New Vatican norms on supernatural phenomena take effect this Sunday

On Sunday, the document from the Vatican's Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, titled "Norms for proceeding in the Discernment of alleged supernatural phenomena," will come into effect. As the Episcopate's press office announced, this document outlines six different evaluations for discerning supernatural phenomena, from a positive to a negative opinion.

The introduction of new norms within the Catholic Church was driven by the difficulty in containing these phenomena at a local level, as some instances have reached a national or even global scale.

The document approved by Pope Francis, "Norms for the Discernment of Presumed Supernatural Phenomena," presents six possible evaluations of supernatural phenomena. These include "nihil obstat," meaning "no objection," "prae oculis habeatur," indicating positive recognition with a need for a doctrinal explanation of certain elements, and "curatur," which advices against issuing a prohibition to avoid disturbing the faithful while instructing the bishop not to promote the phenomenon, culminating in a negative opinion.

This document enables quicker issuance of opinions on the supernatural nature of a phenomenon.

The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith must approve the bishop's final decision and retain the right to intervene at any time through "motu proprio." In recent decades, the Holy Office's involvement in individual bishops' decisions often remained undisclosed and was not made public.

According to the document, the bishop must examine cases and present his assessment to the dicastery for approval. He should avoid public declarations about phenomena' authenticity or supernatural nature to prevent confusion and "foster a climate of sensationalism."

The investigative commission appointed by the ordinary should include at least one theologian, one canonist, and an expert chosen based on the nature of the phenomenon.

The document also outlines criteria indicating that a phenomenon is not supernatural. These criteria include doctrinal errors, "a sectarian spirit that breeds division within the Church, the obvious pursuit of profit, power, fame, social publicity, personal benefits strictly related to the fact, serious immoral acts (…), mental changes or psychopathic tendencies in a person, which could have influenced the presumed supernatural fact, or psychosis, collective hysteria, or other elements that can be attributed to the pathological domain."

The Vatican dicastery initiated the norms' revision in 2019. The document will come into effect on Sunday, May 19, coinciding with the Feast of Pentecost.