bout de papier, Vol. 8, No. 1 (1990), pp. 18–19
Why does Canada have an Embassy at the Vatican? First some facts and some history. The Roman Catholic Church is the oldest and largest religious institution in the world with approximately 900 million baptized members of which over half are in the Third World. The Church came to North America with the settlers from France, it has played an important role throughout Canadian history and about 46% of all Canadians are baptized Roman Catholics. They worship in the Latin rite, in English, French or their mother tongue or in one of the Eastern rites, of which the largest is the Ukrainian Catholic Church.
Unofficial relations between Ottawa and the Vatican were first investigated over a hundred years ago when Prime Minister Alexander Mackenzie requested Rome to send a representative to examine the state of the Church in Canada and its relations with the civil authority. An Irish priest, Mgr Conroy, wrote a report, but died before his return to Rome and there was no follow-up. In the 1890’s, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, reacting to the Manitoba Schools Question, sent one of his ministers to Rome to encourage a further visit. The Papal envoy, Mgr Merry del Val, recommended that the Vatican should have an Apostolic Delegate (unofficial papal representative) in Ottawa. The first incumbent, Mgr Falconio, took up his post in 1899 and there had been an unbroken line of such representatives until Canada and the Holy See established diplomatic relations in 1969. At that time, the Apostolic Delegate became Pro-Nuncio and Canada named an Ambassador to the Holy See.
There were a number of reasons for establishing diplomatic relations. The dramatic humanity of Pope John XXIII and the results of the Second Vatican Council turned the Church away from a certain besieged mentality towards a greater openness to the world while establishing the Pope and his successors as unique spokesmen for the moral and ethical points of view in foreign relations. Canada had found that in its foreign policy there was a convergence of views with the policies of the Vatican in such areas as aid and development, refugees, human rights, social justice, religious freedom, reunification of families, and the European Conference for Security and Co-operation designed to lower the barriers between Eastern and Western Europe. In addition, there was a belief that the Vatican could provide “a unique listening post” gather information on international developments of interest to Canada.
Against this background, the work of the Embassy consists of four aspects: The first is the classic diplomatic task of informing the Holy See of the reasons for Canadian policy in areas of mutual interest or where the approach is different. For example: both Ottawa and Rome abhor Apartheid, but the Vatican has not believed in the usefulness of economic sanctions while Ottawa has.
The second aspect is bilateral relations. These are excellent and generally revolve around visits. There have been two papal voyages in 1984 and 1987, a State Visit by the Governor General in 1986 and subsequent visits by the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for External Affairs. One important new development involving the Pope, the Federal Government and the provincial governments is the increasing tendency of the Native Peoples to appeal to His Holiness to further their objectives in Canada. The Embassy assists the Native Peoples representatives when in Rome, informs the Holy See of Canadian policy and reports on the results of the visits.
The third aspect of the work of the Embassy is to analyze Vatican policy as it could affect Canadian Government policy. For example, we have examined the Pope’s message on Minorities, his Encyclical on the Third World and the Church’s studies on Racism and Third World Debt.
The final dimension of our work is to report Vatican analysis of developing international situations where the Church’s position provides a unique view, such as the role of religion in the changes in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union or the future of the Holy Land set against the Palestinian uprising, Israeli reaction and the difficult peace process.
A colleague has described the diplomatic task at the Vatican is one of reporting to a secular government as a lay observer on the activities of a major international player whose actions are taken for religious reasons that often have political consequences. Or again, reporting on the analysis of political events by diplomatic professionals whose assessments are naturally affected by being priests of a particular religious institution. To the general reader, this may be clearer if I outline some of the matters which the Embassy follows in its three to four telegrams of analysis a week on approximately 25 countries and international agencies.
