Pope Francis has revealed that he urged his fellow cardinals to back Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger to become Pope Benedict XVI in 2005. He said he had felt that the time was not yet right for a Latin American pope.
The revelation comes in a new interview book by an Argentinian journalist, Latinoamérica: Conversaciones con Hernán Reyes Alcaide. Reyes is the Rome correspondent of the Argentine news agency Telam.
The interview marked the tenth anniversary of a highly significant general conference of the Latin-American bishops in Aparecida, Brazil in May 2007, two years after Cardinal Ratzinger’s accession as Pope Benedict XVI.
