Reflections of a stormy petrel

Cardinal Salvatore Pappalardo, Archbishop emeritus of Palermo, has died at 88. To people of my country and generation, this man stands for a time not to be forgotten: the time when, in the middle of terrible shocks and difficulties, Sicily and all Italy began to turn the corner in the struggle against the Mafia - accepting that it was a struggle, accepting that there was nothing inevitable about the Mafia, and accepting that it could be defeated. Cardinal Pappalardo himself was a Sicilian of the Sicilians in everything, beginning with his name - a name simply impossible this side of the Straits. And that was exactly the immensely important point. That a man with his name, his accent, his character - Sicilian to the point of stereotype - should assail the power of crime Sunday after Sunday, in and out of season, and should take powerful, practical steps to defy it, made an enormous impact on both sides of the Straits of Messina. Where previous archbishops had been at best accepting and at worst cooperating with the Mafia - in the name of the fatalistic belief that it could not be uprooted from Sicilian soil - Pappalardo was the first public figure to defy it and denounce it. His omilies and speeches became famous, and the younger generation of politicians and judges that arose in Sicily in the eighties, no longer in collaboration with, but in open revolt against, armed crime, all owned him as an example and master. I have no idea where he stood in the great internal issues of the Church with which I am personally very concerned, but his role in the history of Italy is, as far as I know, wholly positive. In fact, one is tempted to draw a parallel with the death of another famous old man who passed away in a Chilean military hospital at roughly the same time as Cardinal Pappalardo died in his monastic retreat... but why be unkind? God rest his soul and bring Him to everlasting light.