Our Next Ordinary And Archbishop Burke

Nice article from John Allen on Archbishop Raymond Burke being named to the Congregation for Bishops. It shows a bit of what is involved in choosing our next Bishop. An interesting read to be sure.

Burke's influence is set to grow
Vatican names pugnacious prelate to congregation

John Allen
National Catholic Reporter
November 9, 2009

Archbishop Raymond Burke’s Oct. 17 appointment to the powerful Congregation for Bishops offers an illustration of how in the Vatican, even the ordinary can be extraordinary.

The appointment means that the 61-year-old Burke, a frequently polarizing figure during his 12-year run as a bishop in the United States, is now in a position to put his stamp on the next generation of Catholic bishops all over the world.

At one level, Pope Benedict XVI’s decision to tap Burke for the role was the dictionary definition of pro forma. Of the 33 members of the Congregation for Bishops at the beginning of 2009, 25 were current or former Vatican officials, including Burke’s predecessor as prefect of the Apostolic Signatura, the church’s highest court. (Burke was actually appointed on Oct. 17 along with another recently installed curial official, Spanish Cardinal Antonio Cañizares Llovera, who heads the Vatican’s liturgical office.)

That preponderance of Vatican prelates is partly because the Congregation for Bishops has to vet nominees from around the world, and Vatican officials control the archives where possible skeletons may lurk. In addition, the Congregation for Bishops meets for an entire morning every two weeks, and it’s simply more practical to expect prelates based in Rome to show up.

Yet seen through American eyes, Burke -- who’s widely expected to become a cardinal in the next consistory, the event in which new cardinals are installed -- is hardly just another Vatican official.

As the bishop of La Crosse, Wis., from 1995 to 2003, and then as archbishop of St. Louis from 2004 to 2008, Burke earned a reputation as a strong conservative voice on matters of both faith and politics. During the 2004 election, Burke publicly said he would not administer Communion to Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, a Catholic and at the time the Democratic nominee for president. He also once blasted a benefit concert by pop singer Sheryl Crow for a Catholic children’s hospital in St. Louis because she’s pro-choice.

Since being called to Rome in 2008, Burke has hardly gone quiet. In a September 2008 interview with an Italian newspaper, Burke said that the U.S. Democratic Party risks becoming the “party of death” because of its positions on bioethical questions. He’s also insisted that nothing can justify voting for a candidate who’s “anti-life” and “anti-family.”

As a member of the Congregation for Bishops, Burke now has a seat at the table when possible new bishops are evaluated and proposed to the pope. (The Congregation for Bishops handles most appointments in the Catholic church, except for those in mission territories, which are prepared by the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, and those in the 22 Eastern rites in communion with Rome, which are handled by the Congregation for Oriental Churches.)

Burke becomes one of five Americans who sit on the congregation, the second largest national bloc after the Italians, who have 12 -- nine cardinals, including Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, the congregation’s prefect, and three bishops. The other four Americans are Cardinal William Levada, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith; Cardinal Justin Rigali of Philadelphia; Cardinal Francis Stafford, former head of the Apostolic Penitentiary; and Cardinal Bernard Law, archpriest of Rome’s Basilica of St. Mary Major.

Like other important Vatican offices, the Congregation for Bishops has a staff that handles its day-to-day operations, but policy is set by the formal members of the congregation who are appointed by the pope. While many offices have full meetings of members only once a month or less frequently, the Congregation for Bishops meets more often because of the high volume of nominations to be reviewed.

When a diocese becomes vacant, it’s the job of the papal nuncio, or ambassador, in that country to solicit input on the needs of that diocese and to work with the local bishops and bishops’ conference to identify potential nominees. The nuncio prepares a terna, or list of three names, which is submitted to the Congregation for Bishops, along with extensive documentation on the candidates.

Members of the congregation are expected to carefully review all the documentation before meetings, and each is expected to offer an opinion about the candidates and the order in which they should be presented to the pope. Ultimately, it’s up to the pope to decide who’s named to any given diocese, but in most cases popes simply sign off on the recommendations made by the congregation.

To be sure, Burke’s nomination doesn’t mean he can single-handedly control who becomes a bishop, whether in the United States or anywhere else. For one thing, he’s simply one of five Americans on the congregation, and the least senior. At least initially, his input on American appointments is unlikely to be decisive.

Most observers say that aside from the pope himself, the two most powerful players in determining who becomes a bishop in the United States today are the current nuncio, Italian Archbishop Pietro Sambi, and Rigali of Philadelphia. (Rigali is a longtime veteran of Rome himself, and a close friend of Re.)

By itself, Burke’s appointment doesn’t alter that calculus. Sambi in particular is believed to have reservations about the pugnacious, and occasionally partisan, episcopal style that Burke came to symbolize.

On the other hand, Burke’s influence may grow with time.

He’s by far the youngest of the current crop of Americans on the congregation (the next youngest, Levada, is 73, and Rigali is 74). Since appointments are for five-year terms and may be renewed until a prelate reaches the age of 80, Burke could be involved in bishops’ appointments for the next two decades. At some point he may well become the senior American in the process, with a correspondingly greater impact.

Whatever happens, one thing seems clear. If anyone suspected that the decision to bring Burke to Rome last year was a way of muzzling him, or limiting his influence in the United States, it certainly doesn’t seem to be playing out that way.

John L. Allen Jr. is NCR senior correspondent.

Is Rome getting a clue about the USCCB?

Exclusive Interview: Leading Vatican Prelate Says Document of US Bishops Partly to Blame for Election of “Most Pro-Abortion President”
Also says Bishops’ Catholic News Service needs to be given "some new direction"

By Hilary White, Rome Correspondent

ROME, January 28, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A document of the US Catholic Bishops is partly to blame for the abandonment of pro-life teachings by voting Catholics and the election of the “most pro-abortion president” in US history, one of the Vatican’s highest officials said in an interview with LifeSiteNews.com.

Archbishop Raymond Burke, the prefect of the Apostolic Signatura, named a document on the election produced by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops that he said “led to confusion” among the faithful and led ultimately to massive support among Catholics for Barack Obama.

The US bishops’ document, “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship,” stated that, under certain circumstances, a Catholic could in good conscience vote for a candidate who supports abortion because of "other grave reasons," as long as they do not intend to support that pro-abortion position.

Archbishop Burke, the former Archbishop of St. Louis Mo. and recently appointed head of the highest ecclesiastical court in the Catholic Church, told LifeSiteNews.com that although “there were a greater number of bishops who spoke up very clearly and firmly ... there was also a number who did not.”

But most damaging, he said, was the document “Faithful Citizenship” that “led to confusion” among the voting Catholic population.

“While it stated that the issue of life was the first and most important issue, it went on in some specific areas to say ‘but there are other issues’ that are of comparable importance without making necessary distinctions.”

Archbishop Burke, citing an article by a priest and ethics expert of St. Louis archdiocese, Msgr. Kevin McMahon, who analysed how the bishops’ document actually contributed to the election of Obama, called its proposal “a kind of false thinking, that says, ‘there’s the evil of taking an innocent and defenceless human life but there are other evils and they’re worthy of equal consideration.’

“But they’re not. The economic situation, or opposition to the war in Iraq, or whatever it may be, those things don’t rise to the same level as something that is always and everywhere evil, namely the killing of innocent and defenceless human life.”

Archbishop Burke also cited the work of the official news service of the US Catholic Bishops’ Conference, that many pro-life observers complained soft-pedalled the newly elected president’s opposition to traditional morality.

“The bishops need to look also at our Catholic News Service, CNS, they need to review their coverage of the whole thing and give some new direction, in my judgement,” he said.