Is Someone Trying to Tie Pope Leo to Cardinal Roche’s Liturgical Agenda?
Anonymous Vatican briefings are fuelling claims that Pope Leo has fully endorsed Cardinal Roche's liturgical agenda—but is the evidence really there?
A report in a Spanish news outlet today has caused widespread speculation by suggesting that Pope Leo XIV is completely in sync with Cardinal Arthur Roche’s recent interview in The Tablet, in which the Prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship confidently declared that the Holy Father would neither reverse Traditionis Custodes nor return to Benedict XVI’s Summorum Pontificum (see my analysis here).
The latest report, published by La Razón, goes considerably further. Citing anonymous Vatican sources, it claims that the liturgical paper Cardinal Roche distributed to members of the College of Cardinals during January’s extraordinary consistory was not simply his own initiative but had been commissioned by Pope Leo himself, personally reviewed by the Pope, and approved without “changing a single comma.” If true, that would appear to place the Pope firmly behind Cardinal Roche’s theological interpretation of the post-conciliar liturgical reform and at odds with many of his recent personal initiatives. Needless to say, this has caused a great deal of dismay among those who consider Traditionis Custodes a total travesty (as I do) and nothing short of harmful to the faith.
The article however draws a very large conclusion from anonymous sourcing and it is important to distinguish between what has actually been established and what remains assertion. There is little doubt that Cardinal Roche’s document was prepared at the request of the Pope for distribution before the consistory. That much has been widely reported. It is also true that the document was circulated to the cardinals.
What has never been publicly confirmed by the Holy See, however, is that Pope Leo endorsed every argument contained within it, adopted Cardinal Roche’s conclusions as his own, or intended it to become the settled policy of his pontificate.
Indeed, the cardinals themselves reportedly declined to devote time to discussing the liturgical question during the consistory, meaning Roche’s paper was distributed but never became the subject of substantive debate.
Veteran Vatican journalist Diane Montagna has responded to the growing narrative with a measured analysis on her Substack. Rather than accepting the claims at face value, she notes that La Razón relies entirely upon unnamed Vatican sources while Pope Leo himself has remained publicly silent on the specific claims now being attributed to him. Montagna also places this latest report within the wider context of Cardinal Roche’s recent Tablet interview, in which the cardinal repeatedly spoke with remarkable confidence about the Pope’s intentions despite Leo never having publicly made such declarations himself. Her argument is not that the Spanish report must necessarily be false, rather, it is that anonymous briefings should not be confused with papal teaching.
Readers can find Diane Montagna’s full analysis here:
There are reasons for prudence: the timing is noteworthy. Within the space of a few days, two separate publications have advanced essentially the same message: that Cardinal Roche’s liturgical vision is, in reality, Pope Leo’s own vision. First came The Tablet interview, now comes La Razón, apparently strengthening that same narrative by appealing to anonymous Vatican sources. Whether this represents coordinated communication, officials independently briefing journalists, or simply accurate reporting of genuine conversations inside the Vatican is impossible to establish from the evidence presently available and it seems to me it will remain so until Pope Leo actually speaks definitively on this issue.
Equally, there are reports from Spanish commentators suggesting that La Razón itself has long taken a particular editorial line on ecclesiastical affairs and should therefore be read with appropriate caution. Those observations, however, concern the publication’s perceived editorial stance rather than constituting evidence that this particular report is inaccurate. They should therefore be treated as context, not proof.
