then, when the Vatican intervenes, claiming it is far too late to change them.

After years of being outmanoeuvred, the Vatican may have decided it is going to try to keep up with the German Church’s bureaucratic chicanery, offering a kind of real-time corrective.

Or could the new strategy simply be a sign that there’s not much else the Roman curia can do, other than make it clear that it does not approve of the German blessings project?

In practical terms, there is no way to discourage German parishes from continuing to host blessing ceremonies. The organizers didn’t care that the ceremonies were unauthorized when they launched them. Why would Rome’s opposition bother them now?

Doctrinal office statements also won’t prompt the ZdK’s leadership to rethink its endorsement of blessing ceremonies. That’s because the lay body’s leaders believe the doctrinal dicastery is wrong and they are right.

The Vatican could possibly urge the German bishops’ conference to withdraw the guidelines. But it’s likely to argue that they were never officially promulgated in the first place — a plausible position given they were issued during a papal interregnum by a minor bureaucratic body. The conference might also suggest that recalling the document after several bishops have formally endorsed it in their dioceses would be messy.

Yet Rome does have one source of leverage that it could, if it wished, use to great effect.

On March 31, new German bishops’ conference chairman Bishop Heiner Wilmer formally submitted to the Roman curia the statutes for the country’s proposed “synodal conference.”

Establishing the synodal conference — a permanent body of bishops and select lay representatives — is the overarching goal of the synodal way’s organizers. Its creation would embed the synodal way’s mechanisms in the German Church for the foreseeable future. It would give the ZdK and like-minded Catholics a long-cherished status as ecclesiastical decision-makers.

Synodal way supporters believe Vatican approval of the statutes is a given. They are so confident that they have already penciled in the synodal conference’s inaugural meeting for Nov. 6-7 in Stuttgart.

But what if the Vatican decided to make its approval conditional? That would, of course, escalate the conflict, arguably contradicting Pope Leo XIV’s goal of restoring peace in the Church. But it would present a dilemma for the synodal way’s champions.

Their instinct would be to protest as vigorously as possible. But how far would they be willing to go, knowing that the synodal way’s crowning goal — the synodal conference — was on the line?

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Show notes:

Louisiana ‘Vos estis’ complaint remains unanswered

DDF publishes 2024 criticism of German bishops’ guide for blessing irregular unions

Why did Moscow’s Archbishop Pezzi resign?

Religious liberty case involves suppressed canonical association

Ahead of World Youth Day, Catholic population in South Korea climbs slowly

Bosnian bishops reject claims they back division

Column: JPII’s abuse reforms, 25 years later

The announcement was made during a presentation at the Palazzo della Cancelleria in the Vatican, in which a foundation widely considered to be a wing of the Azerbaijani regime’s “caviar diplomacy” showcased the various projects it has funded in the Vatican since 2012.

The event was attended by Msgr. Pasquale Iacobone, president of the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology, and Archbishop Giovanni Cesare Pagazzi, Archivist and Librarian of the Holy Roman Church and secretary for the Dicastery for Culture and Education.

A Heydar Aliyev Foundation statement said that during the event included the presentation of the book “Pontes Culturae,” showing the works conducted by the foundation in the Vatican, and a documentary about the Holy See’s “friendship and cooperation” with Azerbaijan.

The book was prepared by the foundation, the Azerbaijani embassy to the Holy See, and the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology.

Ilgar Mukhtarov, the Azerbaijani ambassador to the Holy See said that “these projects are not limited only to the restoration of architectural monuments but also serve as an expression of respect for humanity’s collective memory, establishing a spiritual dialogue between the past and the future, and transferring universal values to future generations.”

During the event, it was announced that the Azerbaijani regime had signed an agreement with the Governorate of the Vatican City State to restore four statues in the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls on Apr. 29.

A Vatican governorate statement said that two statues of Saint Peter and Saint Paul within the Basilica and two of Saint Paul and Saint Luke in the church’s portico would be restored, and said that the agreement “expressed the sincere friendship and mutual cooperation existing between the Governorate and Azerbaijan.”

The announcement comes days after the Azerbaijani regime demolished the Armenian cathedral of the Holy Mother of God in the city of Stepanakert in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh, disputed between Azerbaijan and Armenia since the 1990s, and de facto controlled by Azerbaijan since 2023 after an offensive in the area that displaced 120,000 ethnic Armenians from the region.

Several human rights organizations and Armenian activists described the demolition of the cathedral as a part of a broader pattern of systematic cultural erasure in the region.

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The demolition took place shortly before the 111th anniversary of the Armenian genocide, during which an estimated 1 to 1.5 million ethnic Armenians were killed and millions more were forcibly deported by the Ottoman government during World War I.

Construction on the cathedral began in July 2006 and when it was consecrated in April 2019 it became the largest Armenian church in Nagorno-Karabakh. The cathedral was used as a bomb shelter during the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War in 2020 but did not suffer significant damage.

Armenian cultural heritage watchdog Monument Watch has reported that the Church of Saint Jacob, built in 2007 and located in the same city, was also demolished in early April.

The Armenian Apostolic Church is the ancient national Church of Armenia, and is one of the Oriental Orthodox Churches, a roughly 70 million-strong communion that also includes the Coptic Orthodox Church.

The Armenian Apostolic Church said in an Apr. 23 statement that “It is obvious that the Azerbaijani government continues to target Armenian Christian holy sites with the aim of erasing the Armenian trace from Artsakh.”

“This state-level vandalism once again proves that Azerbaijan’s anti-Armenian policy has not changed, which makes statements about establishing a stable and lasting peace with Armenia questionable.”

This is not the first time the Vatican has been criticized for its ties to the Azerbaijani regime, which is accused by human rights organizations of ethnically-based persecution of Armenian Christians in border territories.

Azerbaijan signed agreements in September 2025 with the Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital and the Vatican Apostolic Library and Apostolic Archives, alarming critics who accuse the Azerbaijani regime of human rights abuses against the Armenian minority and of practicing “caviar diplomacy” by using its cultural and economic power to influence Vatican policy in the South Caucasus region.

In April 2025, the Azerbaijani regime held a conference at the Pontifical Gregorian University, prompting widespread backlash.

The conference was entitled “Christianity in Azerbaijan: History and Modernity.” But Armenian activists and Church leaders called the event part of a broader campaign to erase Armenian Christian heritage from disputed territories.

Promotional materials for the conference included distinctly Azerbaijani texts on West Asian history, including a display of the medieval Armenian monastery of Dadivank, with the claim that it belonged to the “Caucasian Albanian” culture, an Azerbaijani government claim widely disputed by historians.

“This has no basis in reality. They say these are Caucasian Albanian churches, but Caucasian Albanians disappeared in the 8th century,” Orthodox Archbishop Vicken Aykazian, ecumenical director of the Eastern Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church of America, told The Pillar back in April 2025.

Despite these controversies, the conference received a letter of congratulations from Cardinal Claudio Gugerotti, prefect of the Dicastery for the Eastern Churches.

