Catholic News Service weighs in with some reaction from Father DiNoia, undersecretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
“The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has had no contact with Mr. (Marc) Balestrieri,” said Dominican Father Augustine DiNoia, undersecretary of the congregation.
“His claim that the private letter he received from (Dominican) Father Basil Cole is a Vatican response is completely without merit,” Father DiNoia told Catholic News Service Oct. 19, declining to discuss the matter further.
Now, if this is to be believed, then Father Cole is lying when he says he was asked by Fr. DiNoia to respond to Balestrieri’s questions.
I’ve talked to Marc Balestrieri, and he says he went to Rome and walked into the offices of the CDF where he sat down and talked to at least one person. He then submitted his questions in writing. Several days later he received a response. For Fr. DiNoia to say that Balestrieri had no contact with the CDF could only be true with the most Clintonian parsing of the sentence. Perhaps there was no “official” contact, since only bishops can have official contact, but there was contact.
