Pope Francis remakes the college of cardinals
Over seven years, Pope Francis has gradually remade the college of cardinals, making it less European and more African and Asian.
The conclave that elected Francis was 52% European. After the November consistory, it will be only 41% European. This is Europe’s lowest share of the conclave ever.The Italian proportion of the college has been reduced to 17%, what it was at the end of John Paul papacy, before it was increased to 24% under Benedict. John Paul had reduced the Italian contingent to give red hats in Eastern Europe.On the other hand, the global south (Asia, Africa and Latin America) now has 45% of the college, the highest ever. The conclave that elected Francis was only 35% from the global south.Latin America, Francis’ area of the world, is up to 19% from 16%. This brings Latin America closer to where it was during the Papacy of John Paul II.Francis has also reduced the number of cardinals from the Curia, the Vatican’s bureaucratic ranks. At his conclave, it was 35% of the college; now it is 24%, which is what it was at the end of John Paul’s papacy.In summary, Francis has returned the college to the days of John Paul with regards to the Roman Curia, Italy and Latin America, but he has made it less European and more from the global south than it has ever been in the history of the church.
My Opinions
1. What one Pope (JP2) does, the next Pope (B16) can undo.
2. B16 appointing more Curia, Italian, and less Latin American cardinals got us a Latin American Pope!
3. Will less European's, few Italians and more global south mean that the next Pope will not be European. I doubt it; the Curia, Italians and Europeans will be very motivated to have a European Pope. The rest of the world can be divided and reconquered!
4. Glad Wilton Gregory made it!
UPDATE Rocco Palmo;s usual behind the scenes view of Wilton Cardinal Gregory
Nationality isn't the only difference with the Pope Francis appointees. As I read about them it seems that they are cast in a different mold than the ones from Francis' two predecessors.
ReplyDeleteWe're also happy to hear that Wilton Gregory made it. When he was a young auxiliary bishop in Chicago, my wife and I (actually, at the time I don't think we were married yet, but dating) had a chance to observe him at one or two liturgies. He impressed me then as being pastoral and also excited about his faith.
ReplyDeleteWhile the red hat is a significant achievement for him, mostly I hope that he will be a holy, effective and uncontroversial leader for the Washington DC church. May the Holy Spirit guide his efforts to build up the church there.
I heard or read somewhere that John Paul II's efforts to reform the College, basically brought it into line with where it was under John XXIII, at least numerically. And now we read here in Jack's post that Francis's efforts basically have brought it to where it was under John Paul II. Clearly, it is difficult to change the College; much attention and effort is required simply to keep it roughly where it was before. I'm sure part of the reason is demographic (men already are elderly when they're made cardinals, so their time as cardinal often is relatively brief), and part of it is the process for nominating, vetting and selecting.
ReplyDeleteThere are still some significant "gaps" with Francis. According to custom, LA's archbishop should be a cardinal, and Philadelphia's traditionally has been a cardinal. Francis famously wants to revisit those customs, although making DC's archbishop a cardinal is pretty traditional.
Jim: May the Holy Spirit guide his efforts to build up the church there.
ReplyDeleteDo you mean something specific by this? Is the need greater in DC than in other cities?
If so, in what way?
Hi Anne, I see that Jack responded with a Whispers in the Loggia piece about challenges facing the DC church (which I haven't read yet). In making my comment, I didn't have anything specific in mind beyond the tumult of having two consecutive DC cardinals disgraced (although I don't equate the two and am not sure that Wuehrl's treatment has been entirely fair). For the sake of the DC church, I really hope Gregory doesn't have skeletons in his closet which will come back to haunt him!
DeleteAs I recall, he was president of the USCCB when the Boston Archdiocese sex-abuse scandals broke. He flew to Rome and convinced John Paul II and his curia that this was a real and serious thing; JP II seems to have had a blind spot about sexuaal abuse and its potential to damage the church.
A few other things I learned about Gregory: when he was a kid, his mom was a singer who, among other things, played the voice of Aunt Jemima in radio ads for Quaker Oats. His parents weren't Catholic but they sent him to a Catholic school starting in 6th grade so he could get a better education; within six weeks, he announced that he wanted to be Catholic and wanted to be a priest. His dad was irreligious but Gregory baptized him, with dad's permission, on the latter's deathbed.
