Who is Pietro Parolin? What to know about Italian who is a leading candidate to be pope
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Could the Roman Catholic Church return to its long tradition of Italian popes? For the first time since the death of John Paul I in 1978, it could happen.
Pietro Parolin, a cardinal and longtime Vatican diplomat, is among the top contenders to succeed Pope Francis, who died April 21 at the age of 88.
The last Italian pope was John Paul I, who died suddenly just 33 days into his papacy. His successor, Pope John Paul II, was Polish, the first non-Italian pope in 455 years.
With the election of Parolin, the church would return to a long tradition of Italian popes. The 70-year-old is viewed by many as a moderate, less progressive than Francis, but not as conservative as Pope Benedict XVI, Francis' predecessor. Parolin most recently served as Francis' secretary of state, akin to a deputy pope, since 2013.
His extensive experience in international relations includes times as the Vatican's ambassador Venezuela, as well as the driving force behind the Vatican's rapprochement with China and Vietnam.
A long career in diplomacy
The son of a hardware store manager and a teacher, Parolin began his training in diplomacy shortly after being ordained at the age of 25. His early work took him to Nigeria and Mexico before he was called back to Rome. He's fluent in French and Spanish as well as his native Italian and is proficient in English.
Parolin has been the Vatican's Secretary of State for 12 years, the pope's top diplomat and, essentially, the pontiff's second-in-command. That role means he's well known to all of the electors in the papal conclave, and is seen as a quiet pragmatist, and one who occasionally had to temper Francis' sometimes off-the-cuff remarks to the media.
Ordained in 1980, Parolin's career has been spent almost entirely in Vatican diplomacy, in Rome and elsewhere. He's never led a diocese, though, a significant gap in pastoral experience that his supporters say is tempered by his work with the faithful as the pope's representative around the world.
Controversy over China, real estate investments
Some conservatives in the U.S. and Asia criticized a 2018 Vatican agreement with China, giving Chinese authorities some say in who may serve as Catholic bishops in the country; Parolin was the agreement's architect but it had the support of both Francis and Benedict, a conservative.
Parolin was also leading the Vatican's diplomatic arm when it lost aboutt $140 million in a botched investment in a London property, leading to a corruption trial and conviction of one of Parolin's deputies for embezzlement and fraud.
Contributing: Reuters