Analysis: In 2005 Benedict emerged and now too the odds are against success.
The
announcement of Pope Benedict XVI’s resignation caught most Latin
Americans by surprise, with much of the world’s most Catholic continent
occupied with the distinctly pagan rituals of carnival.
But as
happened after the death of Pope John Paul II, many Latin Americans are
again wondering if the Europeans who dominate the papal conclave might
be ready to turn over the church’s leadership to someone from the region
that is home to more than 40 per cent of the world’s Catholics.
Despite
its continued weight inside the universal church, recent decades have
witnessed a veritable Protestant reformation across Latin America, with
tens of millions of Catholics abandoning Rome to join a dizzying array
of home-grown evangelical Protestant rivals.
A Latin American pope, so the argument goes, could help stem the tide.
But the problem is the lack of any compelling candidate.
In
the immediate aftermath of Pope Benedict’s announcement the most widely
tipped of the Latin candidates has been São Paulo’s archbishop,
Cardinal Odilo Scherer. At just 63 he is young for a cardinal and so
would benefit if the conclave decided it was time to hand the papacy to a
younger man.
But it is difficult to escape the impression that
his immediate inclusion among the candidates is down to his position as
the leading cardinal in the world’s most populous Catholic nation.
‘Very capable’
Since
his elevation to Brazil’s largest archdiocese Cardinal Scherer has
shown little of the charisma or strong leadership qualities that one
imagines the cardinals will require in the next pope.
One priest
who has worked with him in São Paulo questioned his emergence as Latin
America’s leading candidate. “He is a workaholic and very capable. But
he is a civil servant, more of a middle manager than a leader,” said the
priest, who asked not to be named.
Cardinal Scherer’s immediate
predecessor, Cláudio Hummes, was a more charismatic leader of the São
Paulo church and is well known in the Vatican thanks to his position as
head of the Congregation of the Clergy.
But at 78 he might be considered
too old for an organisation that has just seen its head retire for the
first time in centuries.
Dom Hummes had been widely tipped in 2005
as a possible successor to John Paul II for the same reason that
Cardinal Scherer is today.
But according to several reconstructions of
the count that elevated Cardinal Ratzinger to the papacy he was not even
the top- ranking Latin cardinal.
The runner-up slot then was supposedly occupied by the Jesuit archbishop of Buenos Aires, Jorge Mario Bergoglio.
Dirty war
At
76 he is still eligible.
But his elevation to the papacy could lead to
renewed scrutiny of the Argentinian church’s role in the country’s Dirty
War, when it offered support to the military junta in its brutal
campaign of murder of left-wing dissidents.
In 2005 Cardinal
Bergoglio, who was the head Jesuit in the country during the
dictatorship, was accused by a local human rights group of complicity in
the death of two Jesuit priests murdered by the regime, a charge which
he has vigorously denied.
Politics could also hinder the chances
of another cardinal frequently cited as a possible Latin pope, the
popular Cardinal Óscar Andrés Rodríguez Maradiaga, archbishop of
Tegucigalpa in Honduras.
As head of the church’s Caritas charity organisation he is well known across the church.
But
he drew the ire of many Latin American leaders when he was seen to have
given sanction to the 2009 coup that overthrew President Manuel Zelaya,
whom he accused of turning into a Honduran Hugo Chávez.
But
church insiders caution that the conclave that elects Pope Benedict’s
successor will most likely be driven by personal rather than regional
considerations.
“The cardinals will not sit down and decide now is
the time to choose someone from Africa or Latin America,” says Derek
Byrne, the Irish-born bishop of Guiratinga in Brazil.
‘Qualities and abilities’
“It
will depend on the person and how well they all know each other. For
example, they might look at Cardinal Angelo Scola of Milan, not because
they think it is time to turn back to an Italian but because of his
qualities and abilities.”
Such an intimate selection process could
benefit two other lesser-known Latin cardinals serving in the Curia:
Argentina’s Leonardo Sandri and Brazil’s João Braz de Aviz, two lesser
names cited as possible candidates to become the first Latin American
pope.