Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, the retired Archbishop of
Westminster, has confirmed that Pope Benedict XVI told him that he
should not accept a seat in the House of Lords.
In 2009, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown extended an invitation to
Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor to become the first Catholic prelate to serve
in the House of Lords in almost 500 years.
The cardinal, who was
stepping down from his pastoral duties, told the Daily Telegraph that he was inclined to accept the post, but decided to decline the honor on the Pope’s advice.
“I consulted with the Pope and his chief adviser, and they were against
it,” the British prelate said. (Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor did not
identify the Pope’s “chief adviser.”)
He said that the Pope was
concerned about the precedent that could be established by a prelate
assuming a role in government. In recent years the Vatican has
consistently opposed the involvement of Catholic clerics in secular
political affairs.
A leading Vatican journalist, Paolo Rodari, had reported in 2009 that
Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor was prepared to accept the seat in the House of
Lords until Pope Benedict intervened.
Until now, the cardinal himself
had not previously addressed that report directly.
Earlier this month he
had said that he was happy he did not accept the seat, because “I would
be involved in matters that were beyond my brief and might have caused
me some hassle and difficulty.”