The Papabili "Pontificate"

Even before the interregum began, Vatican watchers could not help but speculate who would become the sole Cardinal survivor who would become the Supreme Pontiff.





 Choosing  the next vicar is not decided by playing musical chairs in the Sistine Chapel or at a chatty Church “Tribal Council” but by prayerful discernment with the guidance of the Holy Spirit after interacting with their Cardinal colleagues.

Part of the reason for the General Congregations of the Cardinals in the Sede Vacante interregnum is so that fellow cardinals can informally acquaint themselves before going into the Conclave.

These  informal judgments about character and virtue gleaned from coffee breaks and schmoozing can inform Cardinal-electors to their choice . Consider that as they cast each vote, they must swear an oath to vote for the vest man to lead the church as they as they stand before Michelangelo’s Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel.

Now that the start of the Conclave has been set for Tuesday March 12, we ought to  educate ourselves of potential pontiffs. While the faithful outside the College of Cardinals are neither  privy to a Papabili’s piety nor their force of personality amongst equals, we can get a glimpse of their persona through quotes attributed to these Princes of the Church.

In furtherance of this understanding, here are a passel of Papabili.  For those who appreciate hemaneutics, studying their heraldry along with their chosen mottoes might be revealing.

Note the San Marco lion and the ship on Archbishop Scola's crest--those are remnants from when the nine years when Scola was the Patriarch of Venice before he was transferred to the influential Ambrosian diocese of Milan.

Ravasi was appointed as Prefect of the Pontifical Council for Culture in 2007. Ravasi was also appointed for a five year term on the Congregation for Catholic Education, the Pontifical Council for Interreligous Dialogue and he was the first member of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization.

Pope Benedict XVI appointed Cardinal Turkson to the the President of the  Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace in 2009.

Ouette has been the prefect of the Congregation for Bishops (having the responsibility for "recruiting" and vetting bishops)  as well as also serving as the President of Pontifical Commission for Latin America.

Aside from his tony lineage and close connections with  Pope-emeritus Benedict XVI, Schoenborn was a key editor for the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

Scherer does has some experience with the Roman Curia, as he washe was an official of the Congregation for Bishops from 1994 to 2001.

Braz de Aviz was appointed by Pope Benedict XVI as the Prefect of the  Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life in 2011.

Tagle only received his scarlet zucchetto in November 2012.  But the 55 year old Tagle had been named for a five year term to serve on the Congregation for Catholic Education.  Moreover, Pope Benedict XVI named Tagle as one of the Synod fathers for the Synod of Bishops on the New Evangelization on September 18, 2012.

Cardinal O'Malley is a Capuchin who is renowned for his holiness.  O'Malley serves on the Pontifical Council for the Family which befits his longstanding commitment to pro-life issues as well as his association with March for Life founder Nellie Gray.

Dolan has  been a Cardinal for just over a year but he transferred from a seven year stint being Archbishop of Milwaukee to the Archbishop of New York in 2009.  Currently, Dolan is the President of the U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops.  Last year, Dolan was a leading voice in the Fortnight for Freedom project to educate Americans about the HHS Mandate and how it encroached on First Amendment liberties.

Prior to the Conclave's commencement, Cardinals have urged for prayer in their discerning.  To that end, Adoptacardinal.org  will designate a Cardinal-elector for you to pray for during this period.

On Suffering to Speak the Truth

Óscar Romero was the fourth bishop of San Salvador, El Salvador.  He led the church there during a turbulent time.  Progressives bemoaned his appointment in 1977, as his conservative reputation did not align with priests openly favoring Marxism.  But Romero’s weltanschauung became shaped by the estrangement of secular governments to the faith.  Moreover, when the Revolutionary Government right wing junta came to power in 1979, Archbishop Romero dared to speak up against human rights abuses, poverty, social injustice, torture and assassinations.

Divine Provence Chapel after Romero's assasination

Archbishop Romero was assassinated as he elevated the chalice of Divine Blood while celebrating Mass at “La Divina Provincia" Chapel in San Salvador on March 24th, 1980.  Monsenior Romero was fatally shot one day after he urged Salvadoran soldiers to be Christians and stop carrying out the government’s agenda of repression and basic human rights. 

{Actual audio of Archbishop Romero's assassination 03/24/1980}

At the martyred prelate’s funeral, the representative of the Holy See Mexico City Archbishop Ernesto Cardinal Corripio y Ahumada eulogized Romero as “a beloved, peacemaking man of God” and that “his blood will give fruit to brotherhood, peace and hope.”  Alas, these words were uttered as the crowd of 250,000 mourners were pelted with smoke bombs and were shot at by rifles from rooftops, with between 30 and 50 fatalities. 

In La Violencia Del Amor (The Violence of Love) , a collection of Archbishop Óscar Romero’s teachings, he seemingly anticipated the suffering that the Church needed to endure to remain faithful and challenge secular society to follow divine teaching.