Months before the 2020 offensive in Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan’s First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva was awarded the Order of Pope Pius IX at the Vatican.

Ilqar Mukhtarov, Azerbaijan’s ambassador to the Holy See, received the same distinction on April 3, 2025.

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The Heydar Aliyev Foundation lists the Vatican Apostolic Library and the Vatican Museums among its partners and several restoration projects that it is supporting at the Vatican.

The list includes the Roman Catacombs of Marcellinus and Peter, the Catacombs of Commodilla, and the Catacombs of San Sebastiano, the restoration of a statue of Zeus in the Vatican Museums, the restoration and translation of more than 3,000 books and 75 manuscripts in the Vatican Apostolic Library, the restoration of a bas-relief with the encounter between Pope Leo the Great and Attila the Hun in St. Peter’s Basilica, and the restoration of the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls.

According to Italian outlet Irpi Media, the donations amounted to 640,000 euros (around $730,000). But an Azeri official said publicly in 2020 that the figure was “over 1 million euros.” Many of the restoration works came after 2020, suggesting the actual sum could be even higher.

One of the largest restoration projects was unveiled in 2024, when the Vatican City State Governorate announced an agreement between the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls and the Heydar Aliyev Foundation.

Observers suggest links between the Vatican and the former Soviet republic were strengthened thanks to Cardinal Claudio Gugerotti, who is now prefect of the Dicastery for Eastern Churches and was the apostolic nuncio to Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia from 2001 to 2011.

During Gugerotti’s service as nuncio, Azeri authorities signed a bilateral agreement with the Holy See in 2011, appointing an ambassador the same year, and began to have frequent meetings, both in Azerbaijan and the Vatican, with Holy See officials, among them then-Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, and Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, the then-president of the Pontifical Council for Culture.

According to Irpi Media, Ravasi is another central figure connecting Azerbaijan and the Vatican.

Ravasi opened the doors to Azeri-funded restoration projects in the Vatican with a 2012 agreement to restore Roman catacombs, as well as another to translate and restore manuscripts in the Apostolic Library.

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I’m Luke Coppen and I aim to guide you each weekday morning to the most interesting Catholic news and commentary.

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This episode is sponsored by the Institute for Liturgical Formation at Christendom College Graduate School of Theology. This summer, consider spending four weeks immersed in reverent liturgy and rigorous academics at the Institute for Liturgical Formation.

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Reading 1 - Acts 8: 5-8, 14-17

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Reading 2 - 1 Peter 3:15-18

Gospel - John 14:15-21

While the fate of the Vatican’s criminal prosecution over the infamous London property deal appears to hang in the balance in the city state’s court, a number of legal developments in Rome and abroad suggest the case could be on the verge of collapse.

While that result would be a near-nightmare scenario for prosecutors in the Vatican, with a six-year legal process ending in humiliation, it could also leave the Holy See open to more financial losses stemming from a deal which has already cost the Vatican hundreds of millions.

Such a result seems like something the Vatican should be straining to avoid at all costs, but recent developments suggest the Secretariat of State is itself sabotaging its own legal efforts to claw back losses, potentially leaving itself exposed to millions more in liabilities in the process.

It is unclear what strategy the Secretariat of State is pursuing in its apparently conscious disengagement from its own case — or to what end. But, for now, the potential risks seem all too clear.

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—

Judges at the Vatican City court of appeal ordered in March a review of the investigation and indictment which opened the landmark financial crimes trial in 2022.

In an unprecedented ruling, the judges effectively voided the executive acts issued by Pope Francis which cleared the way for prosecutors’ initial criminal investigation into the events around the London deal in 2020.

The result of that ruling is a kind of trial within a trial which, while leaving intact the 2024 convictions handed down by a lower court, creates the possibility of a mistrial being declared, and blocking any future efforts to prosecute the 10 defendants cited in the initial trial over a series of investments through which the Holy See lost an estimated 200 million euros in the years leading up to 2018.

The collapse of that prosecution would be, in itself, a disaster for the Vatican, meaning that nearly a decade of financial scandal and attendant negative media coverage were ultimately for nothing, despite seemingly clear evidence of corruption and criminal activity coming to light both before and during the trial.

But the potential consequences of the entire Vatican City trial being dismissed could also have far wider implications.

In addition to the criminal prosecutions in Vatican City, the London property deal and connected events have been the subject of numerous legal processes and lawsuits in other countries, none of which have gone the Vatican’s way. Last week, Swiss authorities announced that it had abandoned efforts to prosecute one of the Secretariat of States former investment managers, Enrico Crasso.

According to the man who ultimately sold the Vatican the London building at 60 Sloane Avenue, Raffaele Mincione, Crasso was a key figure in setting up the Secretariat of State’s investment with Mincione and acted — in Mincione’s telling — in ways which seemed at worst illegal and at best highly irregular.

Crasso has also been accused of attempting to bribe and blackmail other actors in the London deal to gain control of the building.

Crasso was additionally revealed to have arranged an investment from the Vatican of millions of euros into a fictitious highway development in the United States.

Despite all of this, the Swiss authorities announced they were closing the case against him, lodged at the Secretariat of State’s request, because the secretariat had refused to make available key witnesses in the case, including Msgr. Alberto Perlasca, the former head of the secretariat’s administrative office who served as a witness in the Vatican trial, and Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, the former sostituto at the same department.

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But the secretariat choosing to, in effect, walk away from its own case in Switzerland not only closes off any likelihood of winning access to funds frozen there as part of their complaint, it could also have significant knock-on effects elsewhere.

In a previous UK lawsuit brought by Mincione shortly before he was charged with financial crimes in Vatican City, the investment manager sought “declaratory relief” from the court against the Secretariat of State, claiming the Vatican had wrongly accused him of mismanagement of Vatican investments and acting in bad faith.

Mincione won a qualified victory in that case, with the Secretariat of State being ordered to pay more than £1 million in legal costs to Mincione in a case in which Peña Parra testified that he signed off on a five million euro invoice he knew to be “completely fictitious” and told the court “You said that I was not honest. I accept that.”

While simply refusing to cooperate with Swiss authorities acting on their behalf might appear like an exercise in avoiding similar embarrassing episodes at the expense of pursuing frozen funds, it could prove even more expensive for the Vatican, though.

In London, Mincione is currently pursuing additional legal action for commercial fraud against the Secretariat of State as well as various financial institutions, having filed a lawsuit in the UK’s Commercial Court last year.

If the Secretariat of State similarly refuses to make key witnesses like Perlasca and Peña Parra available to testify, the UK court look at that decision, together with the collapse of the Swiss case and the disarray of the Vatican prosecution and determine that the secretariat has, to all intents and purposes, walked away from its attempts to prosecute Mincione and, in effect, conceded they have no case against him in the process.

If that were to happen, it could open the Secretariat of State up to another legal loss, this time with the prospect of significant damages — potentially running to the millions — depending on Mincione’s ability to argue that he was, essentially, duped into taking illegally appropriated Vatican funds for investment and then blamed for it.

