Remembering Cardinal Capovilla: secretary to Pope John XXIII

(Vatican Radio) In a tribute to  Cardinal Loris Capovilla, personal secretary to  Saint John XXIII,who passed away on the 26th of May, we bring you a Vatican Radio archive interview in which he explains how this twentieth century Pope rather than arouse in us feelings of nostalgia should encourage us to look towards the future.

Listen to a programme presented and produced by Veronica Scarisbrick:

Asked  what he meant by that comment the cardinal replied that as Pope John once said we are not called to be custodians of a shrine, a reliquary or a museum but rather to be custodians of a garden where is sown the seed of the Word, of the Word Incarnate. In fact he went on to say, we are called to cultivate our garden, to foster the advent of a new Pentecost, a new Easter, a new Spring, not just for our personal joy but for the joy of all of humanity.

Cardinal Capovilla also shares the idea that he viewed the Pope as someone sent by God. " I never felt", he remarked in this interview,  " that I was collaborator or a secretary and still less an advisor, I would have perceived this as a scandalous assumption".

What he did experience, he highlights, was the joy that came with being close to a man who was certainly guided by God and who set the seed for the future of the Church although it was difficult to grasp to the full what was in his soul: "... as I said he set the seed for the future".