Those Vatican archives haven’t been secret for a long time

Blithe Spirit 1 Minute

Not since 1881, and anyhow secret doesn’t mean secret:

Secretum, the Vatican says, translates more accurately to “personal” than to “secret” and refers to the private letters and historical records of past popes. In fact, the archives haven’t been secret since 1881, when Pope Leo XIII opened them up to scholars.

There’s more more more about them in this intriguing* piece in the new all-Catholic news source Crux.

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* That is, quite interesting, not wrapped in or full of intrigue, of course.

Published by Jim Bowman

Jim Bowman covered religion 1968-78 for the Chicago Daily News, since then has written books, articles, etc., mostly on corporate history but also on religion (Company Man: My Jesuit Life, 1950-1968), and more recently on politics (Illinois Blues: How the Ruling Party Talks to Voters -- Lulu.com, Kindle). Longtime Oak Park, Illinois, resident, he lives now on Chicago's North Side, where four of his and Winnie's six children live close by.

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