Scoping Out A Third World Pope

A Possibility, With Over Half Of All Catholics Living In Latin America

(CBS/AP)  As cardinals rushed to the Vatican on Sunday to begin the process of selecting a new pope, many back home were asking a pointed question: With a majority of the world's Roman Catholics living in the developing world, shouldn't the next pope come from one of those countries?

The possibility that the next pope could come from Latin America, Africa or Asia is creating a buzz from Mexico City to Manila, from Tegucigalpa to Kinshasa. Many Latin American Catholics said the only way to improve on a papacy they overwhelmingly support would be to select someone from their own ranks.

Their hopes are fueled by the last papal conclave, in which a Polish archbishop became the first non-Italian pope in 455 years, as well as by the global outreach that John Paul II made a cornerstone of his papacy. They also have been boosted by sheer numbers: Half the world's 1 billion Roman Catholics live in Latin America alone, and the church is seeing explosive growth in Africa and Asia.

Even outside Roman Catholicism, leaders from the developing world saw a chance for change.

"We hope that perhaps the cardinals when they meet will follow the first non-Italian pope by electing the first African pope," Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu said Sunday from Cape Town, South Africa.

Many Catholics in poor countries said a pope from their own regions would better understand the challenges they face, and would make the church more relevant in the lives of its increasingly diverse followers.

Pope John Paul II promoted African bishops to the ranks of cardinals and gave them prominent roles at the Vatican, recognizing the importance of a continent where crops may fail but the Church's harvest of souls and vocations has not ceased to multiply.

Many say an African pope now could anchor the Catholic Church among the world's poor — signaling its aim to lead the fight against inequality and disease and offering a hope of salvation in this world as well as the next.

But even as Africans mourn the loss of a champion in John Paul II, streets and churches are filled with speculation surrounding the possibility that the first non-Italian pope in several centuries could be replaced by the first black pontiff of modern times.

The name that keeps cropping up as a candidate is that of Cardinal Francis Arinze on Nigeria — a priest remembered for turning mission schools into shelters for starving refugees.

While John Paul did not increase the overall number of African cardinals from his immediate predecessors — there are 11 now compared 12 before John Paul was crowned — he has greatly boosted their profile by calling several to the Vatican. Arinze, for example, was entrusted with mediating interfaith relations — one of John Paul's favorite projects.

"John Paul strengthened Africa's role in the church," said Mario Aguilar, dean of divinity at the University of St. Andrews "John Paul gave the tools to the African churches to become more central to the church."

Aguilar said that by giving Africans a greater Vatican role, John Paul "did increase the chances of seeing an African pope."

Yet many in Africa have doubts about whether church elders are ready to elect an African pope.

"I doubt that the white man will allow a black man to become pope," said Chinyere Osigwe, a 40-year-old Nigerian — one of the 135.6 million African Catholics who make up nearly 17 percent of Church's congregation worldwide.

Working to Arinze's advantage is the fact that he has deep personal affinities with John Paul — who named most of the cardinals who will elect the next pope.

Arinze has more than a streak of social activism, and shares John Paul's conservative views on abortion, contraception and homosexuality — which tend to play well in Africa

Nigerians still remember Arinze's work during the Biafra civil war in the late 1960s and early '70s, when missionary schools in the young archbishop's domain were transformed overnight into camps filled with starving refugees.

John Paul II, who made 13 tours to the continent, indicated the importance it held for him by calling last year for a second synod of African bishops, years before one was due.

When the pope made his first visit to Africa in 1980, many countries still suffered under Marxist regimes that persecuted Catholics or military and civilian dictatorships, Zimbabwe had just become independent but South Africa and Namibia remained under white rule.

John Paul visited countries like Guinea-Bissau, where more than 90 percent of the population is Catholic, but he also reached out to Muslim Africa, visiting nations — such as Burkina Faso and Senegal — where less than 5 percent of the population is Catholic.

While several names from developing countries have been mentioned as candidates, it is unclear what kind of chance Third World religious leaders stand. Only 21 of the cardinals eligible to vote on the new pontiff are from Latin America and the Caribbean, and only 11 from Africa, compared with 58 from Europe alone.

But the inroads being made by evangelical Protestants in Latin America, combined with the fact that the church is growing fastest in the Third World, accounts for at least three Central or South American cardinals featuring prominently on several lists, reports CBS News Correspondent Allen Pizzey.

The Dominican Republic's Cardinal Nicolas de Jesus Lopez Rodriguez, who will participate in the conclave, said the next pope should be oriented toward Latin America, but he stopped short of saying the pontiff should be a native of the region.

"The majority of Catholics in the world are in Latin America, so whoever is elected should focus on this continent," Lopez Rodriguez told reporters after celebrating a Mass at Santo Domingo Cathedral.