(LifeSiteNews) — Joining me on this episode of The John Henry Westen Show from Rome is Cardinal Francis Arinze. We discussed this week’s conclave, the need to pray for the new pope to have the courage to teach the Catholic faith, his reflections on participating in the papal conclave, true interreligious dialogue, Christian martyrdom, and more.
This episode was recorded prior to the election of Pope Leo XIV.
I asked Arinze about his experience participating in previous papal conclaves. He could not participate in this most recent one due to age. His Eminence emphasized the privilege of God allowing cardinals to partake in the process of electing a new pontiff.
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“God is the primary cause of anything good, but God has also allowed human beings to be secondary causes. God could have made a table, a bicycle, a 747 aircraft … but He prefers to leave us creatures the intelligence, the capacity, and the material to work on,” the cardinal said. “We call these secondary causes, philosophically speaking, and God is the primary cause, because without God … we would not even exist. So to be associated with the process of finding a new pope is important, and it is taken seriously.”
Arinze dove into some of the considerations that the cardinals take into account when electing a new pontiff, such as assessing the state of the Church and what obstacles need to be overcome.
“[The cardinals must consider] ‘What is our own assessment of the state of the Catholic Church today and tomorrow?’” he said. “‘[What] things we would desire, [what] things would we regard as obstacles, [what] things would we regard as promotional?’ … If you look at it from that point of view, for anybody who loves the Church, it becomes important.“
A bit later in the episode, Arinze discussed his experience working on the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue under Pope John Paul II, and the need for the new pope and the Church as a whole to spread the teachings of Jesus Christ.
“Christ instituted the Church to share the good news of salvation in Jesus Christ with everyone. The Church offers this opportunity,” he said. “The Church is meant to offer it, to bring it to people, but to propose, not to impose, which means we are not expected to force anyone to become a Christian.”
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“But if a person is not a Christian, and the person not only wants to be friendly with me, but is also ready to understand … what we Catholics believe, and if the person wants to share part of it, we do share it, and it becomes our duty,” he added. “That is the height … [of] catechesis, it is a sharing of our faith.”
To hear more from Cardinal Arinze, tune in to this episode of The John-Henry Westen Show.
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