Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Catholic News

Home

Home
Catholic
Religion News
Archbishop Edoardo Menichelli: a talented preacher and soon-to-be cardinal

Archbishop Edoardo Menichelli: a talented preacher and soon-to-be cardinal

Last updated on: February 6, 2015 at 7:04 am by CNA Daily News

Archbishop Edoardo Menichelli: a talented preacher and soon-to-be cardinal 2015-02-06T07:04:00+00:00 CNA Daily News

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Ancona, Italy, Feb 6, 2015 / 12:04 am (CNA/EWTN News).- When he learned in January Pope Francis would make him a cardinal, Archbishop Edoardo Menichelli of Ancona-Osimo did not want to comment. He had turned 75 in October, presenting his resignation to the Pope.

But now that he will have a cardinal's biretta, many in his archdiocese are sure he will remain their ordinary for some time more, despite having reached retirement age.

Archbishop Menichelli is of the three Italians who will be made cardinal at the Feb. 14 consistory.

Born in the small town of Serripola – 14 miles northeast of Camerino – in 1939, Archbishop Menichelli was ordained a priest of the Diocese of San Severino in 1965. He had attended the seminaries of San Severino and Fano, and the Pontifical Lateran University in Rome, where he attained a licentiate in pastoral theology.

While he spent much of his ecclesial career in Rome, Archbishop Menichelli has maintained strong connections with his hometown, where he spent the beginning years of his priesthood as a parochial vicar and a religion teacher in secondary schools.

From 1968 until 1991, he was an official of the Apostolic Signatura, the Church's supreme tribunal and a part of the Roman Curia, and then from 1992 to 1994 was on the staff of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches, where he was secretary to the prefect, Cardinal Achille Silvestrini.

During his years in Rome, he also assisted in family ministry at a parish, served as chaplain at a hospital, and taught ethics to nurses at the Agostino Gemelli University Polyclinic.

In 1994 he was appointed Archbishop of Chieti-Vasto.

He remained in Chieti-Vasto until 2004, when he was appointed Archbishop of Ancona-Osimo, thus sending him back to his home region of Marche.

As Archbishop of Ancona-Osimo, he organized the 2011 Eucharistic Congress in Ancona, which gathered hundreds of thousands of faithful and concluded with a Mass said Benedict XVI and a Eucharistic procession. He is known to have promoted both Corpus Christi processions and Eucharistic adoration.

Archbishop Menichelli is currently secretary of the Italian bishops' Commission for the Family.

He participated in the 2014 Synod on the Family at the will of Pope Francis, and he served there as relator of one of the Italian language groups.

“It is the first time I have taken part in a synod,” he told Vatican Radio Oct. 14, “and I have been interiorly delighted from the way we have welcomed Pope Francis' invitation to speak with frankness and listen to one another with humility. I had the impression that a sense of communion regarding a common pastoral interest on family has increased during these days.”

Archbishop Menichelli commented that the Church must listen more: “We live in a world so complex that we cannot, as the Church, pigeonhole everything in certain terms or certain precise concepts which we have had the habit of using.”

He lamented that Familiaris consortio, St. John Paul II's apostolic exhortation following the 1980 Synod on the Family, has not been well-implemented, regarding preparation for marriage: “On this point I believe that the Church should ask pardon for a kind of 'unwilled', yet 'realized', disobedience. In St. John Paul II's Familiaris consortio, he spoke in fact of remote, proximate, and immediate marriage preparation. In reality, now it is limited only to the immediate, and engaged couples come to the altar with a lack of faith and infected by the culture. It does not take only a handful of meetings.”

He stressed that for him, the question of the divorced and remarried was not whether or not they should receive Communion, but whether there had been a marriage in the first place: “reducing everything to 'Communion yes, Communion no' seems too little.”

During the synod, Archbishop Menichelli also emphasized the importance of pastoral accompaniment of those who had divorced, and said that for three years, he has met monthly with a group of 80-90 divorced persons. “They know that the path of conversion is neither easy nor hasty,” he said.

Regarding homosexuality, he affirmed that persons with homosexual orientations do, as persons, have something to offer the Church; but that “the problem is what these persons call a right does not correspond to the plan of God contained in the Bible,” and that while the Church cannot enter into one's conscience, it is called “to accompany and to educate.”

Archbishop Menichelli is well known as a preacher of great impact, and he was entrusted with guiding catechesis during World Youth Days by the Italian bishops conference. He is also known for his pastoral solicitude for the youth, having founded the Loreto Cross pilgrimages.

According to Il Messaggero, an Italian daily, he has also “always fought for the defense of the marginalized and the poor.”

The Ancona diocese was once considered a cardinal see, but the last Cardinal Bishop of Ancona – until Archbishop Menichelli receives the red hat – was Cardinal Achille Manara, who died in 1906.

Archbishop Menichelli is one of 20 men who will be made a cardinal at this month's consistory, and one of the 15 who, being under the age of 80, would be able to vote in a papal conclave.

Europe

Previous Post

February 6, 2015

A heated debate: Is killing an acceptable end to human suffering?

Next Post

February 6, 2015 Awaiting an ecology encyclical, everyone wants Pope Francis' support

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Americas Asia - Pacific Europe Middle East - Africa Uncategorized US Vatican

Select a Month November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as what?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Snow Wool A lamb Light