Cafardi Considered for Ambassador to Vatican

By Wes Crosby
Duquesne Duke
January 31, 2013

http://www.theduquesneduke.com/cafardi-considered-for-ambassador-to-vatican-1.2979232#.UQrLlmd5e4c

Law professor Nicholas Cafardi has been mentioned as a potential candidate for ambassador to the Vatican. Cafardi was also considered in 2009, but was passed over.

Duquesne law professor and Dean Emeritus of the School of Law Nicholas Cafardi was mentioned as one of the possible candidates President Barack Obama is considering for ambassador to the Vatican.

Cafardi, a Duquesne graduate who has taught at the University for 20 years, said he is honored to be considered, but realizes there is a possibility he might not be chosen.

“It’s obviously a great honor, but after being named once and not getting the nod, it makes you understand that being mentioned is not the same as being an official candidate,” Cafardi said.

Others who have been mentioned include Ken Hackett, the former president of Catholic Relief Services, U.S. Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.) and Stephen Schneck, a professor at the Catholic University of America.

Obama named theologian Miguel Diaz, who left the position to teach at the University of Dayton, ambassador in 2009.

Cafardi, who speaks Italian and earned two canon law degrees in Rome, is the former general Counsel for the Diocese of Pittsburgh. In the 1990s, he also worked with then-Bishop Donald Wuerl of Washington, D.C., to institute national policies which would remove child predators from the ministry.

Ken Gormley, dean of the School of Law, said he expects Cafardi to be “a much more serious candidate” than he was four years ago.

“He has now been intimately involved in the president’s last presidential campaign and he has a long history and connection to the Vatican,” Gormley said.

He received criticism from right-wing Catholics after serving as a Catholics for Obama co-chair, speaking in favor of the president in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Colorado. Some have said that his support for the president is indicative of support for a pro-choice stance, but Cafardi said that the two views do not intertwine.

“We have to be careful not to reduce our faith to just one thing,” Cafardi said. “Catholic teaching is not all about abortion and I don’t think that supporting the president takes away from anything that I believe on that topic.”

Cafardi described himself as a “devout Catholic” and said he believes in everything the Church teaches.

He also said that if he were to be named to the position, Duquesne, as a Catholic university, would be impacted “favorably,” to which Gormley agreed.

“For any university to have someone named to that high of a position would be a great honor,” Gormley said. “With respect to the law school specifically, it would elevate our profile nationally and internationally [among potential students].”

Gormley also said Cafardi’s potential position could have concrete effects on the Law School’s curriculum and could provide “richer collegiate experiences” for the school’s students.

“We could reinstitute our summer program there and that would mean that our students could visit the ambassador’s quarters there,” Gormley said. “That is just a remarkable experience to have as a college student and the Vatican is a very special place, especially for us.”