If that happens, the Vatican could again find itself posting sizable losses on perhaps its most publicly calamitous financial deal in decades.

Worse than a possible financial loss, though, would be the potential damage to the Holy See’s reputation, which has suffered on several fronts throughout the financial scandal investigation and trial.

In addition to serious questions about the competence and methods of the city state’s prosecutor’s office, the airing of serious allegations of corruption at the highest levels of the curia have cost the Vatican considerable credibility.

Under Pope Leo, the Vatican has so far posted guardedly positive financial results, with the pope saying that, although serious efforts are still underway, he is broadly satisfied with the direction of travel and the progress being made.

A series of legal results that amount to seemingly proven bad actors within and around the Secretariat of State escaping punishment while the secretariat itself is found liable for what it has maintained are crimes against it would significantly dent any sense of momentum in the process of reform.

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Despite fielding Christian candidates, the Bharatiya Janata Party failed to win in four pivotal constituencies in an area known as the Syro-Malabar Belt, though it made incremental gains elsewhere in the state.

BJP candidates standing in the April 9 Kerala Legislative Assembly election lost in the strongly Syro-Malabar constituencies of Kanjirappally, Poonjar, Pala, and Thiruvalla, according to results published May 4.

The outcome marked a setback for the BJP’s strategy of reaching out to Christian voters in hopes of expanding beyond its Hindu base to make a major electoral breakthrough in a state dominated by the Left Democratic Front and the United Democratic Front.

The Left Democratic Front, an alliance led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist), has held power in Kerala since 2016. But the United Democratic Front — an alliance led by the Indian National Congress — ended its 10-year rule in the April 9 election, winning 102 of the 140 seats in the Kerala Legislative Assembly.

The result brought an end to India’s last communist-led state government.

A May 5 analysis by the Times of India highlighted extensive efforts to court Kerala’s Christian population by V.D. Satheesan, an Indian National Congress politician and Leader of the Opposition in the Kerala Legislative Assembly.

The newspaper said that Satheesan’s engagement was acknowledged by Syro-Malabar Major Archbishop Raphael Thattil and Cardinal Baselios Cleemis, head of the Syro-Malankara Church, another Eastern Catholic Church in full communion with Rome.

“What emerged was a steady rebuilding of trust through religious and cultural engagement. Whether strategic or organic, the shift is now visible and politically consequential,” the paper commented.

But while the BJP struggled in densely Syro-Malabar areas, it won three Kerala Legislative Assembly seats overall as part of the National Democratic Alliance. This marked a steady advance for the party, which secured only one seat in the 2016 election and zero in the 2021 ballot.

In another notable development, the BJP added West Bengal, an eastern state with more than 100 million people, to the states under its control. This means the BJP and its National Democratic Alliance allies now rule in a vast continuous swathe of Indian states.

Human rights activists argue that the BJP’s dominance at both state and federal levels has implications for India’s Christian minority.

The most recent census, conducted in 2011, concluded that there are around 28 million Christians, comprising around 2.3% of India’s then-population of 1.21 billion. According to the 2011 census, the country is home to more than 23 million Catholics, who belong to the Latin Church, Syro-Malabar Church, and Syro-Malankara Church.

India’s constitution upholds religious freedom, but advocacy groups report widespread violations of Christians’ rights. Campaigners argue that infringements are more common in BJP-led states. But the party insists it upholds the rights of religious minorities and is not connected with anti-Christian incidents.

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A campaign group accused officials in the eastern state of Odisha this week of presiding over “a complete breakdown” of constitutional protections for Christians.

Members of the Karwan-e-Mohabbat (Caravan of Love) group suggested that police, government employees, and politicians were complicit in the persecution of Christians, in an open letter to state authorities at the end of a May 2-5 trip to Odisha.

They said they had heard “repeated testimonies of the role of the police, the civil administration, elected representatives and even members of the state cabinet who encouraged and participated in the persecution of Christian minorities and the denial of their fundamental rights.”

Odisha, previously known as Orissa, has an extensive history of anti-Christian violence, including the 2008 Kandhamal massacre. In 1967, Odisha became the first state to pass an anti-conversion law. The BJP has led the state since 2024.

A “people’s tribunal” organized by Karwan-e-Mohabbat gathered evidence of attacks on churches, social ostracism, and denial of burials in village cemeteries in Odisha.

“In some of the districts, the violence has crossed even these many red lines and taken the form of physical assaults on the bodies of people of Christian identity,” the group said.

“Sometimes, this takes the form of tying them to a tree and beating them or putting them in sacks and physically assaulting them; and a few instances of sexual assault and violence and attempts to burn alive which were halted only at the last minute.”

The open letter claimed that police often charged the victims of violence, rather than the perpetrators.

“What is evident to us is a complete breakdown in the constitutional machinery of the state in relation to its Christian minorities,” it concluded.

Officials in Odisha deny any involvement in anti-Christian persecution and insist the state’s anti-conversion law is necessary to prevent coerced conversions among Hindus.

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Listen to JD read this Pillar Post here: The Pillar TL;DR

Hey everybody,

It’s still Easter, and you’re reading The Tuesday Pillar Post.

At the end of this week, the Church will celebrate the anniversary of Pope Leo XIV’s election to the papacy, after a two-day conclave that began May 7, 2025.

There’s plenty of analysis about the pope’s first year, and plenty more coming. In the meantime, pray for the pope. His is not an easy task, and — contrary to popular opinion — the pope is an ordinary human being, not endowed with superpowers, as he gets used to what must be the most surreal life transition on planet Earth.

I once asked a newly retiring bishop if he’d return to his hometown after the installation of his successor, and he was frank: “I’m 75 years old,” he said. “All my doctors are here. At my age, those are some of the most important relationships in my life. So I’m staying here.”

It was a pragmatic reminder of the unique situation of septuagenarians in the Church’s life. Most guys I know at 70 have wrapped up their careers or are getting ready to. They’re figuring out what the day will look like without the office or shop floor. They’re easing into long put-off hobbies. They’re trying to decide what to do about the sudden increase of ear hair which seems to sprout in the eighth decade of life.

But imagine that you’re 70, and you’ve got five more years of leading a diocese or a dicastery ahead of you, in which you’re expected to take the helm in a changing world, and to do it well.

More to the point, imagine that you’re 70, and suddenly you take a new name, your brothers swear allegiance and obedience to you, you’ve got new charisms of unity and infallibility, and people talk about the fact that you could easily stay in that new job for 20 years, or more.

Accepting the papal office is a call to a kind of martyrdom. Not every pope has accepted that call generously — plenty in history have chosen their own paths instead.

But Leo, after a robust missionary life around the globe, and a few years of hard labor in a Vatican dicastery, seems to have accepted that the last chapter of his life will see him poured out like a libation for the salvation of souls.

