Papal resignation opens door to many contenders

NICOLE WINFIELD

Asso­ci­ated Press

VATICAN CITY — Pope Bene­dict XVI’s res­ig­na­tion opens the door to an array of pos­si­ble suc­ces­sors, from the con­ser­v­a­tive car­di­nal of Milan to a con­tender from Ghana and sev­eral Latin Amer­i­cans. But don’t count on a rad­i­cal change of course for the Catholic Church: Bene­dict appointed the major­ity of car­di­nals who will choose his suc­ces­sor from within their own ranks.

There’s no clear front-runner, though sev­eral lead­ing can­di­dates have been men­tioned over the years as “papa­bile” — or hav­ing the qual­i­ties of a pope.

So, will the papacy return to Italy, after three decades of a Pol­ish and a Ger­man pope? Or does Latin Amer­ica, which counts some 40 per­cent of the world’s 1.2 bil­lion Catholics, deserve one of their own at the church’s helm?

Will a younger car­di­nal be con­sid­ered, now that future popes can feel freer to resign? Or will it again go to an expe­ri­enced car­di­nal for another “tran­si­tional” papacy?

The 110-plus car­di­nals who are under age 80 and eli­gi­ble to vote will weigh all those ques­tions and more when they sequester them­selves in the Sis­tine Chapel next month to choose Benedict’s suc­ces­sor, a con­clave that will likely pro­duce a new pope by Easter.

Some said Benedict’s res­ig­na­tion presents an oppor­tu­nity to turn to Africa or Latin Amer­ica, where Catholi­cism is more vibrant.

“Europe today is going through a period of cul­tural tired­ness, exhaus­tion, which is reflected in the way Chris­tian­ity is lived,” said Mon­signor Anto­nio Marto, the bishop of Fatima in cen­tral Por­tu­gal. “You don’t see that in Africa or Latin Amer­ica, where there is a fresh­ness, an enthu­si­asm about liv­ing the faith.”

“Per­haps we need a pope who can look beyond Europe and bring to the entire church a cer­tain vital­ity that is seen on other continents.”

Car­di­nal Wil­frid Napier of South Africa agreed.

“I think we would have a bet­ter chance of get­ting some­one out­side of the North­ern hemi­sphere this time, because there are some really promis­ing car­di­nals from other parts of the world,” he said.

Despite that enthu­si­asm, more than half of those eli­gi­ble to vote in the Col­lege of Car­di­nals hail from Europe, giv­ing the con­ti­nent an edge even though there’s no rule that car­di­nals vote accord­ing to their geo­graphic blocs.

It’s also likely the next pope won’t rad­i­cally alter the church’s course, though sur­prises are possible.

“Given the pre­pon­der­ance of car­di­nals appointed by popes John Paul and Bene­dict, it is unlikely that the next pope will make many rad­i­cal changes,” said the Rev. James Mar­tin, a Jesuit author. “On the other hand, the papacy can change a man, and the Holy Spirit is always ready to surprise.”

A hand­ful of Ital­ians fit the bill, top among them Car­di­nal Angelo Scola, the arch­bishop of Milan. Scola is close to Bene­dict, has a fierce intel­lect and leads the most impor­tant arch­dio­cese in Italy — no small thing given that Ital­ians still dom­i­nate the Col­lege of Cardinals.

On Mon­day, Scola, 71, donned his bish­ops’ miter and appeared in Milan’s Duomo to praise Benedict’s “absolutely extra­or­di­nary faith and humility.”

“This deci­sion, even though it fills us with sur­prise — and at first glance it leaves us with many ques­tions — will be, as he said, for the good of the church,” Scola said.

Other lead­ing Ital­ians include Car­di­nal Gian­franco Ravasi, head of the Vatican’s cul­ture office and another intel­lec­tual heavy­weight who quotes Hegel and Neitzsche as eas­ily, and almost as fre­quently, as the Gospels. He has climbed into the spot­light with his “Court­yard of the Gen­tiles” project, an ini­tia­tive to enter into dia­logue with the worlds of art, cul­ture and sci­ence — and most impor­tantly atheists.

