On the eve of his ordination as Archbishop and 10 days before being made Malta’s second Cardinal, Mgr Prospero Grech gave journalists a taste of his humoristic streak, yesterday.
“I always believed in the Pope’s infallibility but now I’m beginning to have my doubts,” he joked at a press conference.
Describing his nomination for cardinal as “a surprise”, Mgr Grech noted that The Times’ description of him as “the reluctant cardinal” yesterday had hit the nail on the head.
“Of course, I am grateful to the Pope for bestowing this honour upon me and upon all of Malta but I hope that once the ceremonies are over the seas will calm down and I’ll be able to return to my peaceful life,” he said.
He did not envision the promotion changing his life significantly aside from the odd official task, quipping that Pope Benedict XVI had given him a “retirement present”.
It was Mgr Grech’s first official press engagement, organised in anticipation of his ordination as Archbishop at St John’s Co-Cathedral, in Valletta this evening.
Church law requires Mgr Grech to be made an Archbishop before his ordination as cardinal at the Vatican on February 18, as part of a select group of 22 new cardinals.
The ceremony will begin at 6 p.m. Mgr Grech will be ordained by Archbishop Paul Cremona, who will be assisted by cardinal-elect Archbishop Giuseppe Versaldi and Bishop Mario Grech.
Malta’s 86-year-old cardinal-elect took the occasion to reminisce briefly about his youth, explaining how he made a definitive decision to join the Holy Orders when, as a 17-year-old during World War II, he would spend three days a week attending lectures and a further three manning an anti-aircraft battery at Fort St Elmo.
“The heavy air raids had finished by that time and there were many quiet moments. War gives one plenty to think about,” Mgr Grech said. His cousin, who was an Augustinian priest, soon introduced him to the provincial of the Order.
The present day provincial of the Augustinian Order in Malta, Fr Emmanuel Borg Bonello, spoke of his joy at the news of Mgr Grech being ordained.
“He is a man convinced and dedicated to his vocation,” Fr Borg Bonello said, noting that honours and titles were “not his world”.
“His world” has been that of a quiet academic, shying away from the limelight as a biblical theologian, first at the Augustinian Theological College in Rabat and eventually at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome, where he was a leading lecturer in hermeneutics.
Spanning over 50 years, his vocational career has seen him cross paths with some of the Vatican’s greatest luminaries, including the present Pope.
“Pope Benedict knows me from his time as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith,” Mgr Grech commented. “From time to time he’d give me the odd piece of homework.”
Mgr Grech is unlikely to be daunted by the prospect of further homework. But as journalists crowded him at the end of the press conference, the patient smile on his face betrayed his hope that any future tasks would be somewhat lower key.