Chicago Archbishop Francis George’s startlingly swift arc through the Roman Catholic hierarchy landed him in the church’s inner circle Sunday, when Pope John Paul II announced he will elevate George to the rank of cardinal.
George will receive his red cardinal’s hat here on Feb. 21. Along with it comes a role as one of the pope’s counselors and a seat as one of 123 prelates from around the world who vote in a papal election.
Next to the papacy, a cardinalate is the most prestigious position the 900 million-member church has to offer.
It was no surprise that George’s name was on the list of 22 new cardinals the pontiff read aloud Sunday. Chicago’s last five archbishops were made cardinals.
But the Northwest Side native’s entrance onto the world stage is nonetheless remarkable for a man who less than two years ago was bishop of a tiny diocese in Yakima, Wash.
“There are other candidates far more worthy than I,” George said in Chicago Sunday morning, two days after his 61st birthday. “This is an honor to Chicago primarily. . . . (It) strengthens again the link between the Apostolic See and the Church of Chicago.”
George also joked with reporters at his North State Parkway residence, saying: “Now that I’m a cardinal-archbishop, there is a sense I’m at peace. There is a sense of finality to the whole thing. The next thing is your funeral, I suppose.”
The archbishop then departed for a normal Sunday of pastoral work, rededicating a parish in south suburban Harvey. Later he celebrated a mass at Holy Name Cathedral commemorating a century of Philippine independence with 1,500 worshipers, some in traditional costumes of the islands and others carrying small statues from their native land.
Thousands of miles away, Pope John Paul II had announced the new cardinals during his weekly Angelus prayer service. From the open window of his Vatican apartment, the pope spoke to thousands of cheering pilgrims who had gathered in St. Peter’s Square on a brilliant day.
Among the crowd were choirs from four Chicago-area parishes. The singers emerged from a once-in-a-lifetime performance at high mass in St. Peter’s, only to receive an unexpected public greeting from the pope and the surprise announcement of a new Chicago cardinal.
“It’s a forever kind of memory,” said Pat Crossin, of Chicago’s Beverly neighborhood and the St. John Fisher choir.
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The title of cardinal dates back to the days of the Roman Empire, and the Vatican greets the new “princes of the church” with a lavish series of ceremonies that conjure up all of Catholicism’s imperial grandeur.
The consistery, as the event is known, is to begin Feb. 21, the eve of the Feast of St. Peter. The celebration will continue the next day with a mass at St. Peter’s Basilica, then offer a rare chance for the public to wander the halls of the Vatican and pay their respects to the new cardinals.
George will be honored at the consistery along with James Francis Stafford, the former archbishop of Denver who now heads the Vatican Council for the Laity. The archbishops of Toronto and Mexico City will be elevated as well, along with seven other members of the Vatican administration and diocesan archbishops from Tanzania to Taiwan.
Two of the new cardinals will be elevated in pectore, without the public release of their names, a rare procedure used to safeguard church leaders who live under repressive governments. One new cardinal, a Polish missionary and survivor of five years in the Nazi concentration camp of Dachau, is older than 80 and therefore ineligible to vote in a papal conclave.
One of the Vatican officials whose name had been on the list for elevation, Archbishop Giuseppe Uhac, died Sunday morning before the official announcement. The pope said Uhac had been informed of his impending honor three days earlier.
George’s elevation to cardinal will not change his role as archbishop of Chicago, where he has had direct authority over 377 parishes, 988 diocesan priests and 439 schools since his installation in May 1997.
But now, George will receive a boxy new hat known as a biretta, a new ring, and a whole new set of responsibilities in Rome.
“You become much more of a public person and an international person,” said Rev. Don McMahon, a professor at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome. “The pope has to listen to what a cardinal says. He doesn’t have to listen to anybody else, but he has to listen to his cardinals.”
McMahon is a member of the religious order Oblates of Mary Immaculate, as is Francis George, and the two men lived in the Oblate house in Rome for several of George’s 12 years as the order’s vicar general.
George is only the fourth Oblate to be elevated to cardinal, and McMahon said his experience supervising missionaries around the world will give him a global perspective useful in his new role.
At the same time, of course, George comes to the College of Cardinals as a representative of Chicago, the second-largest archdiocese in the United States.
For its first few decades, Chicago’s diocese was headed by a bishop. In 1880 the city received its first Catholic archbishop, and in 1924 Archbishop George Mundelein was the first Chicago prelate elevated to cardinal.
It took Mundelein eight years to receive the honor, and his successor, Samuel Stritch, served for six years before getting his red hat. But successors Albert Meyer, John Cody and Joseph Bernardin were rewarded within two years of their arrival in Chicago.
Now that Chicago is widely perceived as a diocese important enough to merit a cardinal, the timing depends largely on when the pope calls a consistery. Vatican observers say that a pope waits for a large enough number of openings to make the ceremony worthwhile, as well as a balance between cardinal candidates from the Vatican administration and candidates from dioceses around the world.
Pope John Paul II has not called a consistery since 1994. By naming 19 cardinals of eligible voting age, he raises the total of electors to 123, three more than allowed under canon law.
The pope announced that he was waiving the limit in order to honor three Italian church officials.
In his 19-year pontificate, John Paul II previously has elevated 88 elector cardinals. The new consistery will raise that total to 106 electors, compared with 17 remaining electors from Pope Paul VI’s pontificate.
Some have argued that the predominance of appointments by this pope has made the College of Cardinals more conservative and therefore more likely to elect a conservative successor to John Paul II when that time comes.
Others say the greatest change the pope has made among the cardinals is to make the college more international and less Italian. Following the upcoming consistery, the United States will be represented in Rome by 12 American-born cardinals.
In Chicago, many Catholics expressed gratitude that George would be one of that number.
“I’m very happy for us and Archbishop George,” said Dorothy Marks, a parishioner at Harvey’s Ascension-St. Susanna Catholic Church, where George had just sprinkled holy water on freshly painted walls to bless the 103-year-old church after its $200,000 renovation.
“He is really a beautiful reflection of Jesus,” she added. “The least important thing to him is the title.”