Who Is Dom Claudio?

From Rome, Robert Mickens takes a closer look at the newly-named prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy in tomorrow's edition of The Tablet:

Some have caricatured the cardinal; others have mythologised him. The appointment on 31 October sparked curiosity among many people as well as generating a flood of news stories. Some conservatives immediately cited Cardinal Hummes' longstanding friendship with Brazil's leftist President, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, as proof that he is a closet Marxist in prelate's clothing. But on the other side of the church "divide", activist Catholics involved in social justice issues shook their heads in disagreement. They believe the new prefect is a man who has steadily become more conservative in direct relation to his metamorphosis from simple Franciscan friar to cardinal archbishop in the biggest diocese of the world's largest Catholic country.

Both portraits, it seems, are in some ways correct, yet neither adequately captures the essence of Dom Cláudio. And neither gives a clue as to why the 79-year-old Pope Benedict gave him one of the top jobs in the Vatican.

Auri Alfonso Hummes (he took the name Cláudio when he made profession as a Franciscan) was born on 8 August 1934 in the village of Batinga Sul in the Archdiocese of Porto Alegre. A third-generation Brazilian of German ancestry, he was the third of what eventually would be 13 children....

The young Dom Cláudio spent a year - 1968 - in Geneva, where he studied ecumenism, before returning to Brazil to teach. He quickly rose to leadership in his order, becoming Provincial Superior in 1972. But the experience was short-lived. In 1975 Pope Paul VI appointed him Bishop of Santo André, an industrial city on the outskirts of São Paulo.

It was there that the myth of Cláudio the "labour bishop" was born. As Brazil's military dictatorship and factory workers clashed, the new Bishop Hummes allowed the labour unions to meet in parishes throughout his diocese. It was here that he forged his friendship with the union boss at the time, the man known simply as Lula....

Vatican officials who are familiar with Cardinal Hummes note that he has remained a "simple friar" at heart. He is considered "loyal" to the Vatican line on all major moral and ethical questions, yet he has been characteristically "non-doctrinaire", as one official said. "He is extremely discreet, soft-spoken, and someone who shuns the spotlight," said one Brazilian priest who lives in Rome. Even though the cardinal is considered a "youngish" 72-year-old, he said, his age shows that "the Pope is forming a transitional government". In fact, Pope Benedict has chosen men who are all over 70 (Cardinals Levada, Dias, and Bertone) for the few top Roman Curia jobs he has handed out up to now....

While Brazilian churchmen such as Cardinals Lorscheider and Arns have spoken about the need to at least discuss the possibility of ordaining married men as priests, Cardinal Hummes has been reticent on the point. But he is not opposed to dialogue. Quite the contrary.

"The cardinal is very open to everyone," said a Brazilian priest who teaches in Rome. "He truly believes in dialogue, a so-called ‘servant Church of the poor', and one that is not overbearing," he said. He noted that, even though it is not Cardinal Hummes' "cup of tea", as it were, he initiated the usage of the Tridentine Mass in São Paulo, solely because a group of people in the archdiocese asked for it.

Speaking of which.....

-30-