Cardinal: Pope's reflections should help Americans during elections

Published: 2008-04-09

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI will not bring political directives during his U.S. trip, but his reflections should help Americans make a "deeper moral judgment" during this year's election campaign, a leading U.S. cardinal said. Cardinal J. Francis Stafford, one of two U.S. cardinals who will accompany the pope from Rome to the United States in mid-April, said he thinks Americans will listen closely to what the pope has to say. "The pope is coming at a particularly sensitive time, with the presidential election scheduled for November," Cardinal Stafford told Catholic News Service in an interview April 8 in his Vatican office. The cardinal said he does not expect the pope to address partisan political issues, but to "heighten people's awareness" about what is right and what is wrong. "That is what a religious leader is about, to remind people that there is virtue. And how we, as an American people, can create a higher level of virtue in this country through the choices we make in November," he said. Cardinal Stafford is the head of the Vatican office that deals with penitential issues.

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