THE POPE started the week with a Monday morning meeting with the leaders of Vatican departments, an event which comes ahead of the publishing of a new mission statement for the Roman Curia. For almost six years, Francis and his council of nine advisers (the so-called C9) have been working on an updated apostolic constitution for the Curia, which will build on Pastor Bonus, published 30 years ago by John Paul II. What the new constitution hopes to achieve, according to various sources, is a slimmed-down, mission-focused Vatican that will have serving the Pope and the bishops as its central focus. The hope is that “curial empires”, where prefects run their dicasteries as their private fiefdoms and tell bishops how to govern their dioceses, will be no more. Instead, the Vatican will become a coordinating hub for the universal Church, distilling and sharing the work of the bishops’ conferences from across the world.