Vatican
City, 6 March 2013
(VIS) - “At the fourth General Congregation, which began this
morning at 9:00am with the prayer of the Liturgy of Hours, 153
cardinals were present. This number includes four additional
cardinals who arrived and were sworn in today, three Cardinal
electors: Cardinal Antonios Naguib, patriarch emeritus of Alexandria,
Egypt; Cardinal Karl Lehmann, bishop of Mainz, Germany; Cardinal John
Tong Hon, bishop of Hong Kong, China; as well as Cardinal Friedrich
Wetter, archbishop emeritus of Munich, Germany who is not an
elector,” said Fr. Federico Lombardi, S.J., director of the Holy
See Press Office during his daily news conference with journalists.
To
date, there are 113 Cardinal electors present. Tomorrow the two
remaining Cardinal electors are expected—Cardinal Kazimierz Nycz,
archbishop of Warsaw, Poland, will arrive this afternoon and Cardinal
Jean-Baptiste Pham Minh Man, archbishop of Thanh-Pho Ho Chi Minh,
Vietnam tomorrow morning.
“In
the fraternal spirit that characterizes the Congregations,” Fr.
Lombardi reported, “Cardinal Dean Angelo Sodano wished a happy
birthday to Cardinal Walter Kasper (who turned 80 yesterday),
Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio (who turns 75 today), and Cardinal
Julio Terrazas Sandoval, C.SS.R., (who turns 77 tomorrow). Cardinal
Kasper continues to be a Cardinal elector—he will be the oldest to
cast his vote in this Conclave—because the Apostolic Constitution
regulating the procedure for electing the pontiff establishes the age
limit for cardinals entering the Conclave to be determined from the
beginning of the period of the Sede Vacante.
This
morning 18 cardinals addressed the gathering. Without going into
details, the director of the Holy See Press office gave a general
overview of their nature. “The major theme,” Fr. Lombardi said,
“was the Church in the world, the New Evangelization. Other topics
included the Holy See, its Dicasteries and relations with bishops. A
third theme was a profile of expectations for the next pope in view
of the good government of the Church.”
“There
have been 51 speeches since the beginning of the Congregations,” he
added. Given the large number of cardinals wishing to address the
gathering, a five minute time limit was established but is not
strictly enforced. It was decided that tomorrow they will meet in a
morning as well as an afternoon session.
Regarding
the cancelling of the press conferences that some of the American
cardinals were giving in these days, Fr. Lombardi observed that “the
Congregations are not a synod or a congress in which we try to report
the most information possible, but a path toward arriving at the
decision of electing the Roman Pontiff. In this sense, the tradition
of this path is one of reservation in order to safeguard the freedom
of reflection on the part of each of the members of the College of
Cardinals who has to make such an important decision. It does not
surprise me, therefore, that along this path there were, at the
beginning, moments of openness and communication and that afterwards,
in harmony with the rest of the College, it has been established
whether and how to communicate.”
Also
brought up in the press conference was the date of the opening of the
Conclave. “The College has a great spirit of preparation that is
serious, profound, and unhurried,” Fr. Lombardi clarified. “Perhaps
that is why it still did not seem opportune to take a vote on the
date of the Conclave, which a large part of the College could sense
as something forced in the dynamic of reflection. It also needs to be
kept in mind that some cardinals are still arriving and it would be a
sign of respect for them to wait until the College is complete.”
In
conclusion, the director of the Holy See Press Office confirmed that
“the Fisherman's Ring has been scratched over,” that is, rendered
unusable.
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