VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter
by John L. Allen Jr. | Feb. 26, 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.
To date I haven’t included Italian Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi in my daily sketches of papal contenders, largely because I published a profile of him on the first day of the Vatican’s Lenten Retreat, which was led by the 70-year-old President of the Pontifical Council for Culture.
That profile can be found here.
Suffice it to say that I’m sticking to my guns: In many ways, Ravasi really is “the most interesting man in the church.”
Ravasi drew good reviews for his meditations during the retreat, organized as a series of reflections on the Psalms. At the end, Pope Benedict XVI thanked him for his “brilliant” work – “brilliant” being a word that often tends to crop up in sentences about Ravasi.
In most media reports, the only line from the retreat that got much play was Ravasi’s reference to “divisions, dissent, careerism [and] jealousies”, which made a nice sound-bite amid the “Vatican gay lobby” furor touched off by the Italian media.
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