I wouldn’t wish it on anyone — even while I know that once God calls, it’s the particular path which might lead him to salvation.

As I say, pray for the pope. He needs it.

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The news

The Vatican has not responded to a Vos estis lux mundi whistleblower complaint from the Diocese of Baton Rouge, more than 60 days after the report was initially filed.

While the norms of Vos estis require the Dicastery for Bishops to respond within 30 days of receiving a complaint, an allegation that Bishop Michael Duca mishandled a case in the Baton Rouge diocese has to date gotten no response from Vatican officials.

The complaint alleges that Duca discouraged a whistleblower from calling the police after a priest reportedly admitted to sexual activity with minors, and that the diocese did not follow its own policy while addressing allegations of the priest’s misconduct.

The bishop is alleged to have told a Catholic concerned about the priest: “You don’t need to call law enforcement. You’re just going to muddy the waters.”

A whistleblower in the case says he’s been told that the Archdiocese of New Orleans, which would be responsible for investigating the case, has gotten no direction from the Dicastery for Bishops.

Meanwhile, the diocese has not responded to The Pillar’s reporting on the subject, but the diocesan vicar general, who is named in the Vos estis complaint, has been appointed administrator of the parish where the accused priest had been pastor.

The situation is a test case for the Dicastery for Bishops absent its former prefect, Cardinal Robert Prevost, who has now a new position in the life of the Church.

It is also an interesting test case for new U.S. nuncio Archbishop Gabriele Caccia, who arrives in post this week — while former nuncio Cardinal Christophe Pierre was famously unresponsive to requests for information about Vos estis cases, Caccia may soon be in the position to decide whether his term in the U.S. will be marked by the kind of transparency that Vos estis was meant to assure.

Read about the case here.

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The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith published on Monday a 2024 letter which criticized a German proposed ritual for blessing same-sex couples, and others in irregular unions.

The letter’s publication is remarkable, it comes after German bishops have moved forward with implementing the ritual, in apparent defiance of the correction given by the Vatican.

The Pillar was the first to report in October 2025 that the DDF had sent the letter to German bishops, while bishops in that country were insisting that they had “consulted” with the Vatican on their plans for the ritual blessing.

So what does all of this mean:

— That the Vatican has been clear to the German bishops for several years about their intended plans.

— That the method of intervention has been one of subsidiarity: Identifying problems in the German plans, and expecting the German bishops to address them.

— That the issue has clearly escalated now, and Cardinal Victor Fernandez at the DDF, under the leadership of Leo, has decided to bring public clarity to the controversy. That could portend a new way of doing things, and one worth attention.

Here’s our report.

—
Pope Leo XIV accepted Saturday the resignation of the Italian archbishop who has served as the de facto leader of Russia’s Catholic community for almost 20 years.

The resignation of Archbishop Paolo Pezzi gained some real attention, because the bishop is only 65 years old.

It also puts a spotlight on the fascinating history of Catholicism in Russia.

Luke Coppen explains it all — with the startling Coppen clarity you’ve come to expect.

Here’s what you need to know.

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Next, a kind of fascinating religious liberty case involving a suppressed canonical association, and the parish property it owns (already an unusual situation) in the Diocese of Covington, Kentucky.

The Missionaries of St. John the Baptist were once a public association of the faithful, entrusted with the administration of a parish in Kentucky. As it happened, they owned the parish church and the property on which it stands.

At that time, the group decided to build a new grotto on the land — a decision which triggered a legal fight with neighbors, who said the area wasn’t zoned for a grotto. That fight has gotten complicated enough that it may well end up at the U.S. Supreme Court.

But in the meantime, the association was suppressed, after Covington’s bishop decided the group “consistently disparaged” the Church’s current Roman missal. But in an unusual twist, the suppressed group continued to license its property for use of the parish church.

That adds some interesting complication to the ongoing legal fight over the grotto.

Read all about it.

—

The Catholic population of South Korea has surpassed 6 million, with recent statistics showing growth in the local Church, even as the country’s population continues to shrink.

However, while the Church in the country is expanding, its demographics also reflect the rapid aging of the general population in the East Asian nation.

As the Republic of Korea prepares to host World Youth Day next year, Michelle La Rosa breaks down the local numbers.

—

The Catholic bishops of Bosnia and Herzegovina have rejected claims by a local Islamic organization that the Church supports efforts to divide the country.

The bishops spoke out after a Muslim representative body in the country said that church leaders are sowing division over religion in the country.

Here’s why.

—

And we have a column this week from Notre Dame professor Fr. John Paul Kimes, who was a long-time official at the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, and is one of the world’s foremost experts in the Church’s penal law.

Fr. Kimes looks at an important, though mostly unheralded anniversary — 25 years ago last week, Pope St. John Paul II promulgated Sacramentorum sanctitatis tutela, an apostolic letter on grave canonical crimes which changed everything.

“SST was, and remains, the single most important piece of legislation in the life of the Church in the 21st century. That no one remembers or celebrates its birthday is unfortunate but understandable. It was released with no fanfare, and, in all honesty, it was completely inadequate for the challenges it would immediately face — as was the Church,” wrote Fr. Kimes.

“However, both it, and the Church, changed in response to the crisis that followed.”

Read all about it.

—
Finally in the news, the Vatican released this morning some study reports, from Synod on Synodality commissions — one working on “synodal discernment” of doctrinal and ethical issues, and another working on the selection of bishops.

We’ll have a full readers’ guide today on the theological discernment report. But I wanted to take a moment to consider the recommendations of the synodal study group on the selection of bishops.

The report says the study group’s goal was to make proposals for a better discernment of diocesan bishops, in part by better understanding the situation of vacant sees.

The heart of the proposal is to create in each diocese “a Committee for the Provision of the Local Church” at the time when acute succession planning is underway.

The committee is to include two diocesan priests elected by the presbyteral council, along with “two consecrated men/women and two laypersons elected by the Diocesan Pastoral Council, along with the Diocesan Administrator or Apostolic Administrator, if present.”

After taking an oath of confidentiality, committee members begin communicating with the apostolic nuncio “to clarify the state of the diocese, the profile of the new Pastor, and to receive opinions on possible candidates.”

The nuncio “relies on the committee,” the synod proposal suggests, to understand the diocese and its needs.

If you ask me, this rather misses the mark, representing a Potemkin kind of consultation that’s unlikely to actually be helpful. In that sense, it seems to embody all the worst criticisms of synodality itself.

Diocesan priests in the group might themselves be actually well represented — they’ll be chosen by their peers — at least those on the presbyteral council. And since the presbyteral council includes elected presbyters, there is at least a chance that the views of the majority of the presbyterate might get through.

But as to laity and religious — they’d be chosen by a group itself usually hand-selected by the bishop, the diocesan pastoral council. In other words, diocesan insiders — those in good standing with the incumbent diocesan bishop — would be tasked with choosing some folks to present the state of the diocese to the nuncio. The nuncio would be enjoined to rely on them.

