Recipe
for a Pope: a Christlike Man Who Can Govern and Unite
NEWS ANALYSIS
by EDWARD PENTIN 03/06/2013
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VATICAN CITY — Ask any
Vatican official or leading Church figure in Rome what one of the most
important characteristics of the new pope should be, and, chances are, they’ll
say he must have an ability to govern.
Amid the many tributes
being paid to Pope Benedict XVI, among the few criticisms is the observation
that governance wasn’t the Holy Father’s strong point.
Although he has been
widely praised for certain aspects of governance — namely his episcopal
appointments, his efforts to crack down on clerical sex abuse and measures to
make the Vatican’s finances more transparent — running the Roman Curia was his
Achilles heel, made harder by his infirmity and old age.
He appeared to allude to
this in his letter of resignation,
when he said he had “come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an
advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine
ministry” and that, “in order to govern the barque of St. Peter and proclaim
the Gospel, both strength of mind and body are necessary.”
“Benedict XVI was an
excellent theologian [and he] will leave us with a tremendous wealth in the
field of the magisterium,” said Cardinal Ruben Salazar Gomez of Bogota, Colombia,
according to a Feb. 18 report by
the German Catholic news agency KNA. “But from the
perspective of government, this was not a strong papacy.”
Since the Vatileaks
scandal last year and the dysfunction it revealed, other cardinal electors are
openly talking about the need for reform of the Roman Curia.
“It has to be attended
to,” Cardinal Francis George of Chicago said, according to a Feb. 21 Associated
Press article. And
in a Feb. 20 interview with
the Italian daily newspaper Corriere della Sera,
Cardinal Walter Kasper, who retired in 2010 as prefect of the Pontifical
Council for Promoting Christian Unity, called for “more coordination between
the [dicasteries], more collegiality and communication.” He added, “Often, the
right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing.”
‘Petty’ Squabbling
Opus Dei Father Robert
Gahl, a professor of moral philosophy at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome, believes the
next pope must be able to tackle the Curial factions “warring against one
another” over “petty issues.” These factions are “not arguing over big
theological issues,” he observed, but, instead, over “struggles to advance
their own careers and reinforce their own power.”
“Those are all reasons
why the kind of governance the next pope will have to deal with is reforming
the Curia,” he continued, “and making sure that in the future the Curia acts in
a spirit of service rather than one of personal ambition.” Currently, he added,
parts of the Vatican are victims to a “feudal turf war.”
“The management style of
the Vatican remains that of Italian feudalism, similar to that of 18th or even
17th-century Italian politics — way before the existence of the Italian
republic,” he said. “And yet, clearly, there have been tremendous advancements
in management theory, practice and technology, so there’s a need for reform of
that governance model.”
The kind of governance
being proposed is one that moves away from a rigidly hierarchical pyramid that
management experts have long held to be a very inefficient and incompetent way
of running an organization. Such a system of management leads to information
only passing through a superior, while those officials at the same lower levels
in different offices do not communicate with one another.
This overdue reform of
Curial management is considered all the more important in today’s environment
of rapid information flow, where there’s a need for information to be
communicated through multiple channels.
Diocesan Experience
For these reasons, it’s
likely the cardinal electors will be looking for someone with diocesan and
pastoral experience who has a track record of good governance.
“I really don’t see them
choosing someone who at least hasn’t had a foot in a diocese,” a veteran
Vatican official told the Register. “Someone with Curia experience would also
be helpful.”
Some argue that such a
pope needs to be a reform-minded Italian; others disagree, believing that a
non-Italian would be best, as he would be well outside the institutional
infighting.
Whatever their
nationality, the cardinal electors will be looking for someone with energy, who
is media savvy and, most importantly, a man of deep faith. They will be looking
for someone who can unite the Church — the key papal task — and, most
importantly, someone of prayer, for whom the transcendent reality is a daily
reality.
In short, the cardinal
electors, led by the Holy Spirit, will be looking for someone with holiness and
Christlike qualities — pastoral and with deep compassion for the poor, the
suffering and the most vulnerable, especially the unborn.
“Among the cardinals,
there are so many who are worthy and capable,” said Benedict XVI’s brother,
Msgr. Georg Ratzinger, in a Feb. 21 interview with Corriere della Sera. “But I would say that the new pope
should be a person deeply rooted in the faith and that faith must guide his
life. It’s necessary to have a great respect for the weak.”
He added that another
“indispensable quality is realism: to understand what is possible and what is
impossible to do. He will have to have enormous energy, because it takes a lot
to direct such a large community and to get the message across with strength.
Perhaps they should choose a younger man.”
The ideal age of the new
pope, according to many observers, would be around 65 and certainly below the
age of 75. The average age of the cardinal electors is 72, and only 43 of the
116 voting cardinals are under the age of 70.
Many Challenges
Relative youth will be
needed to confront an array of challenges, such as the growth of secularism and
moral relativism in post-Christian Europe and North America and their effects;
the emergence of radical Islam and an increasingly troubled Arab world; and the
social fallout of debt-ridden, troubled economies. Ecumenism and interreligious
dialogue will be added challenges.
It’s unclear whether the
majority of the cardinal electors will choose a European or North American to
tackle those areas where the Church is in greatest crisis or settle on someone
from Asia or Africa, where the Church is growing fastest.
“Let’s be honest: The
future of the Church is in Africa and Asia; it’s not in Europe or North
America,” said the Vatican official. “It’s just not there. They’re dead [in
terms of faith growth], and it would make more sense to go for a place that’s
got life, liveliness and hope.”
But he said his view was
not typical of the Italian-dominated Curia, which tends to believe that only
Europeans should be pope.
An American Pope?
An American pope is also
possible, though its superpower status could be an obstacle. Ever since the
French Pope Clement V became a tool of the French monarchy (then the world’s
most powerful nation) and transferred the entire papacy to Avignon in 1309, the
Church has been reluctant to elect a pope from a ruling superpower.
Cardinal Timothy Dolan
of New York disagrees, however. In a Feb. 19 interview on
Sirius XM satellite radio, he said that when he was growing up it was presumed
the pope would be an Italian.
“We don’t even think
that anymore, do we?” he said. “The pope is the earthly, universal pastor of
the Church. To think that there might be a pope from North America, to think
that there might be a pope from Latin America, a pope from Asia, a pope from Africa
— I think that’s highly possible, don’t you?”
Father Gahl similarly
thinks an American has a fair chance of being elected.
“Americans always bring
up the difficulty of electing an American pope — no one else,” he noted. He
believes this is a remnant from the Cold War and the Bush era of America being
a hyper-superpower. Now that the Church is in “open contrast” with the White
House, Father Gahl believes “it removes entirely that objection.”
Furthermore, some see
Cardinal Dolan as having just the attributes needed, given his admired ability
to unite the Church in support of religious freedom and yet remain separate
from partisan politics. His personality, too, is suited to today’s media age.
Some, of course, disagree.
Cardinal Dolan himself
played down his own chances when asked in the Sirius interview if he could be
elected. “I could be the next shortstop of the Yankees too,” he said. “Anything
is possible!”
Edward Pentin is the
Register’s Rome correspondent.