John Paul Il is an indefatigable traveller to his Catholic parishioners around the world and his voyages often have political fall-out such as in the Philippines, Haiti and Chile, or longer-term effects such as in his homeland Poland. It was the Embassy’s role to evaluate the negotiations leading to diplomatic relations between Poland and the Vatican, the revival of religious belief and protest in Czechoslovakia a precursor to its new-found freedom, the gradual return to relations with Hungary and, on the occasion of the Millenium of Christianity in Russia, the first official contact between a representative of the Pope and the Head of State of the Soviet Union leading to the unique visit of Gorbachev to the Pope in Rome. Of particular interest to Canada has been the fate of the Ukrainian Catholic Church declared illegal by Stalin after the War with approximately 4-5 million adherents in the Ukraine and over 200,000 in Canada.
Throughout the slow rapprochement between Moscow and Rome, it has been necessary to keep in mind that for the Pope the improved relations with the secular states in Eastern Europe and greater religious freedom for all churches may lead to a healing of the oldest major schism in Christianity (1054AD) between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Churches of the former Byzantine Empire. The Vatican’s relations with the secular states of Western Europe are good but Rome believes that, after centuries of anti-clericalism and humanistic ideologies, Western Europe has become largely de-Christianized. The Church has supported the movement towards European Unity and the breaking of barriers between East and West as the only way to a stable and peaceful continent. It hopes that in these conditions the European’s loss of spiritual memory can be revived through an interest in their common culture of which Christianity was a central part.
How Latin America resolves its contemporary problems will have its effect on the evolution of the Church itself. Soon half the world’s baptized Catholics will live on the continent where the social and economic disparities are vast. Conditions certainly exist for the traditional mission of the Church to the poor and deprived. In carrying out this mission, Rome faces many difficulties — its own past, opposition from local oligarchies, rich fundamentalist sects and division within the Church itself on social policy. Is it to be based on economic determinism as many Latin American theologians have argued or must it not flow as the Pope has said from faith and not ideology? It is the role of the Embassy to take these various elements into account in analyzing the attitudes of the Vatican to specific economic and political developments in such places as Brazil, Chile and Central America.
Africa is a tragic continent with its famines, ecological disasters, wars, refugees and extreme poverty. The Vatican and Canada have convergent views on how to try to meet these problems through humanitarian and development aid. They have similar attitudes to economic justice and apartheid. Canada’s French- and English-speaking aid programmes, the work of Canadian missionaries and Canadian NGO’s are recognized in Rome. The very gravity of the situation of the continent is likely to ensure that we shall be working towards many of the same ends in the years ahead and it is incumbent on the Embassy to report on the African activities of Rome, such as the many visits by Pope John Paul.
The relations between the Roman Catholic Church and the two other monotheistic religions Islam and Judaism can have consequences that effect Canadian interests. Islam and Christianity have tended to regard each other throughout history as a threat to the religious beliefs of the other. Since the Second Vatican Council, Roman Catholicism has tried to establish a dialogue with Islam, so far with minimal success. The reasons for this are many and complex, but the results are worrying, such as sporadic religious rioting in Nigeria or the rise of Islamic fundamentalism with its potential for creating instability. Arab Moslem countries, however, maintain a dialogue with the Holy See as a state because they have an interest in Rome’s policy of internationalization of the Holy Places in Jerusalem and support for a Palestinian homeland The theological dialogue of the last twenty-five years between Catholicism and Judaism has made slow but steady progress but has for the time been frustrated by the Intifada and Israel’s reaction to it. The Vatican supports a Palestinian homeland, is distressed by Israeli oppression and encourages negotiations. Israel finds such a position unacceptable, particularly from a state that does not recognize Israel. For Canada, the relationship between Catholicism and Judaism, and the Holy See and Israel, are important not only because of instability in the Middle East and the dangers of a rise of anti-semitism, but because of the influential Jewish and growing Moslem communities in Canada.
This brief account of the work at our Vatican Embassy would not be complete without mention of the 400-odd visitors a year who receive their tickets for various Church occasions, the more than 300 Canadian religious in Rome for whom the Embassy is often seen as a link with home, nor the great Canadian Church occasions when there is a beatification or a canonization or a Canadian is named Cardinal. The Federal Government is always represented at these ceremonies.
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Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 8, No. 1 (1990), pp. 18–19. Read the rest of this issue →
