https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/former-jesuit-superior-general-dies-in-tokyo-at-84-16934

Former Jesuit Superior General dies in Tokyo at 84

October 25, 2012. Credit: Matthew Rarey/CNA

CNA Staff, May 20, 2020 / 07:30 am MT (CNA).

Fr. Adolfo Nicolás, the 30th superior general of the Society of Jesus, died Wednesday in Tokyo, Japan, at the age of 84.

The Spanish priest led the Jesuits, the world’s largest men’s religious order, from 2008 to 2016.

In a condolence message May 20, his successor, Fr. Arturo Sosa, said that Nicolás’ time as Superior General was marked by “his sense of humor, his courage, his humility and his close relationship with Pope Francis,” the first Jesuit pope.

“All of us here at the Jesuit General Curia mourn him and a special Mass will be offered here in Rome as soon as we can organize it. Because of travel restrictions just now, I cannot travel to Japan for the funeral but I assure all his many friends there of my closeness, my compassion and my condolences,” he said.

Nicolás, who had been ill for some time, met with Pope Francis for a final time on Nov. 26, 2019, during the papal visit to Japan.

In 2008, he was elected Superior General of the Jesuits in the second round of voting, succeeding Fr. Peters Hans Kolvenbach.

In an interview that year, Nicolás described his approach to leadership.

“For everything whether it is spirituality or social apostolate, whatever it might be there is no shortcut. There is always a long way; real change and real insights come through a long process. The first step in all of them is contact – contact with persons, contact with situations,” he said.

Nicolás was born in Palencia, northern Spain, on April 29, 1936. After entering the Jesuits in 1953, he volunteered for the foreign missions and was sent to Japan. He was ordained to the priesthood in Tokyo in 1967.

After further studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome from 1968 to 1971, he returned to Japan, where he served as a professor of systematic theology at Sophia University.

From 1978 to 1984, he was director of the East Asian Pastoral Institute at the Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines. Later he served as rector of the scholasticate (house of formation) in Tokyo.

In 1993, Nicolás became Provincial of the Jesuit Province of Japan. At the end of his six-year term, he devoted four years to serving poor immigrants in Tokyo.

The Jesuits in Britain website quoted a prayer that Nicolás had composed during his annual retreat in 2011.

“Enlighten our minds and our hearts, and do not forget to make us smile when things do not go as we wished. At the end of the day, of each one of our days, make us feel more united with you and better able to perceive and discover around us greater joy and greater hope,” the prayer concluded.

A memorial website has been created to celebrate Nicolás life.

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/column/vatican-finances-what-is-going-on-the-malta-case-4173

May 19, 2020

Vatican finances, what is going on? The Malta case

By Andrea Gagliarducci

Attorneys for a Maltese business venture involved in a legal dispute say the so-called Vatican bank’s new management care more about sullying the good names of the old management, than they do about doing good business.

That is a serious accusation. The lawyers representing Futura, an investment company with which the Institute for Religious Works had started a deal shortly before the sensational renunciation of Benedict XVI, say the IOR has no interest in maintaining its reputation or defending its investments.

Instead, they say the current IOR management are out to cast the previous management in a bad light. The accusation comes directly from Futura’s lawyers.

After Pope Francis’ election, everything has changed in the IOR. The Malta trial is only one episode, albeit a revealing one – and this is also the thesis of Futura's lawyers – especially when it comes to the disputes being played out within the Vatican financial institutions.

The latest meeting of the heads of dicasteries saw the Vatican big wigs take up – again - the idea of a central fund: a topic already widely discussed in the past. How this fund will be structured – if it will be structured at all – remains to be seen. . Times are bad for Vatican finances, indeed, and as the general worldwide economic outlook continues to be grim, the Vatican’s straits will only become more dire.

The Malta Case

On April 4, Maltese media reported that the Maltese Civil Court had ordered the seizure of €29.5 million from the Institute for Religious Works. It was the latest development in a saga that began in 2013, when the IOR took on an investment obligation with which it then failed to comply, and sued the companies in Malta with which the IOR had entered into the deal.

The seizure of the IOR money was the result of a counter-complaint made by the companies involved, which accused the IOR of blocking a sale of shares. Practically speaking, they accused the IOR of interfering in the repayment of a debt. .

The way the story has unfolded shows how the Institute for Religious Works has managed investments from 2013 to the present.

The investment over which the dispute in Malta arose, was one of the last ordered during Benedict XVI’s pontificate. Subsequently, the top management of the Vatican financial institution changed. The new management adopted a new investment policy.

Many of the previous financial transactions have been canceled, sometimes at the expense of substantial penalties, other times incurring unpleasant situations such as that of Malta.

The IOR transferred funds and said it did to resort to ethical investments. The general impression is, instead, the IOR wanted to cut the past. Was the IOR’s past so dark, by the way?

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/column/vatican-finances-how-did-the-ior-work-4084

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/column/is-pope-francis-setting-up-the-next-conclave-4165

May 06, 2020

Is Pope Francis setting up the next Conclave?

