Italian Cardinal Angelo Sodano, number two in the Vatican in the pontificates of John Paul II and Benedict XVI and involved in several controversies that shook the Church, died on Friday (27) at the age of 94 in Rome, the Vatican announced on Saturday (28). ).
Sodano died in a hospital in Rome, where he had been hospitalized since May 9, after having complications from Covid-19, according to the Holy See website, Vatican News.
Appointed by João Paulo 2nd Secretary of State in 1990, he remained in the position, which is equivalent to a Minister of Foreign Affairs, until 2006. In 2005, he also became dean of the College of Cardinals, which he directed when Benedict 16 left the pontificate, in February 2013. As he was over 80 at the time, however, he missed the opportunity to participate in the conclave that chose the new pope.
Sodano, along with John Paul’s secretary, then-Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz, was widely believed to run the Church in the later years of that pope’s life as his health deteriorated – he had Parkinson’s and other illnesses and died in 2005.
Born on November 23, 1927 in the Italian region of Piedmont, Sodano was part of the diplomatic corps of the Holy See in countries such as Ecuador, Chile and Uruguay.
In 1977 he was appointed 6th apostolic nuncio to Chile by Paul, where he maintained a very tolerant attitude towards the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. At this time, he participated in the mediation of the Catholic Church to resolve territorial problems between Argentina and Chile.
In addition to his relationships with Pinochet or his high standard of living in Rome, Sodano has been involved in other controversies, having been accused of covering up one of the Catholic Church’s most notorious sex abusers – he denied.
Legionaries of Christ
In a series of denunciations in the National Catholic Reporter in 2010, author Jason Berry, a leading expert on the Church’s sexual abuse crisis, wrote about how Sodano blocked the Vatican from investigating Father Marcial Maciel, founder of the Legionaries of Christ religious order.
After John Paul’s death, Pope Benedict stepped up investigations into Maciel and removed him in 2006, when the Vatican acknowledged claims that had been dismissed for decades were true.
The Legionnaires of Christ order, whose rules forbade criticizing its founder or questioning his motives, later acknowledged that Maciel, who died in 2008, lived a double life as a pedophile, a harasser of women and a drug addict.
Sodano has repeatedly denied allegations that he was aware of this and that he had covered up Maciel – who made generous financial donations to the Vatican.
In 2010, Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn of Vienna accused Sodano of having blocked a major investigation into former Austrian Cardinal Hans Hermann Groer, who stepped down as Archbishop of Vienna in 1995 after allegations he had sexually abused young seminarians. . He died in 2003, never having admitted guilt or faced charges.
Sodano also denied these allegations.
In 2010, victims of clergy sexual abuse criticized Sodano for saying, in a public Easter speech, that the abuse issue was mostly “petty gossip”.
Ordained a priest in 1950, Sodano entered the diplomatic service several years later. He served in Vatican embassies in Ecuador, Uruguay and Chile, before being recalled to the Vatican for senior administrative positions.
Church sources told Reuters that even after he retired, the cardinal exerted significant influence on the careers of Vatican officials throughout the remainder of Benedict’s pontificate — he resigned in 2013.
After Sodano’s death, Pope Francis referred to him as “an esteemed man of the Church, who lived his priesthood with generosity … at the service of the Holy See”, in a telegram sent to the family and published by Sodano. Vatican.