Vet­eran Vat­i­can ana­lyst John Allen Jr. has labled the 70-year-old Ravasi as quite pos­si­bly “the most inter­est­ing man in the church.” Rais­ing his pro­file fur­ther: Bene­dict appointed him to lead the Vatican’s spir­i­tual exer­cises dur­ing Lent, giv­ing Ravasi a vis­i­ble forum in the weeks lead­ing up to the conclave.

Benedict’s one­time the­ol­ogy stu­dent, Vien­nese Car­di­nal Christoph Schoen­born, 68, has long been con­sid­ered to have the stuff of a pope — mul­ti­lin­gual, affa­ble and, most impor­tantly, Benedict’s blessing.

He has been deal­ing, how­ever, with a dif­fi­cul­ties in Vienna, where a revolt of dis­si­dent priests has ques­tioned church teach­ings on every­thing from women’s ordi­na­tion to celibacy for priests. His deci­sion to let a gay Catholic serve on a parish coun­cil raised eye­brows among some con­ser­v­a­tives, who said the move clearly sealed his fate as too lib­eral for today’s Col­lege of Cardinals.

There are a hand­ful of can­di­dates from Latin Amer­ica — and by Mon­day their back­ers were in full force tout­ing their attributes.

“It’s time for there to be a Latin Amer­i­can pope, because Latin Amer­ica has the great­est num­ber of Chris­tians,” said the Rev. Juan Angel Lopez, spokesman for the Catholic Church of Hon­duras. His man, Hon­duran Car­di­nal Oscar Andres Rodriguez Mara­di­aga, how­ever, is con­sid­ered far too lib­eral to be elected by such a con­ser­v­a­tive bloc.

Lead­ing Latin Amer­i­can pos­si­bil­i­ties include Brazil­ian Car­di­nal Odilo Pedro Scherer, the 63-year-old arch­bishop of Sao Paulo, and Argen­tine Car­di­nal Leonardo San­dri, 69, head of the Vatican’s office for East­ern rite churches. San­dri earned fame as the “voice” of Pope John Paul II when the pon­tiff lost the abil­ity to speak because of his Parkinson’s disease.

Brazil­ian Car­di­nal Joao Braz de Aviz, 65, has earned praise as head of the Vatican’s office for reli­gious con­gre­ga­tions, even though he’s only held the job since 2011. He has had the dif­fi­cult task of try­ing to rebuild trust between the Vat­i­can and reli­gious orders that broke down dur­ing his predecessor’s reign.

His deputy took that effort too far in reach­ing out to U.S. nuns who were the sub­ject of a Vat­i­can doc­tri­nal crack­down, and was sub­se­quently sent back to the U.S.

Car­di­nal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turk­son of Ghana is one of the highest-ranking African car­di­nals at the Vat­i­can, cur­rently head­ing the Vatican’s office for jus­tice and peace. But he is prone to gaffes, though, and is con­sid­ered some­thing of a wild card.

Car­di­nal Anto­nio Tagle, the arch­bishop of Manila, is a ris­ing star in the church, but at at 56 and hav­ing only been named a car­di­nal last year, he is con­sid­ered too young.

North Amer­ica has a few can­di­dates, though the Amer­i­cans are con­sid­ered long­shots. These include Car­di­nal Tim­o­thy Dolan of New York and Car­di­nal Ray­mond Burke, an arch-conservative and the Vatican’s top judge.

Cana­dian Car­di­nal Marc Oeul­let is a con­tender, earn­ing the respect of his col­leagues as head of the Vatican’s office for bish­ops, a tough and impor­tant job vet­ting the world’s bishops.

Michele Dil­lon, a Uni­ver­sity of New Hamp­shire soci­ol­o­gist who stud­ies the church, said no “rad­i­cal trans­for­ma­tion” is expected in the direc­tion of the church and that a “tweak” here and there would be more likely than an overhaul.

“The church obvi­ously is well regarded for its con­ti­nu­ity,” Dil­lon said. “I’m not per­son­ally expect­ing a trans­for­ma­tive change, but change is always possible.”

Posted by AP News on Feb 11 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.