I went to the SNAP website to see what they think about this latest news, but didn't see any news releases about the news. They do have some material about Gregory on their site; their criticism essentially is that they think he could have done more than he did, both as president of the USCCB and as bishop and archbishop. I didn't see any sensational accusations.
The special problems of DC are well outlined in the following article:
ReplyDeletehttp://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/2019/04/for-crisis-hit-capital-healer-in-chief.html
Thanks, Jack. I guess I've been gone from RC pews so long (10 years) that I no longer hear the gossip, nor do I read the newspaper (not that it ever mentioned anything remotely related to scandals anyway - a very Pollyannish archdiocese if you go by the Catholic Standard and letters to the editor were forbidden).
DeleteThe local news (WaPo etc) did take note of the fact that Gregory was highly displeased with the KofC for letting trump use the JPII center for a photo op. He also spoke out when trump took over the Episcopal church in Lafayette Square, forcing the EC clergy gathered there off the property so he could use it as a stage. Gregory joined the EC bishop in denouncing trump for his callous use of religious sites for his personal PR.
Lay women and men could run most of the Vatican dicasteries. In fact, Pope Francis's intention for this month for the Pope's Prayer Network (nee Apostelship of Prayer)implies as much. There would be, then, less need of the pile-up of cardinals around St. Peters and a better ratios cardinals with experience doing real bishop-y things to cardinals pushing paper.
ReplyDeleteYes, why is there a need for a cardinal to be, for instance, in the Secretariat of State? BTW, in this news item Cecilia Moragna was arrested for receiving 455,000 euros from Cardinal Becciu. My question is, since he misappropriated the funds in the first place, why is he not also arrested?
Delete"why is he not also arrested?"
DeleteThere is a great Vatican tradition that the underlings have to pay the price while the people at the top get off free. So the more lay people and lower clergy you have in major roles, the more likely they are to be held accountable. Of course if you still have heads of departments as clergy, they may not be held unaccountable.
Usually only the heads of departments are cardinals. Of course there have been many departments in the past. Part of Francis reform has been reducing the number of departments which means less opportunities for cardinal department heads. He has also been getting rid of the custom of promoting cardinals to honorary positions rather than just retiring them (that is what he did to Burke and the head of the CDF).
So does that mean no more titular archbishops of archaeological sites?
DeleteWell the nuncios are titular archbishop because they represent the Pope to the hierarchy of the country. They might be able to be laypersons if they only represented the Pope to the civil authorities.
DeleteOf course if we changed the appointment of bishops so that it was done say by a committee of clergy and laity without the large role now played by the Apostolic Delegate then his role in relationships to the bishops of the country would be minimal. Right now he is the one who makes the initial three recommendations list of candidates.
When Vat II was still fresh memory, I asked the first president of the National Council of Catholic Bishops, as it was then, Cardinal John Dearden of Detroit, if his job wouldn't put the apostolic delegate out of business. He said he didn't think so, but he didn't see why not. It's 54 years later, and I still don't know why not.
DeleteI spent a lot of years caring about Anglican Church politics, especially re homosexual clergy and the schematic threats of some belligerent African bishops.
ReplyDeleteIt's probably a good idea that the cardinals roughly represent the demographics of the faithful. But Catholic bishops, the pool from which cardinals are chosen, generally strike me as very removed from the lives of ordinary people and reality.
Hoping Cardinal Sarah isn't our next pope.
DeleteThen there is this appointment:
Deletehttps://www.ucanews.com/news/new-brunei-cardinal-runs-diocese-with-only-three-priests/90047?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=UCAN+Mrng+Newsletter+28+Oct
New Brunei cardinal runs diocese with only three priests
Jim, that is a neat story about Brunei. Sounds like they have an enthusiastic congregation. Hope the PTB won't give them too much trouble becsuse they aren't Muslim.
DeleteI stopped reading Whispers a long time ago: too in-bred. Rocco's first post was in December 2004 when he was in his early 20s. He was living at home in his parents basement. As far as I know, he's still there and now close to 40. There is much more to this church than the news about the clergy.
ReplyDelete