VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter
by John L. Allen Jr. | Feb. 18, 2013
Starting today, John Allen will be offering a profile each day of one of the 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 that 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.
Rome
By consensus, there’s no slam-dunk, take-it-to-the-bank favorite heading into the next papal election, but the closest to thing to someone in pole position is probably 71-year-old Cardinal Angelo Scola of Milan.
Scola breathes the same intellectual air as Benedict XVI, coming out of the Communio theological school co-founded by the young Joseph Ratzinger in the period following the Second Vatican Council (1962-65). As a young theologian himself, he published book-length interviews with Henri de Lubac and Hans Urs von Balthasar.
During his college years Scola met the famed Italian Fr. Luigi Giussani and became part of his Communion and Liberation movement. Of late Scola has tried to put some distance between himself and the ciellini, as the center-right movement’s members are known, especially because several leading Italian politicians identified with it have been engulfed in corruption scandals.
Still, in Italian ecclesial politics, Scola is inextricably linked with the movement, which cuts both ways – some deeply admire Communion and Liberation, others not so much. The linkage with Scola was solidified amid the Vatileaks scandal, which included a letter from Giussani’s successor to Pope Benedict XVI in March 2011, suggesting that the previous two archbishops of Milan had fostered a critical stance toward some aspects of church teaching, and that Scola was the best candidate to take over.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.