According to several sources consulted by I.MEDIA, Cardinal Peter Turkson, prefect of the Dicastery for Integral human development, will resign soon. This is a surprising development, as the 73-year-old senior Ghanaian prelate is at the head of one of the most important administration of the Curia, a super-dicastery created by Pope Francis in 2016 to bring together several pre-existing offices.
Other resignations within the dicastery might also occur, though the Vatican press office had no comment on the reports.
According to one of the sources, the merger of the Justice and Peace councils, Cor Unum, Pastoral Care of Migrants and Travelers, as well as that of health services into a single dicastery has encountered problems since its implementation in 2016, particularly managerial issues.
This summer, Cardinal Blase Cupich, archbishop of Chicago, visited the dicastery at the request of the Pope.
According to the director of the Vatican press office, this “audit” was “part of a normal examination of the activity of the dicasteries aimed at acquiring an up-to-date representation of working conditions.”
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The resignation of Cardinal Turkson would come after several departures: that of the French Bishop Bruno-Marie Duffé, secretary who left at the end of his mission this summer, but also that, on August 26, of Father Augusto Zampini, assistant secretary of the Dicastero. He had been freshly appointed to the dicastery and was replaced ad interim and without explanation by Sister Alessandra Smerilli, until then under-secretary.
Cardinal Turkson is currently the last African to head one of the dicasteries of the Curia since the retirement of Cardinal Robert Sarah, Prefect Emeritus of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, on February 20.
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