International New Pontiff firmly supported Paul’s approach to reform

Press, 28 August 1978, Page 8

International New Pontiff firmly supported Paul’s approach to reform

NZPA-Reuter Vatican City Cardinal Albino Luciani, the newly elected Pope, is the son of a humble labourer, with a reputation for ooen mindedness and moderation.

A priest since he was 23, he rose quickly through the hierarchy of the Church in his native northern Italy to become Archbishop and Patriach of Venice in 1969. On Saturday' he became the third cardinal this century, after Pius X and John XXIII, to move from the Archbishopric of the lagoon city to the Papacy. Now 65, he has been a staunch supporter of the policy of moderate reform undertaken by his immediate predecessor, Pope Paul VI. He has advocated changes, but strongly opposed legislation bringing divorce and abortion to Roman Catholic Italy.

Those who know him described him as open and friendly, always ready to listen and encourage, with his warm easy smile he showed to thousands of worshippers who greeted his Papacy in St Peter’s Square on Saturday evening (local time). Pope John Paul I — he chose to combine the names of his two immediate predecessors — becomes supreme Pontiff of the world’s 700 million Roman Catholics with no great experience of the Vatican behind him. His career has been spent almost entirely in the provinces.

He was born in the small town of Forno di Canale near Belluno, which nestles under the Dolomites between Venice and the Austrian border, on October 17, 1912. His father, Giovanni, an avowed Socialist, was a labourer who spent several years as a migrant worker in Switzerland before returning to start a family with his wife, Angela. He worked in the glassworks on the island of Murano in the Venetian lagoon. After study in local seminaries, Albino came to Rome

as a student at the Gregorian University. He obtained a degree in theology before being ordained in July, 1935. He first worked in the parishes or his home diocese dedicated to the pastoral work that has dominated his career.

But in 1937 he was appointed professor of dogmatic theology and vice-rector of the Belluno Seminary. Promotion followed. In 1958 he was made Bishop of Vittorio Veneto, and in 1969 Pope Paul moved him to Venice as Archbishop and Patriarch. He was given his cardinal’s red hat five years ago.

“History is history,” he said on becoming a cardinal. “We must look to the future with fresh hopes and new ideas.”

His fellow cardinals regard him as a man of purpose and reflection: the legacy of his days as a theology student and professor. They say he is culturally well prepared to handle the problems of the modern world while never losing the humble, common touch of God’s shepherd. His taste for simplicity was demonstrated when he took over as Archbishop of, Venice.

Warmly received by his flock on arriving in the city, he refused to allow the solemn procession of gaily bedecked gondolas and river boats that traditionally welcome the new Patriarch. During his spell in Venice he was very close to Pope Paul whom he welcomed on a ceremonial visit in 1972. A year earlier he- had been invited personally by Paul to take part in the synod of Italian bishops and he became vice-president of the Italian Episcopal Conference in 1973. Pope Paul made him ai

cardinal, with 29 other Churchmen, in the consistory of March 5, 1973. In the 1974 referendum which gave Italy divorce, Cardinal Luciani saw that the issue was splitting the country into two very hostile camps. While personally deeply opposed to divorce, he dissolved Catholic youth organisations campaigning against divorce in his archdiocese to defuse the issue. A man of Spartan habits, the new Pope says he eats “like a bird." Recently when a friend from his native village visited him in Venice, bringing him a hamper of locallygrown food, the Cardinal would 'only accept two walnuts, saying that would be enough for his supper. His parents are dead, but the new Pope has a brother, Berto, a school-teacher, who is married with 11 children and living in the house where they were born, and a sister, Nina,' who is married to a bricklayer. The new Pope when younger spent a year in hospital with a lung illness, but is now believed to be in good health.

As Bishop and Patriach, Luciani wrote frequent articles for Catholic newspapers of the Venice area trying to enlighten simple Christians about change and turmoil in the church. In one series of articles he later collected in a popular book entitled “Very Illustrious,” he wrote imaginary) letters to famous people I from characters of the past:! from Charles Dickens to; Mark Twain, from St Theresa of Avila to Penelope, from Goethe to Pinocchio, the Italian wooden puppet. The new Pope once told a reporter that had he not become a priest he would have become a journalist.