After Paul: The Leading Contenders

The Romans have a word for it: papabili -- the "possible Popes." In other times and other conclaves, they were at most a handful of men who, because of their holiness or wisdom or political savvy -- or some fortuitous combination of such qualities -- were deemed worthy of election as Pope. The conclave to choose a successor to Pope Paul VI, however, will be like no other before it. The number of Cardinal-electors, for one thing, is far greater than in any previous conclave, nearly twice the number who voted in 1963 in Pope Paul's election. With that increase has come an explosion of candidates. Observes Paulist Father Thomas Stransky, a former member of the Vatican's Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity and longtime Curial insider: "There is such a wide spread that it is impossible to say whose name will finally come up."

As many as 20 names are already being bruited, including those of some non-Italians. Most of the candidates defy easy labeling, for as Britain's Peter Hebblethwaite, veteran Catholic editor and Vatican expert, wrote in The Spectator just before Paul's death: "Any candidate who comes along with a conservative or progressive label must expect to be defeated. The next Pope cannot be the Pope of a faction within the church. He will have to rule from the center and be the servant of unity."

Redemptorist Theologian F.X. Murphy, a shrewd observer of papal politics since the Second Vatican Council, singles out two qualities that the new Pope must have: "pazienza e presenza, " the patience to deal with a pluralistic, decentralized church and the commanding presence to lead and guide. Similarly, U.S. Sociologist Father Andrew Greeley, in a detailed "job description" for the next Pontiff, concludes that he should be a "hopeful, holy man, who can smile, delegate responsibility and trust other human beings." If he is, Greeley observes, "it does not matter whether he is progressive or moderate."

Another old distinction is fading, too -- the line between a "pastoral" Pope, like John XXIII, and the statesman-diplomat, like Pius XII. Though bred to the Curia, Paul VI so cherished his nine years as Archbishop of Milan that he determined that future Cardinals, even career Curia men, should have at least one good stretch of pastoral work. Most of the leading contenders are men with both pastoral and Curial experience.

Of the many names on the lips of the conclavists, five stand out, with several others in close contention and a large field of dark horses. The five:

Sebastiano Cardinal Baggio, 65. Inducted into the Vatican diplomatic corps as a 23-year-old priest, Baggio (pronounced Bah-jee-o) has moved steadily upward in a flawlessly loyal career. As signed first to Vienna, he soon became a Latin American virtuoso, serving in six countries and learning, as he went, superb Spanish, Portuguese, English and half a dozen local dialects. The pastoral job Pope Paul found for him in 1969 would have discouraged a lesser man: the Archbishopric of Cagliari in Sardinia. Baggio gamely traveled the island in a simple black cassock, exhorting fraternal love in place of the endemic vendetta, cajoling landlords and industrialists to provide better conditions for workers. As prefect of the Congregation for Bishops since 1973, he has screened episcopal candidates from all over the Western Hemisphere and Western Europe -- a job that has brought the tough but approachable Cardinal many a loyal ally and at least a few enemies. In one angry letter, he excoriated the Philippine hierarchy and religious superiors for their denunciations of the Marcos regime. He would be acceptable to many conservatives and moderates.

Sergio Cardinal Pignedoli, 68. The most congenial and outgoing of the top tier of papal candidates, Pignedoli (pronounced Peen-yeh-doli) was Pope Paul's closest confrere among the Cardinals, a man whom the Pontiff most often chose for the concelebration of Mass, as a companion for trips abroad or to stand at his side for speeches from St. Peter's balcony. Ordained at 22, he has served in a wide range of jobs -- including a harrowing tour as the first Italian navy chaplain to accompany a submarine crew into action in World War II. He earned his pastoral spurs -- and the future Pope's lasting trust -- as auxiliary bishop to then Archbishop Montini in Milan. Diplomatic assignments in Latin America, Africa, Canada and Viet Nam seasoned Pignedoli for a higher post: in 1967 Paul named him secretary to the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, a position in which he helped to elevate native priests and bishops. Now, as president of the Secretariat for Non-Christians, Pignedoli can still indulge a passion for travel. He has visited 105 countries, preaching warm sermons on prayer and photographing everything. During these trips, he has built up an astonishing worldwide correspondence with more than 6,000 people --many of them young--who write to him in Rome, addressing him "Dear Sergio." Though nurtured by Paul, he could be another John.