Hand-chosen insiders choosing other insiders to report on the state of the diocese does not strike me as an especially likely way to get anything but an affirmation of the status quo.

It does not strike me as a way to hear anything other than an assemblage of mutually reinforcing perspectives — the bishop gives a report on the state of the diocese, which would likely be buoyed by a report from the laypeople in his circle, regardless of what anyone outside that orbit has to say.

Synodality is supposed to be an invitation to the conversation to voices well outside the center — in the places Pope Francis liked to call the “existential peripheries.”

Of course that consultation is much harder — it involves more labor, more filtering, more discernment, more compilation — and it involves the possibility that reports will say something no one wants to hear.

But isn’t that the point? To reflect on reality, instead of offering platitudes of praise to the Church’s leadership cadre, straight from the Church’s donor and influencer class?

If we believe disciples and prophets — and maybe saints — can exist well outside the ambit of the chancery’s orbit, isn’t the point of synodality to invite those people into the Church’s real discernment?

Achieving real synodality is messier, but it least aims at something worthwhile. The proposal floated by the synod study group seems content to replace clericalism with “insiderism” and call that a win. Curiously, that’s the criticism that the synodal processes of the past few years have also faced.

And really, is that all the Lord is asking in synodality’s “new paradigms?”

Now, the synodal study group’s synodal proposal on synodal discernment of synodal bishops is just a proposal, of course.

But it sounds to me like the plan is to put a new label on an old wineskin, and call it a new way of being Church.

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We are a bagel people

I’m from New Jersey. The part of New Jersey where dads commute into “the city” each morning, and it’s not uncommon to take the train into Manhattan for a Broadway play, or a good meal, or — if you’ve got terrifically bad taste in professional sports — a Knicks or Rangers game.

We’re not New Yorkers, and we take pride in that. We maintain that north central New Jersey (my childhood home is eleven miles from the Goethals Bridge to Staten Island) has a unique and superior culture, that can only be partially understood by “Jersey Shore” — which was actually a show mostly about New Yorkers coming down the shore to cavort, spray tan, and get arrested.

I’m from the part of New Jersey in which I recognize the streets from outdoor scenes of “The Sopranos,” and in which I’ve known a few dads who are the spitting image of Silvio Dante.

New Jersey is, as I put it to Ed recently, the actual incarnation of its own stereotypes, and I’m ok with that.

I’m also ok living now many states away, where the collective blood pressure is quite a few degrees lower, and where almost no one spends three figures monthly on hair gel.

But I miss a few things, and among them is the bagels.

Bagels in New Jersey are an ordinary and underappreciated part of life. Every town has a local bagel shop or two, usually owned by a local family, and offering dozens of varieties hot and fresh each morning.

New York and Connecticut do passable bagels, but the best bagel in each of those places would be only a mediocre bagel in my part of New Jersey.

Our bagels are nothing like what you can get at Einstein’s or Panera. The crust on a real bagel is crispy, the inside dense and chewy.

They’re uniquely good in New Jersey, people say, because of soft tap water with a low mineral content, which contributes to elasticity of the dough, along with the lengthy process of long-proofing, kettle boiling, and then baking on wooden boards in high temperature ovens.

But New Jersey bagels are also good because of the culture — Eastern European Jewish families who came to our state brought with them the experience of bagel baking spanning centuries, and with that experience the wisdom of what to do, and what not to do.

Proper bagels are not eaten toasted, but rather (in the morning) piled high with salted butter or cream cheese. They should be sliced in half for the filling horizontally, but ought not to be halved vertically, as that leaves quartered pieces more likely to fall apart.

And proper bagels are ubiquitous. Dads run out to the bagel store on weekend mornings, and come home with a dozen or so in a paper bag, to be eaten casually at the table while reading the paper. The bag’s top must be properly rolled after a bagel is retrieved, to avoid premature staling.

At most large public high schools, bagel sales — hosted by the school’s clubs and sports teams — are a near daily occurrence, and probably the most important contributor to ensuring teenagers have some semblance of a balanced breakfast, usually for only a buck or two.

Bagels matter where I’m from. But you only appreciate that after you’ve left, and you’ve sampled the round bread which passes for a bagel at America’s chain restaurants.

After a while, if you’re from where I’m from and then live somewhere else, you begin to spend an inordinate amount of time considering how bagels (and with them leisure) can be the basis of culture.

Which is why I was excited a few weeks ago to read in some national newspaper (I can’t remember which) a trend story about the frequency with which tri-state area bakers have begun opening legit bagel shops in other parts of the country, to appeal to regional ex-pats like me.

I’ve read that some such shops have gone so far as to ship New Jersey’s tap water across the country, and to buy supplies from tri-state area vendors, leaving nothing to chance in the quest for authenticity.

That sort of thing usually strikes me as too precious by half, but in this case — with the effort meant to appeal to my own regional taste and nostalgia — I had no complaints.

So I was especially delighted to learn that one such shop had opened just two miles from my Colorado home, in a strip mall containing my children’s preferred chik-fil-a, and the Apple Store I visit with disturbing regularity, every time I break my MacBook on some reporting excursion.

It was not actually a storefront, this bagel shop, but a food truck, plastered with signs promising bagel authenticity, and parked in a few leased spots of the parking lot, where the manager told me it’s expected to remain permanently.

That might be optimistic. At least if the business model depends on customers who have previously tasted a bagel.

I pulled up last week to the bagel truck and ordered a buttered poppy seed — what should be a standard order for any self-respecting bagel vendor. The manager first expressed bewilderment, before explaining that a poppy seed bagel wasn’t an option.

Upon further enquiry, I learned that poppy seed wasn’t sold out, it just wasn’t on the menu, even while “cheddar” and other bagel heresies were widely available.

I could get a sesame seed bagel, I learned, though I caused a stir when I explained that I didn’t want it toasted — I was apparently the first person in the shop’s history to order a bagel the right way.

And I compounded the kitchen’s anxiety when I said that I did want it buttered. The butter, it was explained, was kept cold, and thus was unspreadable on a cold bagel.

I accepted the situation, and tried to conceal my disappointment, asking if I could cancel my order — until an enterprising kitchen worker told me he could take care of the bagel.

And just a few minutes later, he served me something I could not have predicted — an untoasted sesame seed bagel which had been dipped into melted butter, and was then oozing from the paper wrapping and across the counter.

I had almost no sense of what I was looking at; I was both dismayed and befuddled, perhaps even scandalized. And I realized in that moment I would have no Proustian satisfaction that day.

Since the bagel wasn’t hot, the man explained, he’d decided the butter should be.

I give full points for effort and creativity on that one. But I settled for cream cheese and returned the sopping mess.

And I learned a valuable lesson: You can import all the tap water you want, but you can’t manufacture a culture without the people who’ve been formed in it.

Here in Colorado, I’ll stick with green chile breakfast burritos. I advise you do the same. We already know how to make them.

Please be assured of our prayers, and please pray for us. We need it.

