What I Used To Do In Rome

Somebody asked me what I used to do in Rome. I enjoyed what I wrote so I thought I would post it here.

My job was called Segretario per inglese. Secretary for English. A short structural reflection helps in getting it. Many international Catholic entities, like religious institutes of pontifical right (e.g. the Capuchins) have their central administration in Rome. In Rome business goes on in Italian. But Italian is a very small language in terms of the world. So there’s a language bottleneck into and out of Rome. I worked that bottleneck for English. I had colleagues doing the same thing for Spanish, French, Portuguese, and Polish. German and Indonesian were outsourced to friars elsewhere.

Some of this was day-to-day translations; news blurbs, announcements, items for the ofmcap.org website or newsletters, that sort of thing, but the larger part of the work was handling and composing correspondence. Let’s say the major superior of the Capuchin province of New York-New England writes to the Minister General in Rome with a question or to ask permission for something for which such permission is required by canon law or our Constitutions. The letter gets presented at the next meeting of the elected general council of the Order. (Someone in that room knows enough English to present the matter from the letter.) A decision is made.

Then I get a folder back with the original letter and a small slip cut from the meeting minutes with instructions in Italian: Province of New York-New England asks about/for x, and then the basic nature of the reply to be written: thank you, no, yes, not at this time, more information needed, take him and crucify him yourselves (my favorite; it wouldn't say that literally). Then I take all this info and compose a letter with the decision. I hand it in to the Secretary General of the Order, he checks it and then gives it to the Minister General for signature. The signed letter comes back to me, I make a scan and send it by email to the major superior or his provincial secretary, put the original in the pile to be taken to the Vatican post office, and make a copy for the archivist with an archive routing form explaining in Italian what it’s about.

Within this process there were also various form letters that only needed names and dates for things that come up routinely; dispensations from temporary vows, transfer of province, canonical erection and suppression of novitiate houses, etc.

English was the biggest job of the languages (and the only one considered full-time), mainly because of India. But of course I also had parts of Europe and Asia, East Africa, Australia, and of course the USA and English-using Canada.

There were other incidental duties as well, such as taking requests to the papal blessing office, hospitality for English-speaking guests (especially if they didn’t speak Italian), as well as looking after American major superiors who ended up in the hospital in Rome (this happened twice during my time).