Thursday, November 22, 2007

"Hope": Still On the Way

Earlier today the "Vice-Pope" announced that Spe Salvi -- "Saved By Hope" -- Benedict XVI's second encyclical, will be "signed" on 30 November.

Speaking at a Rome meeting of justice and peace groups, Italian media reports noted that Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone SDB didn't exactly say when the text would be made public.

Under standard Vatican protocol, a text's signing date is not usually its date of publication. A signing date that hasn't coincided with a document's release has never previously been announced. For example, B16's Deus Caritas Est was signed on Christmas 2005, but released on 25 January 2006, while Summorum Pontificum (the motu proprio on the use of the 1962 Missal) bore the stamp of its publication date, last 7 July.

In addition, Bertone's afternoon remarks included a mention that the Pope will use 2008 to "underline in a concrete way the work of the church's organs of justice and peace across the world," the ADNKronos agency reported.

And if Bertone says it, well, you can take it to the bank.

SVILUPPO: The Friday morning edition of the Vatican's daily Bollettino announces that, indeed, the encyclical will be released on 30 November.

A midday press conference has been scheduled for the date; Cardinals Georges Cottier OP, the former theologian of the Papal Household, and Albert Vanhoye, the Jesuit scholar of the New Testament, will serve as the document's presenters.

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