When the Archbishop of Bologna, Matteo Zuppi, received his cardinal’s red hat on Oct. 5, 2019, his day ended with a Mass celebrated in the square of the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere, a neighborhood in central Rome where he found his direction as a teenager and later served as a priest.
“My life, or rather life itself, is always made up of so many pieces that have shaped us and are part of me,” Cardinal Zuppi, now 69, said during his homily that evening. “Today I can see, and I believe we all see it, the joy of being together as a piece of our common life, exactly the opposite of individualism.”
Many of those gathered to wish him well during that Mass knew him from his days as a teenage volunteer for the Community of Sant’Egidio, a Catholic charity known for working with the poor, for interreligious dialogue and for mediating international conflicts.
After he became a priest, he went on to become a vicar at the basilica and for years, he was a spiritual leader of the Community of Sant’Egidio, which prays at Santa Maria in Trastevere.
Now he is among the cardinals frequently mentioned by Vatican watchers as a contender to be pope. As a priest and a bishop he embraced a pastoral vision of ministry similar to Francis’, and he would be expected to continue his approach if elected.
For many Romans, Cardinal Zuppi is known as “Don Matteo” — the name of a crime-solving priest on Italian TV.