VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter
by John L. Allen Jr. | Feb. 20, 2013
Rome —
John Allen is offering a profile each day of one of the most frequently touted papabili, or men who could be pope. The old saying in Rome is that he who enters a conclave as pope exits as a cardinal, meaning there’s no guarantee one of these men actually will be chosen. They are, however, the leading names drawing buzz in Rome these days, ensuring they will be in the spotlight as the conclave draws near. The profiles of these men also suggest the issues and the qualities other cardinals see as desirable heading into the election.
As veteran Vatican writer Andrea Tornielli reminds readers today in La Stampa, one way to judge how serious a papal candidate may be is by how much whispering, rumor and character assassination that person generates. By that standard alone, one probably ought to take Cardinal Marc Ouellet seriously indeed.
The 68-year-old Ouellet, a native of Quebec who currently heads the Vatican’s all-important Congregation for Bishops, has long been considered a formidable contender to take over the church’s top job. He’s got the brains, the languages and the life experience to satisfy the conventional wisdom about what it takes to be pope.
As recent days have shown, he’s also got the baggage any public figure accumulates over a long and controversial career.
Profiles in the Canadian press have been mixed — Toronto’s Globe and Mail on Saturday was typical, asking, “Can the Cardinal who couldn’t save his Quebec church save the Vatican?”
The gist was that Ouellet’s tenure as archbishop of Quebec from 2002 to 2010 was rocky, and there’s little indication he turned around the steep decline in faith and practice in Francophone Canada. (One profile pointed out that even some of his siblings are no longer practicing.)
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