Cardinal Francis Arinze

次期法王への可能性☆フランシス・アリンゼ

☆Cardinal Francis Arinze, former archbishop of Onitsha, Nigeria. He holds key posts in the Vatican and turns 71 on Nov. 1. A familiar face to American Catholics, he has made frequent trips to the USA and has been papabili for years. Church historian Matthew Bunson describes him as a veteran pastor highly ranked with the Curia, a noted author and a conservative on liturgy. He is respected for interreligious dialogue efforts. And "he plays a mean game of tennis."

☆Cardinal Arinze☆

Nigerian Cardinal Francis Arinze, prefect of the Vatican's Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, visited Long Island (in New York) last week. He spoke during the 2nd Annual Cardinal Bevilacqua Lecture in Pastoral Theology, held at the Seminary of the Immaculate Conception in Huntington. He was invited by Bishop William Murphy, head of the Diocese of Rockville Centre.

International travel is, of course, one of the ways that a potential pope comes to the attention of his brother cardinals and the broader Catholic world.

More than 200 Catholic clergy and lay people attended the event to hear the cardinal address the importance of the Eucharist in the pastoral ministry of the priest.

"If you touch the holy Eucharist, you touch the heartbeat of church life," Arinze said, emphasizing the need for priests to abide by the norms of the sacrament. Priests should remind parishioners of the importance of confessing their sins before receiving the blood and body of Christ, he said.

Though Arinze did not spell it out, the comment could not help but have political echoes given the current debate over pro-choice politicians and the Eucharist. Earlier in the year, Arinze made waves at a Vatican press conference when he said that a politician who does not follow church teaching on abortion should not present himself for communion, and if he does, the priest should not administer it.

"Objectively, the answer is clear," Arinze said April 23. "The person is not fit. If he shouldn't receive it, then it shouldn't be given."

His reputation as a papal front-runner preceded him to New York.

"I'm very interested in hearing the cardinal, especially since he's being talked about as the next pope," Tony Korec of Medford, NY, told Newsday, the major daily serving Long Island.