Late Cardinal Calls Catholic Church '200 Years Out of Date'

The former Archbishop of Milan, a one-time candidate for pope who died Friday, said in his last interview that the Catholic Church is “200 years out of date.”

Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini died Friday in Milan at 85 after suffering from Parkinson's disease.

His last interview was published Saturday in Italy's Corriere della Sera newspaper, in which he had a regular column.

The cardinal noted that churches are “big and empty” while the church bureaucracy grows and the rituals become “pompous.” He accuses the church of failing to keep up with the times.

Cardinal Martini says the recent child abuse scandal obliges the church to transform itself by admitting mistakes and beginning a radical change, starting with the pope and bishops.

Cardinal Martini was regarded as one of the most progressive voices in the church. He held relatively liberal views on such issues as contraception, celibacy for priests, and abortion.

Vatican liberals pushed the cardinal as a candidate to succeed Pope John Paul in 2005 before the more conservative wing prevailed with Pope Benedict.

Belarus Cardinal Kazimierz Swiatek Dies at 96

Thursday, 21 July 2011

The former leader of the Catholic Church in Belarus, Cardinal Kazimierz Swiatek, has died in a Pinsk hospital at the age of 96.

In a statement the Catholic Church of Belarus said he died early Thursday. The cause of death was not specified.

After entering the priesthood in 1939, Swiatek was sentenced to death for spying by Soviet authorities. But he escaped when Nazi Germany's forces occupied the city of Brest.

When the Soviet army took control of Belarus in 1944, Swiatek was re-arrested and sentenced to 10 years of hard labor in the Gulag prison system. He served more than nine years before being released and returning to the church.

Swiatek became archbishop of the Minsk diocese in 1991, and was named a cardinal in 1994. He headed the church in Belarus until 2006.

Photo: Cardinal Kazimier Sviontak, 2009. (Photographer: Serge Serebro, Vitebsk Popular News)