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CNN Live At Daybreak

U.S. Cardinals Return Home After Meeting With Pope John Paul II

Aired April 26, 2002 - 06:32   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: U.S. cardinals have returned home after meeting with Pope John Paul II on the sex abuse scandal looming over the Catholic Church.

CNN's Martin Savidge reports on one cardinal who was once at the top of his game but is now struggling just to stay in the game.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): If you want to know who's in and who's out in Boston, you talk to David Nyhan. For more than 30 years, he wrote about those in power for the "Boston Globe." He has seldom seen a fall from grace like that of Cardinal Bernard Law.

DAVID NYHAN, HARVARD JFK SCHOOL OF GOVERNMENT: And he was quite a close ally of former President Bush and the current President Bush on matters of foreign policy, school funding and most notably opposition to abortion.

ENSOR (on camera): One of or would you say the most powerful Catholic leader in this nation?

NYHAN: Well, I think he was the senior, the most influential with the Vatican, certainly. At least that's the way his supporters portrayed him in Boston.

ENSOR (voice-over): In fact, Nyhan says, there was talk Cardinal Law was destined for even greater influence.

NYHAN: Some people talked of him as the first American pope. Law used to joke about that and say well, the next, the only stop after Boston is heaven. Well, I don't think he feels the same way now.

ENSOR (on camera): So where does Cardinal Law stand today?

NYHAN: He's in low repute in his home archdiocese. Surveys show that a majority of Catholics in Boston would like to see him resign. They no longer have faith in his moral leadership.

ENSOR (voice-over): From what Nyhan hears now, the cardinal's resignation is not a matter of if, but when. NYHAN: The smart money that I talk to, both within the church and senior Catholics, lay people, seem to believe that he won't resign immediately, that he'll wait out a period of months and then he'll be reassigned by the Vatican, possibly to Rome.

ENSOR: But the former newspaper man says there'll be plenty to write about after Cardinal Law, such as who will take over what is arguably the most powerful Catholic post in the nation.

Martin Savidge, CNN, Boston.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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