Not to be overlooked in today’s announcement of new cardinals is Fr. Albert Vanhoye, an 82-year-old French Jesuit. He was a secretary to the Pontifical Biblical Commission and a consultor to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith under Cardinal Ratzinger. A friend says that if anybody deserves such an honor it is Vanhoye. He is genuinely humble almost to the point of silence, austere, powerful, and faithful, in addition to being a scholarly expert on the Letter to the Hebrews.
As a consultor to the CDF, he apparently did a lot of work for Ratzinger that would and could never be publicly recognized. His close work with the former prefect is probably why the Pope is giving him this honor now. It might also be seen in some circles as a rebuff to the present Jesuit hegemony.
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How would appointing a Jesuit be a rebuff to the “present Jesuit hegemony” (even if there is such a thing, of which there is little evidence). Perhaps you mean the present Jesuit hierachy?
Is he going to be made a bishop? Or is he declining that as did Cardinal Dulles.
I suppose the word I was looking for was “establishment” not “hegemony.”
And it was a rebuff in the sense that Vanhoye is in the Fessio, Rutler, Shaughnessy vein of Jesuits, not the Martin, Reese vein.
I don’t know anything about whether he’s going to be made a bishop yet. Good question.
Rutler?
Yes, it’s been pointed out to me. That was an error.