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Yours in Christ,

JD Flynn
editor-in-chief
The Pillar

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I’m Luke Coppen and I seek to guide you each weekday morning to the most interesting Catholic news and commentary.

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When April 30 went unnoticed in 2001, I was a newly ordained priest, sitting in a classroom in Rome, about to finish my license in canon law.

I happened to be taking a class on penal (criminal) law that semester. I had no idea how important April 30 was going to be; to be honest, I had no idea that my entire life, my entire priesthood, would be changed by that day.

It was on that day – April 30, 2001 – that Pope John Paul II promulgated an apostolic letter entitled Sacramentorum sanctitatis tutela, which updated the Church’s law regarding the sexual abuse of minors.

At the time, the apostolic letter gained little attention. It would not be for several more months – Jan. 6, 2002, to be exact – that the “Spotlight” series in the Boston Globe began to unveil the extent of sexual abuse of minors in the Archdiocese of Boston, and the inactivity on the part of Church leaders.

This newspaper series would eventually lead to the USCCB’s “Dallas Charter,” and the flurry of activity by the U.S. bishops, aiming to respond to the endless stream of media reports of clerical sexual abuse which followed the initial Spotlight story about the abuses perpetrated by John Geoghan.

But while few people paid attention to SST – as the apostolic letter came to be known – even fewer people know that the most novel aspects of it were actually the fruit of earlier efforts by the U.S. bishops to address cases of clerical sexual abuse.

In 1994, the U.S. bishops sought and obtained permission from the Holy See to make two important changes to canon law.

The first change was raising the age of a minor from 16 to 18, as it pertained to cases of clerical sexual abuse. That was significant because it allowed the bishops to respond through canon law to accusations that would represent crimes in all 50 states, some of which considered minors to be under the age of 18.

The second was a technical change regarding the calculation of the statute of limitations. For cases involving minors, the clock wouldn’t start on prescription — the proper canonical term for the statute of limitations — until an alleged victim turned 18.

These important changes were introduced as universal law in SST, months before “Spotlight.”

SST was, and remains, the single most important piece of legislation in the life of the Church in the 21st century. That no one remembers or celebrates its birthday is unfortunate but understandable. It was released with no fanfare, and, in all honesty, it was completely inadequate for the challenges it would immediately face — as was the Church.

However, both it, and the Church, changed in response to the crisis that followed.

SST was a law written for another time. It demanded that only priests could serve in any tribunal function in cases of accused priests, as if the number of cases would be low enough or the number of adequately trained priest canonists high enough for that to be feasible.

It allowed cases to be adjudicated only by means of a judicial penal trial, a more complex set of procedural norms that almost no one in the Church had used with any regularity since the new Code of Canon Law was promulgated in 1983.

It even forgot to include within its competence one of the crimes that the office which crafted the law had, itself, created in the 1980s — the malicious recording and publication of a confession.

But SST adapted. Quickly.

With the onslaught of cases that arrived from the U.S. – then later Ireland, and Belgium, and Germany and Latin America and, well, everywhere – successive popes adapted the law to fit the need. It functioned in many ways like an emergency utility infielder – a law that capaciously took in many difficult issues and sought to provide an adequate response. This was in part possible because of the specific way canon law looks at crimes of sexual abuse. By speaking of this horrific crime in moral terms – as a violation of the sixth commandment – the law was able to include different forms of abuse, without the delay that would have been necessary to legislate about, for example, online abuse or child pornography.

For years, SST was the only universal canon law of its kind, and it necessarily came to impact the way the Church thought about and practiced penal law more broadly.

It also pointed to other areas of the law that needed addressing, as the cases of clerical sexual abuse exposed flaws in matters of episcopal responsibility and other forms of abuse that also needed to be addressed.

For priests of my generation — I was ordained in 2000 — our entire exercise of ministry has been in the shadow of the sexual abuse crisis. For some, it was already a part of their lives as they, too, had been victims of abuse. For me, it has become a shadow over nearly all of my ministry for the past 17 years: in my work in the discipline section of the (now) Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith for more than a decade, and now six years of service to dioceses across the U.S. since returning home.

But for all of us, priests and laity alike, SST was already working before the Dallas Charter to shape a future in the Church that would never again allow crimes of child sexual abuse to be unaddressed.

I celebrate April 30 every year, as the birthday of the law that changed the Church for the better. It is a law that changed my life. Whether you know it or not, it changed yours, too. It is, and will remain, the law which marked a definitive turning point in the life of the Church, if for no other reason than it reminds us all of our responsibility to the most vulnerable among us.

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Fr. John Paul Kimes is an Associate Professor of the Practice at Notre Dame Law School and the Raymond of Peñafort Fellow in Canon Law at the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture.

He served for 11 years as a canon lawyer at the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. He was ordained in 2000 as a priest of the Maronite Catholic Eparchy of Our Lady of Lebanon of Los Angeles

The Vatican announced May 2 that the pope had approved the resignation of Archbishop Paolo Pezzi, F.S.C.B., as head of the Archdiocese of the Mother of God at Moscow.

The move raised eyebrows because Pezzi is only 65 years old — meaning he could have served another 10 years before reaching the standard retirement age for diocesan bishops.

As well as accepting Pezzi’s resignation, Pope Leo named the Russia-born auxiliary Bishop Nicolai Dubinin, O.F.M. Conv., as apostolic administrator of the archdiocese.

Those are the plain facts, but do we know anything more about the leadership transition in Moscow? Before we answer that, let’s take a brief look at the archdiocese’s history and Pezzi’s tenure.

The birth of an archdiocese

The Catholic presence in Moscow dates back to the 14th century, when the city was ruled by princes. But the Catholic Church’s longstanding pastoral structures in Moscow were demolished following the Russian Revolution in 1917.

The city hosted a 1923 show trial of Russia’s Catholic leadership on charges of counter-revolutionary activities. Two churchmen — Archbishop Jan Cieplak and his vicar general Msgr. Konstanty Budkiewicz — were sentenced to death, while 15 others were sent to the Gulag, the notorious network of forced labor camps.

The country’s majority Russian Orthodox Church was also dismantled, with around a thousand Orthodox clergy executed at a single site in the Moscow region: the Butovo firing range, later known as the “Russian Golgotha.”

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Pope John Paul II faced a conundrum. He needed to reestablish pastoral structures in the Russian Federation. But he knew the step would be opposed by the Russian Orthodox Church, a fragile body emerging from the most painful episode in its history.

The Russian Orthodox Church argued that Russia — the world’s largest country by geographical area — was its “canonical territory.” But the Catholic Church, which believes it has a duty to shepherd Catholics wherever they are found in the world, did not recognize the concept.

Before the Russian Revolution, Moscow’s Catholics belonged to the Archdiocese of Mohilev, which stretched from the Baltic Sea in the west across the entire land mass of Russia to the Pacific Ocean. But the Vatican couldn’t simply restore the Mohilev archdiocese because the Soviet Union had fragmented into independent states, each of which logically needed its own jurisdiction.