By Andrea Gagliarducci

"At the end of the last week, Pope Francis elevated cardinals Luis Antonio Tagle and Beniamino Stella to the Order of Cardinal Bishops – the highest rank of dignity within the College of Cardinals – putting them on par with the Cardinals eligible for the office of Dean of the College. He also appointed the archbishop Ilson Montanari as vice Camerlengo. These decisions could have an impact on the next conclave.

Pope Francis, however, is not likely to set up the election of his successor according to traditional criteria.

The Dean of the College of Cardinals is essential.

When the See of Rome is vacant, the Dean of the College leads the pre-conclave meetings and then the Conclave itself. If the Dean is older than 80 and therefore excluded from participation, the vice Dean will lead the Conclave. If the vice Dean is older than 80, the senior Cardinal Bishop will lead the Conclave. This happened in 2013 conclave: both the Dean – Cardinal Angelo Sodano – and the vice Dean – Cardinal Roger Etchegaray – were beyond 80 and unable to participate.

. . . Pope Francis opted for a different way.. . .

Pope Francis has no filters, and he likes to make decisions himself. It is unlikely that the Pope wants to design a successor. He knows that the Church has no dynasties and that he cannot be sure that everything will go according to his plans. The Pope’s most trusted circles are not among cardinals. Those who are, must rely on a more prominent structure and an institution that goes beyond centuries.

Pope Francis’s strategy cannot be, in the end, that of designating a successor or burning an enemy. Rather, Francis instead aims at expanding the electoral base. The more cardinals of his line there are, the more likely it is that his legacy will be carried forward.

Pope Francis’s legacy, by the way, is political and geopolitical: mostly based on practical issues. Francis’s guiding rationale is that the Pope can be an influential guarantor able to give voice to the poor and the marginalized. The Pope dialogues with governments and seeks to create new political and economic models. This is not a papacy that inspires ideas, nor is it an institution capable of providing frameworks beyond the practical issues.

A little hint of this rationale came at the end of Pope Francis’ Urbi et orbi Easter message. The Pope concluded the message saying, off script: “These are some thoughts of mine that I wanted to share.” This sentence somehow de-institutionalized that moment.

With Pope Francis, the institution is dismantled to change its profile. Pope Francis often spoke about the need for a conversion of the souls. This is how he pushes for the conversion: to dismantle to rebuild, or at least to leave the reconstruction to people he trusts.

From this perspective, the choice to co-opt Cardinal Tagle in the Order of Cardinal Bishops does not mean that the Pope is setting up Tagle as a candidate for his succession, nor that the Pope is burning his eventual candidacy. It merely means that the Pope is shaping the institution his way. There is no history or tradition to be preserved.

There is instead a new Church to be created in the Pope’s image.

This is how the next Conclave is being set up: It will be a different kind of Conclave, in which none of the traditional keys to understanding papal electoral dynamics will be valid.

The issue must be furtherly explored."

LOTS OF ACTIVITY THIS MONTH!!

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-francis-names-spanish-jesuit-head-of-vaticans-economy-secretariat-90731

Pope Francis names Spanish Jesuit head of Vatican's economy secretariat

By Hannah Brockhaus

Vatican City, Nov 14, 2019 / 04:47 am MT (CNA).

“Pope Francis Nov. 14 appointed Spanish Jesuit Fr. Juan Antonio Guerrero Alves as prefect of the Secretariat for the Economy, following the expiration of Cardinal George Pell’s term in February.

From Merida, Spain, Guerrero, 60, will begin his term as prefect in January 2020.

Pope Francis established the Secretariat for Economy in 2014 as part of his financial reform of the Vatican. Its task is to oversee the financial aspects of both the Roman Curia and the Vatican City State administration, including a review of financial reports. . . .”

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-francis-moves-financial-records-office-under-secretariat-for-economy-44927

Pope Francis moves financial records office under Secretariat for Economy

By Hannah Brockhaus

Vatican City, May 20, 2020 / 09:00 am MT (CNA).

“Pope Francis Wednesday moved the office of the Vatican’s financial records database under the management of the Secretariat for the Economy – reversing a decision he made in 2016.

According to a rescript May 20, starting June 1 the Data Processing Center (CED) will no longer be run by the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See (APSA) the Vatican’s sovereign asset management body as was first defined in the apostolic constitution Pastor bonus in 1988.

Instead, the Secretariat for the Economy, under the leadership of prefect Fr. Juan Antonio Guerrero, S.J., will oversee the work of the office and its employees.

Pope Francis first moved the financial records office from the competency of APSA to the Secretariat for the Economy in July 2014, a few months after he created the secretariat as part of his financial reform of the Curia.

The Secretariat for the Economy is tasked with oversight of the Vatican’s administrative and financial structures and activities, including monitoring the work of APSA.”

“. . . APSA, which operates like the Vatican’s central bank, oversees real estate holdings and other sovereign assets. The financial operations APSA carries out are recorded in the CED database, which includes the records of investments and financial transactions going back 50 years.”