Italian Cardinal Canestri dies at 96
VATICAN CITY — Italian Cardinal Giovanni Canestri, who attended every session of the Second Vatican Council as a bishop, died April 29 at the age of 96.
He died 20 years after retiring as archbishop of Genoa and more than 53 years after his ordination as a bishop.
Italian Cardinal Giovanni Canestri, retired archbishop of Genoa, who attended every session of the Second Vatican Council as a bishop, died April 29 at the age of 96. He is pictured in a 2012 photo. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)
Pope Francis, offering his condolences, said he admired the cardinal’s “humanity and fidelity in his long and fruitful priesthood and episcopacy.” The pope wrote particularly of the cardinal’s ministry in Rome neighborhoods marked by particular “suffering and poverty” during the difficult years of World War II, his participation in the Second Vatican Council and the “goodness and gentleness” with which he treated people throughout his life.
Born Sept. 30, 1918, in Castelspina, a northern Italian town not far from Genoa, he entered the local minor seminary when he was 11. He moved to a Rome diocesan seminary in the 1930s and earned a theology degree from the Pontifical Lateran University.
Ordained to the priesthood in 1941, he spent the next 18 years as a parish priest in the poorer neighborhoods on the outskirts of Rome.
In 1961, St. John XXIII named him an auxiliary bishop of Rome. He joined thousands of other bishops from around the world at the Second Vatican Council from 1962 to 1965.
He was named bishop of Tortona, in northern Italy, in 1971, but was back in Rome four years later as vice regent of the Diocese of Rome and an archbishop.
St. John Paul II named him archbishop of Cagliari in southern Italy in 1984 and transferred him home in 1987 as archbishop of Genoa. St. John Paul gave him his red hat in 1988.
Cardinal Canestri retired as archbishop April 20, 1995.
His death leaves the College of Cardinals with 222 members, 120 of whom are under the age of 80 and therefore eligible to vote in a conclave to elect a new pope.
Related Posts:
- The council that surprised even the pope who called it
- Pope confirms heads of Vatican curial agencies
- Living, working with holy popes, secretaries struck by their faith
- Cardinals dedicate new wing of U.S. seminary in Rome
- Pope names 15 new cardinal electors, most from global South
The post Italian Cardinal Canestri dies at 96 appeared first on The Compass.