On April 13, 1991, the Polish pope made a decisive move. He established the Archdiocese of Minsk-Mohilev, based in the capital city of the newly independent Belarus. In Russia itself, he created the Apostolic Administration of European Russia, centered on Moscow, and the Apostolic Administration of Siberia, covering eastern Russia.

In 2002, John Paul II further altered Russia’s Catholic jurisdictions, establishing the Metropolitan Archdiocese of the Mother of God at Moscow and three suffragan dioceses: St. Clement at Saratov, St. Joseph at Irkutsk, and the Transfiguration at Novosibirsk.

The new jurisdictions were carefully named to avoid antagonizing the Russian Orthodox Church, which was alert to what it perceived as Catholic expansionism as it struggled to rebuild after communist persecution. Creating a Catholic Archdiocese of Moscow would have been insensitive, so the Polish pope opted instead for the Archdiocese of the Mother of God at Moscow, employing a Marian title favored by Orthodox Christians.

Nevertheless, the 2002 changes prompted protests from the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church, which denounced what it called “a challenge to Orthodoxy.”

Archbishop Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz, a Belarusian with Polish ethnic roots, initially led the Moscow archdiocese. But he was named Archbishop of Minsk-Mohilev in 2007. He was succeeded in Moscow by Archbishop Pezzi, a member of the Fraternity of St. Charles Borromeo, a priestly society linked to Communion and Liberation. Pezzi had served as a missionary in Russia in the turbulent early 1990s and gained experience of Catholic-Russian Orthodox relations.

The replacement of the formidable Kondrusiewicz with the milder Pezzi was seen as a diplomatic concession by the Vatican to the Russian Orthodox Church. The change reportedly provoked mixed reactions among Russian Catholics, some of whom preferred Kondrusiewicz’s boldness to Pezzi’s more cautious approach.

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The Italian archbishop’s patient outreach to the Russian Orthodox was hampered by events beyond his control, principally political and ecclesial tensions in Ukraine, which built to a feverish intensity following the Russian seizure of Crimea in 2014.

Pezzi welcomed the historic meeting between Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill of Moscow in Cuba in 2016. But the encounter did not usher in a new era in Catholic-Russian Orthodox relations. Instead, Rome-Moscow ties foundered as the conflict in Ukraine deepened. They reached a low point in 2022 when Pope Francis said that Patriarch Kirill risked becoming “Putin’s altar boy” because of his uncritical support for Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine launched that year.

There was little Pezzi could do except concentrate on the pastoral welfare of Russian Catholics. As Moscow archbishop, he oversaw the care of around 70,000 Catholics in roughly 60 parishes. The trouble was that his archdiocese is one of the geographically largest in the world, approximately four times the size of Texas. He had at his disposal about 100 priests. He was only given an auxiliary bishop — Bishop Dubinin — in 2020.

Perhaps the archdiocese’s vast sweep didn’t matter when Pezzi began to serve as Moscow’s Catholic archbishop as an energetic 47-year-old. But the responsibility likely took its toll as he entered his 60s. In 2020, he was forced to self-isolate after falling ill with COVID-19.

Not long after he recovered, Russia was placed on a war footing and its citizens were subjected to ever-tightening censorship. As a public figure, Pezzi needed to choose his words extremely carefully. Anyone resident in Russia who expressed hopes for peace could find themselves open to the charge of “discrediting” the armed forces, which carried a penalty of up to 15 years in prison.

A ‘midday shock’

Archbishop Pezzi’s resignation came as a surprise not only to Vatican watchers but also to senior members of Russia’s Catholic community.

Bishop Clemens Pickel, head of the Diocese of St. Clement at Saratov, responded with a blogpost titled “Midday shock,” referring to the Vatican’s noon daily press bulletin that announced the resignation.

Pickel wrote that, since the archbishop had not reached the age limit of 75, the only possible ground for his resignation was Canon 401 § 2 of the Code of Canon Law, which says: “A diocesan bishop who has become less able to fulfill his office because of ill health or some other grave cause is earnestly requested to present his resignation from office.”

Sure enough, the Archdiocese of the Mother of God at Moscow confirmed on its website that Pezzi’s resignation was accepted under Canon 401 § 2.

“The decision by bishops to resign due to health reasons or other circumstances that prevent them from adequately fulfilling their ministry — a rarity in the past — has become more common in recent times,” the archdiocese commented.

It urged local Catholics to unite in a prayer of thanksgiving for Pezzi’s “long and faithful service,” but presented no specific rationale for the resignation.

In a May 2 statement to the archdiocese, the apostolic administrator Bishop Dubinin praised Pezzi’s 18-year tenure, saying the archbishop exemplified the good shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep. He invited Catholics to attend a May 30 thanksgiving Mass that Pezzi will celebrate at Moscow’s Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception.

Knowing that the resignation was offered under Canon 401 § 2 does not in itself clarify the decision. The canon has been cited in a wide variety of situations, from brain injuries to burnout to administrative failures to the mishandling of abuse cases.

In the absence of an official explanation, Catholic media are seeking to fill the void. The Spanish website InfoVaticana suggested Pezzi was worn down by his vast responsibilities.

It said: “According to sources consulted by InfoVaticana, Pezzi’s departure is mainly due to accumulated personal wear and tear after years in a particularly tough posting. There are no consistent indications of disciplinary measures or open conflicts that explain the decision, which must be interpreted in terms of institutional fatigue rather than a specific crisis.”

Meanwhile, The Tablet magazine reported May 4 that Pezzi had addressed the circumstances of his resignation at a Mass on the day of the announcement. The archbishop reportedly said that, “to make it clear and not spread any conspiracy theories or incorrect rumors, I want to announce that I have resigned because of my health, which does not allow me to manage this beloved, beautiful diocese as I should.”

Pezzi’s comments were first covered by the Belarusian website katolik.life, citing a Russian Catholic journalist based in Moscow.

Pezzi reportedly said he would continue living in Moscow in retirement, serving at the 52-year-old Dubinin’s disposal.

The archbishop also spoke about the Devil’s role in spreading divisions, which katolik.life interpreted as a reference not only to internal Church matters but also Russia’s wider socio-political situation.

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The move follows the approval by several German bishops of rituals and manuals for blessings of couples in irregular unions — developments criticized by Pope Leo XIV during an in-flight press conference returning from his April trip to Africa.

The dicastery released the letter, signed by its prefect, Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, and dated Oct. 24, 2024, addressed to Bishop Stephan Ackermann of Trier. The letter addressed a handbook sent to Rome as part of the manual “Blessings for couples who love one another,” which was slated for a vote by the German bishops’ conference later that year.

The letter quotes paragraph 11 of Fiducia supplicans, which says that “the Church does not have the power to confer its liturgical blessing when that would somehow offer a form of moral legitimacy to a union that presumes to be a marriage or to an extra-marital sexual practice.”

