In the next few months, if not weeks, the Vatican will announce that Pope John Paul II has appointed new cardinals.  At least, this is my prediction of an event that has become routine every few years.  It does not take a soothsayer to foresee this happening soon.

When it does happen, Sean O’Malley, the new archbishop of Boston, will almost surely be one of those chosen.  Because he holds this position in the third or fourth largest archdiocese in the United States with more than two million Catholics, he will be included among those favored by the pope for this honor. The last four of his predecessors –  Archbishops O’Connell, Cushing, Medeiros, and Law – were all selected for the red hat and installed with much hoopla surrounding the event.

I would like to suggest that Archbishop O’Malley turn down the appointment as cardinal.

To most right-thinking people this suggestion will undoubtedly sound outrageous. They will quickly point to the advantages of Boston’s archbishop accepting the position and they may even judge it an affront to the pope if he were to refuse it.

Among the advantages, the most important is the role of cardinal as papal elector. Since the year 1059, cardinals have had the responsibility of voting for the next pope when the seat has fallen vacant. After they have determined their choice by at least a two- thirds majority, then the ballots are burned, white smoke seeps out into the air, and people assembled in St. Peter’s square see that someone has been elected.

Cardinals also have special access to the pope and can advise him on issues of importance to the church. They have leverage with other church leaders also, bringing more prestige to bear than do other bishops.

However, the cardinalate remains largely honorary and does not confer on the holder of this office any spiritual advantages.  As a matter of fact, it carries with it, in my opinion, certain disadvantages from the vantage point of spirituality and this is my chief reason for suggesting that Sean O’Malley content himself with being archbishop.

Not only does the Bible offer no basis for the office of cardinal, but the words of Jesus in the Gospels conflict with the pomp and circumstance that so often attend the role. In many ways, he emphasized to his disciples the importance of simplicity and personal humility, along with the avoidance of external show.

In St. Matthew’s Gospel, for instance, Jesus contrasts the style the apostles are to follow by contrast with that of secular rulers. “You know,” he says, “that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant.”

In other texts Jesus disapproves of his followers seeking the place of honor at banquets and he tells them to avoid external show of piety in favor of the interior spirit of religion. The lifestyle of American cardinals, who dress in brilliant red and are deferred to at every step, seems hardly compatible with the words of Jesus. Also the disproportionate influence they have among the American bishops as a group is reported to damage the collegial spirit of those bishops.

Archbishop O’Malley has already announced his intention to live in the rectory of his cathedral rather than in the grandiose building where his four predecessors lived. Though he has tried to downplay the importance of this decision, it has spoken to people interested in seeing Boston’s new spiritual leader show forth Gospel values of simplicity and humility.

The decision to turn down the cardinalate would indicate even more clearly the archbishop’s commitment to these same values. It would be a way to tell people concerned about the ailing church of Boston and the Catholic Church across the country that he will be different from other leaders.

It would be a way of disassociating himself from conventional power and influence. In accordance with the tradition of his patron, St. Francis of Assisi, this gesture would ally the archbishop with that saint’s radical renouncing of worldly advantage.

Sober heads will tell you this will never happen. However, for spiritual reasons I suggest that renunciation of the cardinalate could strike a blow for freedom and signal new beginnings for Catholics in Boston and throughout the country.

Richard Griffin