A Quick Cologne Primer

As B16 enters Cologne Cathedral, he is surrounded by two very distinct "rings" of prelates.

Running advance, as usual, is Bishop Renato Boccardo, the number-two man at the Governorato (the body which manages the Vatican City State). A former official at State, Boccardo has been the papal "travel agent" since the retirement of Roberto Tucci in 2001 and was ordained a bishop last year, initially assigned as the secretary of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications.

The Popemobile has two additional seats aside from the Pope's. One is always taken by the secretary (Georg, who is making himself omnipresent today), the other by the bishop of the place being visited (a very happy Cardinal Joachim Meisner).

But in the "inner ring" immediately surrounding him, there are the following individuals:

• Meisner
• Sodano
• Ganswein
• Boccardo
• Archbishop Stanislaw Rylko, president of the Pontifical Council for the Laity (the dicastery charged with planning WYD)... As a sidenote, Rylko is a Krakow protege of Pope Wojtyla's who served as Dziwisz's assistant when JP was archbishop of Krakow.
  

The "second ring" is more a security necessity than a commentary on who's in and who's out. But it's still of interest. There we find:

• Bishop Josef Clemens, secretary of the Pontifical Council for the Laity (Cardinal Ratzinger's beloved private secretary of 20 years)
• Archbishop Piero Marini, master-genius of papal liturgical ceremonies
  
• Archbishop Leonardo Sandri, sostituto of the Secretariat of State (the papal chief of staff... well, when State's behaving itself)
• Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity (the point-man for tomorrow's visit to Cologne's Synagogue in his capacity as president of the commission for Religious Relations with the Jews)
• Cardinal Karl Lehmann, bishop of Mainz and president of the German Bishops' Conference
• Bishop Franz-Joseph Bode, bishop of Osnabruck and chair of the German Bishops' Commission on Youth

Also in this circle is someone I haven't seen in awhile: the "second secretary," who has apparently been retained from the last pontificate, John Paul's beloved Msgr. Mieczyslaw Mokrzycki.

The Pope has been received in the cathedral to the strains of Anton Bruckner's Ecce Sacerdos Magnus. Interesting pick, and Marini's dictating the pace without betraying any signs of it. The Marini Code is, indeed, a wonder.

UPDATE: Contrary to the previous assumptions, I'm told that Ingrid Stampa is present in the papal entourage. I haven't seen her, but then again the cameras are lucky to have five seconds of good feed each, given the pressing crowd and overpowering security. Like her boss, she's also very good at being inconspicuous.

More soon.

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