Report: Shakeups Coming at Vatican Media Office; Lombardi Due to Retire

Last updated on: November 25, 2015 at 8:20 pm by Deacon Greg Kandra

Report: Shakeups Coming at Vatican Media Office; Lombardi Due to Retire 2015-11-25T20:20:12-05:00 Deacon Greg Kandra

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Details:

First of all, it appears that Fr. Federico Lombardi, who has headed the Holy See Press Office since 2006, is going to retire by the end of December.

The 73-year-old Jesuit has also been running Vatican Radio since 1991 as its program director and since 2005 as its general director.

It’s still not clear if Francis has decided to replace him at the press office with another member of their order, 49-year-old Jesuit Fr. Antonio Spadaro, or if he’s opted to name Basilian Fr. Thomas Rosica, 56, to the post.

Spadaro is the editor of Civiltà Cattolica and is the man who conducted the blockbuster interview with Pope Francis that was published simultaneously in September 2013 by Jesuit publications around the world. The pope has given Spadaro freedom to help shape his message and clearly values his younger confrere’s advice.

“Spadaro has the pope’s ear,” it is often said in Vatican circles.

On the other hand, Rosica has used his fluency in several languages, an impressive theological education (he has a doctorate in Scripture) and extensive experience in developing and running a top-flight communications network (Salt + Light in Toronto) to be a highly effective Church representative in the media. A native of Rochester, N.Y., with dual U.S.-Canadian citizenship, he is already an at-large English attaché for the Vatican press office. And the pope has known him for several years.

But it is structural changes in the Vatican’s media operations that will be turned up a few more notches next month when the newly created Secretariat for Communications leaves its temporary home at the Vatican Radio building and takes over the offices of the Pontifical Council for Social Communication. It’s not clear if Mgr. Dario Viganò, the secretariat’s prefect, will be named a bishop. The 53-year-old Milan priest, who is not related to the apostolic nuncio to the United States with the same name, is a specialist in film and television.

It seems this change of offices is confirmation that the pontifical council will be suppressed and its president, Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli, given a new post — likely with the promise of a red hat. The career papal diplomat (he served in the Vatican nunciature in Argentina, among other places) will not be 75 until next July, but it’s possible that he could be named Archpriest of St. Mary Major. The current titleholder is Cardinal Santo Abril y Costelló, a former nuncio who turned 80 last September.

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