Thursday, July 2, 2009

Chaput's Visitation

A handful of my regular visitors (OK, all of my regular visitors only amounts to a handful, I’m talkin’ about a fraction thereof) will find this interesting. The Apostolic Visitation of the Legionaries of Christ is finally scheduled to begin. Catholic News Agency has the confirmed report. There will be different prelates responsible for the Visitations in different parts of the world, with Visitation to the Legion’s institutions in the United States being carried out by Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver. The Visitations and an official announcement are expected to begin on Julyl 15.

I trust that Archbishop Chaput will conduct a fair and thorough examination. The Legionaries have many friends and enemies, both of whom will be expectantly awaiting the reports of the Visitors.

An Apostolic Visitation is the Pope’s way of exercising his jurisdiction. In essence, he deputizes somebody to go and look around on his behalf, and then report back what you find. In some cases, the Pope’s legates might be authorized to enact changes or levy canonical penalties. In this case, I believe that the Pope has reserved those options to himself.

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