Paolo Cardinal Bertoli, 70. In 1973, after nearly four years as prefect of the Congregation for Saints' Causes, Bertoli abruptly resigned his position. Neither he nor the Vatican ever explained the event, but two reasons have been suggested: 1) Bertoli was miffed that a new secretary to the congregation, Archbishop Giuseppe Casoria, had been appointed without his assent; in the 1960s, then Monsignor Casoria was identified as the notorious inquisitor of Priest-Educator Ivan Illich. 2) Bertoli felt that too many politically opportune saints were being pushed through the canonization process for the 1975 Holy Year without sufficient investigation. Either explanation, or both, would attest to Bertoli's wide reputation as a man of strict principle who could give the papacy a decisiveness that conservatives, especially, believe it needs. Bertoli's earlier diplomatic career took him from Occupied Paris in World War II, to Latin America, to war-sundered Lebanon in 1975. He has no specific pastoral experience, but work with World War II refugees brought him close to the poor and the homeless.

Johannes Cardinal Willebrands, 68. Italians have enjoyed a 455-year monopoly on the papacy, but if the voting swings to a non-Italian, a probable choice will be Holland's Willebrands (pronounced Vill-eh-brants), a prelate who manages to keep one foot in his archdiocese of Utrecht and the other in Rome as president of the vital Secretariat for Christian Unity. An Amsterdam parish priest in the 1930s, a philosophy professor and seminary rector in the 1940s, Willebrands in 1948 became head of a Dutch church group promoting ecumenism. In 1960 Pope John appointed him to the new Christian Unity Secretariat under Ecumenical Pioneer Augustin Cardinal Bea. Inheriting Bea's mantle in 1969, Willebrands has forged new links with Eastern Orthodox churches, Anglicans, Lutherans and other Protestant churches. As Primate of Holland since 1975, he has eased -- but not ended -- bitter tensions between the progressive wing of the Dutch church and an angry, re-emergent conservative wing.

Eduardo Cardinal Pironio, 57. In conventional papal terms, Argentina's Pironio is too young for the job: if he reached Paul's age, he would still be ruling in 2001. But he is also a distinguished prelate of the burgeoning Third World and at the same time the son of Italian immigrants--the youngest of 22 children. Among the top five candidates, he is easily the most accomplished theologian, former dean of the Theological Faculty at the Pontifical Catholic Argentine University and a peritus (theological expert) at Vatican II. He is sympathetic to the social activists who espouse liberation theology, and as secretary-general of the Latin American Bishops' Conference (CELAM) from 1967 to 1972, encouraged them as members of his staff. After becoming president of CELAM in 1972, he responded to Vatican worries about the increasingly Marxist drift of the theology and allowed a conservative secretary-general to cull the liberationists. Nevertheless, as Bishop of Mar del Plata, Pironio spoke out so sharply against right-wing terrorism that his life was threatened. In 1975 Pope Paul called Pironio to Rome, where he now heads the Congregation for the Religious. He could win the needed votes if the conclave wants a Third World man with Roman credentials.

The contest in Rome this month is by no means confined to these three Italians and two non-Italians: they are simply the early-form leaders in a very open race. There is, for example, a second rank of Italian papabili, led by the able Archbishop of Florence, Giovanni Cardinal Benelli, 57. As Substitute Secretary of State under French Cardinal Jean Villot for a decade, Benelli wielded more power than his boss, acting effectively as the Pope's chief of staff. Paul rewarded him last year with a red hat and the Archdiocese of Florence, but he is still quite young. What is more, his often bruising man ner as the Pope's aide may have left too much blood on too many cassocks for him to win election this time.

