Well, instead of a pleasant surprise (Chaput), we got a predictable Levada and O'Malley. Hmm. It was bound to be them. After all, once you're grand inquisitor, you can't hardly go on being a mere archbishop. And if you're in Boston, well, even if you're dismantling the Church there...
Still. Disappointing, though unsurprising.
I'm afraid it is perfectly traditional to exclude Chaput, not because he was not deserving but because of the relative unimportance of his see. Washington and Boston are red hat sees. Denver, no matter how good its bishop never will be.
ReplyDeleteYeah, but that doesn't mean the Holy Father couldn't have made him a cardinal in anticipation of sending him to Detroit to replace your neighbor, Maida, or to Boston to replace O'Malley (we can dream, cain't we?).
ReplyDeleteAs for Washington, the other supposedly cardinalateral see down here that's due for a change, I'd say leave it vacant--the nuncio can drive an hour up the road to Baltimore when he wants to dine with a cardinal. We don't need a cardinal there just because it's the seat of the illegitimate, Masonic, de facto government. Instead return the galero to St. Louis, which is really, historically, far more important than Washington (and I'm not just saying that because I'm living in the historical boundaries of the St. Louis Archdiocese, really. The entire center of the continent was Christianized (at least for a time) by the Archbishop of St. Louis).