Cardinal Prospero Grech: “In my speech, I called for the need to preach Jesus Christ, for unity among Christians.” Photo: Chris Sant Fournier

Cardinal Prospero Grech believes Pope Francis has given the Church a “breath of fresh air” by addressing issues that were tarnishing its transparency and credibility.

“Having a more transparent, credible and united Church was everyone’s wish and not just mine. I think the Pope has taken these issues very seriously,” he said yesterday, days after his meditation session that opened the cardinals’ conclave last March was leaked by the Italian media. In his speech, he warned fellow cardinals of a schism in the Church unless something was done.

Soon after his election, Pope Francis became a highly popular figure, especially since he came across as down-to-earth. Despite his brief tenure, observers said there were signs he was a decision-maker.

The task of the Church is the task of the Pope and he is doing a brilliant job

Initial decisions included shaking up the corruption-riddled Vatican Bank and appointing an advisory council to help him reform Church bureaucracy. For his first overseas visit he chose Lampedusa, a major landing point for asylum seekers.

“He took the issues facing the Church very seriously. From the outset, he gave the Church a new breath of life, which was welcomed by everybody,” Cardinal Grech told Times of Malta.

“In my speech, I called for the need to preach Jesus Christ, for unity among Christians, among the Church, for Christians not to fear persecution and leave everything up to God to lead his own Church.

“The task of the Church is the task of the Pope and he is doing a brilliant job,” said the 87-year-old cardinal.

The text of his meditation was also released in the Acts of the Apostolic See, the Vatican’s official journal of record.

Cardinal Grech, who had urged the Church to be more transparent and appealing to its followers, refused to describe his calls as prophecies, given that they were immediately taken on board by the new Pope. He said he believed any chosen Pope would have tackled the issues with immediate urgency.

In his speech, Cardinal Grech told cardinal-electors that “persecution is a constitutive element of the Church, as is the weakness of her members”.

Referring to the paedophilia scandal, the cardinal called for greater “transparency” because the Church can be “obscured or hidden”.

He called for courage in the face of the scandal, and to “trust only in God” rather than relying on political solutions.

“Nowadays, many people do not believe in Christ because He is being hidden behind an institution which lacks transparency.

“If recently we cried over unpleasant events involving clerics or lay people, even within the Vatican, these negative events, as serious as they may be, are nothing but a cold when compared with the bad in the history of the Church,” he said, before the cardinals went on to elect Jorge Mario Bergoglio, a Jesuit, as the new leader of the Catholic Church.