Francis on Monday officially changed the name of the Holy See archive to remove what he said were the "negative" connotations of having "secret" in its name.

From now on, the vast trove of documents, manuscripts and papyrus of popes past will be officially known as the "Vatican Apostolic Archive."

In a new law, Francis noted that the archive has long been open to scholars and that he himself has decreed that the archives of World War II-era Pope Pius XII, accused by some of not speaking out enough about the Holocaust, would open to researchers ahead of schedule on March 2, 2020.

He said the name change better reflects the archive's reality and "its service to the church and the world of culture."

The archive contains the documentation on the life of the universal Catholic Church dating from the eight century to the present. It contains 600 different collections that are organized across 85 kilometers (50 miles) of shelving.

Located inside the Apostolic Palace, the archive contains a series of reading rooms and a two-story "bunker" of reinforced cement.