Quoting Fiducia supplicans again, the letter adds that “with such blessings ‘nothing is intended to be legitimized, but only to open one’s life to God’ (no. 40), nor to ‘sanction… anything’ (no. 34), but only to ask for God’s help ‘to live better, and also to invoke the Holy Spirit so that the values of the Gospel may be lived with greater fidelity’ (no. 40).”

The letter also criticizes the German bishops’ handbook because it refers to the blessing of “‘a union’ and of an ‘official regulation’ by pastors of couples who love one another outside of marriage, thereby also becoming the object of a true and proper ‘acclamation,’ a gesture that is normally foreseen in the matrimonial rite.”

“In this sense, one in fact seems to aim at legitimizing the status of such couples, in a sense contrary to what is affirmed by Fiducia supplicans,” the DDF letter adds.

The letter then explains that Fiducia supplicans excludes any type of liturgy or blessings that could give the impression of a sacramental blessing “that could create confusion” and adds that Fiducia supplicans makes clear that it should be avoided that these blessings “‘become a liturgical or semi-liturgical act, similar to a sacrament’ (no. 36). ‘For this reason, one must neither promote nor provide for a ritual for the blessings of couples in an irregular situation’ (no. 38).”

It adds that while the handbook speaks of “spontaneity and freedom” in these blessings, “a fixed formulary is then offered for their realization, contradicting what was previously affirmed.”

“In particular, in the final part (“Form”), after having said that ‘the manner in which the blessing is carried out, the place, the aesthetics of the whole, including music and singing, must bear witness to the appreciation of the persons who ask for the blessing,’ a sort of liturgy or para-liturgy is prescribed with regard to the blessing of same-sex couples,” the letter adds.

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Fernández’s decision to publish the letter comes a week after several prominent German church officials defended the handbook, despite Pope Leo’s criticism aboard the papal plane returning from his African trip in April.

In response, Bishop Georg Bätzing, who oversaw the guidelines’ introduction in April 2025 when serving as chairman of the German bishops’ conference, insisted that they posed no threat to Church unity.

Bätzing, who approved the guidelines for use in his Limburg diocese in July 2025, said last month that “Even though there are differing views on this within the universal Church, I believe this practice in the Diocese of Limburg is carried out within responsible limits. It serves the people and, in my view, does not jeopardize the unity of the Church.”

The guidelines were issued by the bishops’ conference in conjunction with the lay Central Committee of German Catholics, known by its German initials ZdK.

ZdK president Irme Stetter-Karp told German media there was no reason to withdraw the guidelines following Pope Leo’s remarks.

She said the document was aimed at encouraging the provision of blessing ceremonies “for couples who do not wish to enter into a sacramental church marriage or for whom such a marriage is not an option.”

“No more and no less. There is no possibility of confusing it with the sacrament of marriage,” she said.

On April 21, Pope Leo had said in a press conference that “The Holy See has made it clear that we do not agree with the formal blessing of couples, in this case, same-sex couples… or of couples in irregular situations, beyond what Pope Francis has specifically permitted by saying that all people should receive the blessing,” the pontiff said during an April 23 press conference aboard the papal plane returning from his 11-day trip to Africa.

Leo was responding to a question about plans announced by Cardinal Reinhard Marx, to formalize blessings for same-sex and other irregular couples in the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising, while requiring clerics unwilling to perform them to refer those requesting a blessing to another priest or pastoral worker.

Leo explained that “the Holy See has made it clear that we do not agree with the formalized blessing of couples, in this case, homosexual couples, as you asked, or couples in irregular situations, beyond what was specifically, if you will, allowed for by Pope Francis in saying all people receive blessings.”

“When a priest gives the blessing at the end of Mass, when the pope gives the blessing at the end of a great celebration like the one we had today, there are blessings for all people,” he said.

“Francis’s infamous, famous, well-known, expression, ‘tutti, tutti, tutti,’ expresses the Church’s conviction that everyone is welcomed, everyone is invited, everyone is invited to follow Jesus, and everyone is invited to seek conversion in their own lives,” he added.

The pope concluded his reply by saying that “to go beyond this today, I believe, could cause more disunity than unity, and that we should seek to build our unity on Jesus Christ and on what Jesus Christ teaches.”

German newspaper Die Tagepost reported April 20 that Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Munich had instructed priests and pastoral workers in the archdiocese to use a handout called “Blessing Gives Strength to Love” as the basis of pastoral care to LGBT people and people in irregular unions.

Priests who refuse to carry out blessings are obliged to refer couples to other priests or pastoral workers, according to the instruction.

The letter also says that in June several archdiocesan offices will begin to offer training about the specifics of the blessing “celebrations” for all priests and pastoral workers.

In October 2025, Cardinal Fernández told The Pillar that “the DDF didn’t approve anything [of the irregular unions’ guidelines], and wrote a letter some time ago reminding [the German bishops] that [Fiducia supplicans] excluded any form of ritualization, just as the pope has said.”

Fernández’ statement to The Pillar came after then-German bishops’ conference president Bishop Georg Bätzing said in September that the Vatican had been consulted on the development of controversial guidelines issued in April, days after the death of Pope Francis.

But according to Fernandez, there was little in the text’s development which could be described as consultation, and the dicastery’s intervention was critical of the German bishops’ efforts.

“The DDF sent a letter to the liturgical commission of the German bishops’ [conference] indicating that the DDF cannot approve any form of ritualization of these blessings, because any form of ritualization is expressly excluded in FS,” the cardinal told The Pillar.

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While the German plans for ritualized blessings of irregular unions have come under fire from the Vatican since they were first proposed, the Belgian bishops have approved a similar handbook without much public criticism from the Vatican.

The bishops of Flanders, the Dutch-speaking region of Belgium, said that the three-page document, entitled “Being pastorally close to homosexuals: For a welcoming Church that excludes no one,” aims to “structurally anchor [the Church’s] pastoral commitment to homosexual persons and couples.”

The Flemish bishops’ text said that homosexual couples who choose to live “in lasting and faithful union with a partner” deserve “appreciation and support.”

The Flemish bishops’ document, which repeatedly referred to Pope Francis’ 2016 apostolic exhortation Amoris laetitia, concluded with a “Prayer for love and fidelity” — which has been widely received as being a liturgy for the blessing of same-sex couples.

In a preamble to the prayer, the bishops wrote: “During pastoral meetings, the request is often made for a moment of prayer to ask God that He may bless and perpetuate this commitment of love and fidelity. What content and form that prayer can concretely take are best discussed by those involved with a pastoral leader. Such a moment of prayer can take place in all simplicity. Also, the difference should remain clear from what the Church understands by a sacramental marriage.”

After an opening prayer and Scripture reading, the bishops suggested that the two people involved should “express before God how they are committed to one another.”

This would then be followed by the “prayer of the community,” in which those present ask “that God’s grace may work in them to care for each other and for the wider community in which they live.”

The prayer would conclude with intercessions, an Our Father, a final prayer, and a blessing.

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