La iglesia tiene que sufrir por decir la verdad, por señalar el pecado, para arrancar de raíz el pecado. Nadie quiere tener un punto delicado tocado, y por lo tanto una sociedad con tantas llagas tics cuando alguien tiene el coraje de tocar y decir: 'Hay que tratar eso. Hay que deshacerse de eso. Creer en Cristo. Convertíos'.

                                  {see translation above}

While Archbishop Romero was martyred by a right wing paramilitary, the Church may have to stand firm against militant secularism and progressive praetorianism. 

In  2010, Chicago Archbishop Francis Cardinal George opined: 

I expect to die in bed, my successor will die in prison and his successor will die a martyr in the public square. His successor will pick up the shards of a ruined society and slowly help rebuild civilization, as the church has done so often in human history.

As he gave the Keynote to a College of Cardinal's meeting at St. John Lateran's Basilica in February 2012, New York Archbishop Timothy Cardinal Dolan deflected any insinuations of glory that some might associate with being a  a cardinal.   Dolan, the jocular President of the U.S. Council of Catholic bishops jested: 

Holy Father, can you omit the 'shedding of your blood' when you present me with the biretta?" 
The pope responded-- "Of course not! We are but 'scarlet audio-visual aids' for all of our brothers and sisters also called to be ready to suffer and die for Jesus." 

This is a reminder of Archbishop Romero’s witness to the truth to the point of his death.

With Western progressive governments pushing same sex marriage, broad ability to divorce and liberal abortion, leaders in the Church who wish to defend traditional, scripturally inspired societal practices which chaff against the current.  Moreover, the application of Obamacare’s HHS Qualified Health Plan Contraception Mandate is anathematic to following their faith as well as the natural right of free exercise of religion as guaranteed by the Constitution. 

The fervency of faith and fearlessness for speaking the gospel certainly ought to be qualities considered when the College of Cardinals has its mid-March conclave in the wake of Pope Benedict XVI's abdication.

America's New State Religion?

In the wake of the Obama Administration’s HHS Qualified Health Plan Mandate (a.k.a. the Contraception Mandate), mainline churches have to come to terms with a Federal government which narrowly construes the First Amendment Freedom of Religious Expression.

While the Obama Administration exempts parishes from these objectionable regulations, no such leeway is given to religiously affiliated organizations, like Catholic colleges, religious orders, Catholic Insurers etc.  from paying for abortions, sterilizations and abortifacients.  But such groups were given a year’s reprieve from complying. As New York Archbishop Timothy Cardinal Dolan quipped that they were given an extra year to figure out how to violate their consciences.

President Obama claimed a work around which would force a farce that insurers would give away these services so religious organizations would not have to pay.  Of course, this is a ruse as insurers would simply raise their premiums to everyone to cover these free services.  But Obama’s announcement came on the same day that the Federal Register published the original rules unchanged, so the ameliorations were a rhetorical chimera.

This move by the Obama Administration has awakened a sleeping giant.  This summer, the U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops promoted the “Fortnight for Freedom”,  a coordinated nation-wide effort of prayer, fasting and educating American Catholics on the importance of preserving Americans’ First Amendment rights to the unfettered exercise of religious beliefs.

Some pastors have picked up this mantle to drive this crucial point home.  On the “Pastor’s Page of St. John the Evangelist of St. Paul (MN), Fr. George Welzbacher published this thought piece on the establishment of a nationwide first state religion–secular humanism.

It would seem that, for the first time in the history of our republic, we are witnessing here in the U.S.A. the establishment of a state religion, a religion so crafted as to delight the heart of a secularist, a religion with clearly defined dogmas, compliance with whose demands is to be enforced with all of the coercive powers at the disposal of the federal     government.  Here are the dogmas of this new faith. 

Dogma #1: A woman has the right, the unrestricted right, to make arrangements for the killing of her unborn child whenever such course of action is convenient.
Dogma #2: The chief purpose served by the institution of marriage is the securing of social recognition for romantic attraction, together with the panoply of benefits accruing to such recognition. The begetting of children, together with such subsequent upbringing as will equip them to contribute responsibly to the society in which they will spend their lives, can be dismissed as of  marginal importance. Thus every man, should this be his bent, has the right to marry another man, just as every woman, should she be so disposed, has the right to marry a woman. To suggest otherwise, to imply, for example, that a man's realigning of his reproductive powers to adapt to another man's digestive tract is in any way abnormal is to be guilty of a hate crime, in exculpation of which no appeal to the rights of conscience shall be allowed,  this being an intolerable crime, properly punishable with fines and/or imprisonment.
Dogma #3: The sovereign pontiff in this new state religion is the people's hero, Barack Hussein, now reigning gloriously in the White House.

Dogma #4: Enemy Number One of the new state religion is, by and large, the Christian faith and, with special intransigence, the Catholic Church. Measures must accordingly be taken to compel the recusant authorities of the Roman Catholic faith to genuflect at the new religion's altar. (Thus the new Health and Human Services mandate).

 All of this represents at least one way of looking at President Obama's arrogant trampling upon the First Amendment, not to mention his repudiation of God's Commandments.

If this is the case, I hope that I’m losing that religion come the first Tuesday in November.

h/t: Jerry Breen