Pope names new leader for Britain’s Catholics

VATICAN CITY — Pope John Paul II has named 67-year-old Bishop Cormac Murphy-O’Connor of Arundel and Brighton to succeed the late Cardinal Basil Hume as Archbishop of Westminster, the Vatican announced Feb. 15.

At a news conference in London, Murphy-O’Connor said he learned he would be appointed by reading about it in the newspapers. Westminster is the major archdiocese in Britain, and its archbishop is considered the top leader of the Roman Catholic Church.

Murphy-O’Connor, one of Britain’s leading ecumenists, was rector of the English College in Rome from 1971 until he was appointed bishop of Arundel and Brighton in 1977.

Murphy-O’Connor’s appointment was warmly welcomed by the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, who last year conferred on him a Lambeth Doctorate of Divinity, making him the first Roman Catholic bishop since the Reformation to be so honored.