Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi is refusing to comment on a "private meeting," but Pope Francis is being quoted by a number of European media outlets, including AFP (Agence France Presse), as confirming the existence of a "gay lobby" inside the Vatican that he suggests may be among the targets of a newly formed special commission on curial reform. "In the Curia, there are holy people, truly holy people, but there is also a current of corruption," the pope said, according to a transcript of a June 6 audience with CLAR, the Latin American and Caribbean Confederation of Religious.
Days before Pope Benedict's historic decision to retire in February, Italian media reported that a dossier prepared by a committee of Vatican investigators included reports of corruption and blackmail attempts against gay Vatican clergy as well as favoritism based on gay relationships. "There is talk of a 'gay lobby' and it's true, it exists. We have to see what can be done," Pope Francis said, according to the transcript. The June 6 transcript was posted at the website for Reflection and Liberation and translated by another website, Rorate Caeli.
According to the transcript, Pope Francis added:
The reform of the Roman Curia is something that almost all cardinals asked for in the congregations preceding the conclave. I also asked for it. I cannot promote the reform myself, these matters of administration... I am very disorganized, I have never been good at this. But the cardinals of the Commission will move it forward. There is Rodríguez Maradiaga, who is Latin American, who is in front of it, there is Errázuriz, they are very organized. The one from Munich is also very organized. They will move it forward. Pray for me... that I make the least possible mistakes.
Though the Vatican has not confirmed that the transcript indeed reflects what Pope Francis told the CLAR representatives who attended the audience, papal watchers say the blunt comments certainly reflect the pope's off-the-cuff style and revisit some themes he has previously discussed. Photos of the audience have been released by L'Osservatore Romano. R&L reports that in an hour long conversation the pope told the members of CLAR "don't be afraid," urging them to remain willing to take risks and to "open doors." R&L reports that he said: "Courage! Advance towards new horizons! Do not be afraid to run risks going to the poor, and to new emerging subjects in the continent.
They will make mistakes, they will make a blunder, this will pass! Perhaps even a letter [from the CDF] will arrive for you, telling you that you said such or such thing... But do not worry. Explain whatever you have to explain, but move forward... Open the doors, do something there where life calls for it. I would rather have a church that makes mistakes for doing something than one that gets sick for being closed up...
According to the transcript, Pope Francis also expressed concerns about the property and money management of congregations that are growing older without attracting new vocations and urged the CLAR members to "enjoy this moment that we live in the Congregation for Consecrated Life... It is a moment of sunshine." According to the transcript, he also spoke of "restorationist" and Gnostic "currents" in the church:
I share with you two concerns. One is the Pelagian current that there is in the church at this moment. There are some restorationist groups. I know some, it fell upon me to receive them in Buenos Aires. And one feels as if one goes back 60 years! Before the Council... One feels in 1940... An anecdote, just to illustrate this, it is not to laugh at it, I took it with respect, but it concerns me; when I was elected, I received a letter from one of these groups, and they said: "Your Holiness, we offer you this spiritual treasure: 3,525 rosaries." Why don't they say, 'we pray for you, we ask...', but this thing of counting... And these groups return to practices and to disciplines that I lived through - not you, because you are not old - to disciplines, to things that in that moment took place, but not now, they do not exist today...
The second [concern] is for a Gnostic current. Those Pantheisms... Both are elite currents, but this one is of a more educated elite... I heard of a superior general that prompted the sisters of her congregation to not pray in the morning, but to spiritually bathe in the cosmos, things like that... They concern me because they ignore the incarnation! And the Son of God became our flesh, the Word was made flesh, and in Latin America we have flesh abundantly! What happens to the poor, their pains, this is our flesh...
Of his own stlyle as pontiff and the various gestures and comments he has made which have excited attention from Catholics and nonCatholics alike, Pope Francis purportedly remarked:
These gestures... they have not come from me. They have not occurred to me. It is not as if I had brought a plan, nor that I have made one myself once elected. I do it because I felt this was what the Lord wanted. But these gestures are not mine, there is Someone else here... this gives me confidence. I came [to Rome] only with the necessary clothes, I washed them at night, and suddenly this... And I did not have any chance! In the London betting houses I was in 44th place, look at that, the one who bet on me won a lot, of course...! This does not come from me...
UPDATE: Officials from CLAR have apologized for the posting of the "transcript" of their organization's meeting with Pope Francis. They explain in a statement released June 11 that no recording was made of the meeting and that the posted material cannot be described as a verbatim text, but represents a synthesis of the dialogue based on the recollections of the participants.
