Papal hopeful shows he can work the crowd ahead of vote

IT had all the hallmarks of a political campaign: the candidate was shaking hands in the adoring crowd, a television crew and security detail covering his every move.

Except that this is no regular election, and the people don’t vote.

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Archbishop of Genoa and a papal contender, was working the crowd outside St Peter’s Basilica this morning, greeting some of the tens of thousands of pilgrims who had lined up to pay their final respects to Pope John Paul.

“It’s an extraordinary day,” he said, his camera crew taping every word. “Full of memories of our Pope. The Pope did so much for the world.”

Bertone, a former high-ranking Vatican official who took up his Genoa post in 2002, shook hands, embraced a backpacker and gave words of encouragement to the faithful as they waited for hours to file past the body of the late Pontiff.

He said the crowds were there “to give back to the Pope all the love the Pope gave to the world”.

Overt campaigning for the job of pope is frowned upon, and Bertone clearly wasn’t trying to hustle votes since the College of Cardinals will choose the new pope, not the public.

But Bertone, 70, is considered “papabile”, or having the qualities of a pope - and so his actions are being watched these days. He heads an important diocese, Genoa, and certainly is known by Italians since he occasionally offers up radio commentary of his favourite football team, Juventus.

He also made international headlines a few weeks ago when he organised a seminar to call for a boycott of Dan Brown’s best-selling book The Da Vinci Code, which he said espouses heresy and deceives the world by distorting the origins of Christianity.

Bertone served as number two to the powerful Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger in the Vatican’s orthodoxy watchdog, the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, before heading to Genoa.

Ratzinger, 77, is the dean of the College of Cardinals and will have a prominent role in conclave proceedings. A German, Ratzinger is often mentioned as a possible “transitional” pope.