Salvatore Cardinal Pappalardo, 59, Archbishop of Palermo, might be a more conciliatory choice. A longtime teacher of Vatican diplomacy who was pro-nuncio to Indonesia during the anti-Communist bloodbath of 1965, Pappalardo capably moved into his faction-ridden Sicilian diocese as a unifying leader. A fellow southern Italian with an outside chance is Corrado Cardinal Ursi, 70, Archbishop of Naples. A widely admired pastor of the poor, Ursi travels from parish to parish to be sure all his people are cared for. His serious drawback is his parochialism: he speaks only Italian and has never served outside the country. Ugo Cardinal Poletti, 64, vicar-general for the Pope as Bishop of Rome, has been mentioned as a candidate because of his own concern with the capital's poor, but his efforts have been less intense and less successful than Ursi's. One powerful Italian, Pericle Felici, 67, who heads the Vatican commissions on implementing Vatican II and on revising canon law, will figure prominently in the conclave, but is rated too abrasive a conservative to be elected.

Perhaps the most attractive Italian of all has almost no hope of election: Archbishop Anastasio Ballestrero of Turin. Installed a year ago, Ballestrero, 64, is a Carmelite friar noted for his spirituality. He was slated for a red hat. The Cardinals in conclave could choose him (in theory, any Catholic male can be named Pope), just as they are said to have considered Archbishop Montini in the 1958 election. But no non-Cardinal has been elected since the 14th century.

Other appealing candidates stand only the barest chance in the voting. One is Bernardin Cardinal Gantin, 56, a black priest from Benin (formerly Dahomey), who was consecrated bishop 21 years ago by Pius XII. A tall, gentle man, quick to smile, he is now prefect of the Commission on Justice and Peace. Another is Britain's George Basil Cardinal Hume, 55, a Benedictine monk who in 1976 was plucked from obscurity as Abbot of Ampleforth Abbey to become Archbishop of Westminster. Hume's relative youth and inexperience are likely to count negatively with the pragmatic Cardinals.

Certain other non-Italians may stand a better chance. France's Jean Cardinal Villot, 72, as camerlengo during the papal interregnum, has become suddenly more visible than he ever was as Secretary of State. Though austere in style, Villot is an approachable, sensible moderate, whom Paul might have listened to more carefully: he warned that a divorce referendum in Italy would result in a resounding defeat for the church, which is precisely what happened. It is, however, unlikely that any Cardinal from a major Western nation, such as France, West Germany or, above all, the U.S., would be chosen, lest the Vatican be identified too closely with big-power politics. No Americans are considered papabili anyway.

Smaller powers are more likely to provide viable dark-horse candidates. Despite his age, 73, and his Shermanesque talk of refusing election, Austria's Franz Cardinal Koenig remains a possibility. Spain's Vicente Cardinal Enrique y Tarancon, 71, Archbishop of Madrid, has won a reputation as a courageous, liberalizing leader who declined to officiate at Franco's funeral but pointedly helped to crown King Juan Carlos. In a stalemate, the "Iberian bloc"--Portuguese, Spanish and Latin American votes--could swing behind him. A favorite of many in Latin America and elsewhere is Brazil's Aloisio Cardinal Lorscheider, 53, Archbishop of Fortaleza, president of Brazil's Bishops Conference and outspoken critic of the military regime. Lorscheider's advocates have worried more about his health than his youth, but he is now fully recovered from open-heart surgery last year.

One old Roman saying need not bother the candidates: Chi entra Papa esce Cardinale (He who enters [the conclave] Pope leaves it a Cardinal). Even front runners, such as Pignedoli and Baggio, are not so far ahead that they can go into the conclave as "Popes." Any of a number of good men, however, could come out one.

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