'He was able to touch so many people and so many diverse groups'

Edited excerpts of an interview with Archbishop Sean P. O'Malley of Boston with Boston Globe reporter Michael Paulson. The interview took place yesterday at the Pontifical North American College in Rome.

Q. Tell me about your experience at the funeral.

A. Well, it certainly was a very moving experience, a tribute to a man's life and ministry. Also, I think, sort of an experience of the world as a global village, where our lives are so intertwined. He was able to touch so many people and so many diverse groups. Having people from all over the world come to Rome to be a part of this, besides the celebrations and the mourning and the observances that took place in virtually all parts of the world, it was certainly something that was very moving.

I was, of course, taken with the crowd and their enthusiasm for the holy father and the fact that they seemed to be calling for his canonization. It's almost like the early church, where, before we had this very cumbersome process of canonization, it was by popular acclamation, and it almost seems as though that's what was happening with his life.

Q. There's been so much focus in Boston on challenges and problems, but it seems we've seen this incredible response over the past week. How do you see that?

A. I think with a lot of people, there is a hunger for God, there's a hunger for transcendence, for spirituality, and this man represented that. Certainly . . . other people [were] looking for a world leader who spoke with a consistency and out of his own personal ethos and not for any political advantage or following a party line, but rather was someone who was living the Gospel and trying to carry that same message to people throughout the world and stressing the dignity of human life and human beings and our responsibility for one another. So I think that message translated, even for those who are not Catholics. There was this feeling of solidarity, of unity, that he generated and that the world needs.

Q. Why did you want to be there yourself? I know not all of the American bishops came.

A. Well, I just felt as though I wanted to be a part of this, I guess, like so many people who threw all their other responsibilities to the wind and said, ''I'm going to Rome." But I also felt that Boston should be represented here. And this is a pope who I've had many interactions with since he became pope. In 1979, when he made his very first trip as pope, it was to Puebla [Mexico] for the Puebla conference, and I was there, and ever since then our paths have crossed many, many times in many different parts of the world. And he was the one who made me bishop and archbishop. And so I feel a special responsibility to his ministry; he made me a part of it.

Q. Puebla was the first time you met him?

A. Yes. It was his very first trip as pope. It was just an incredible outpouring. The church had been so persecuted in Mexico for a couple generations that having the pope come there was almost unbelievable. The Mexican people are very Catholic, but the government is very anticlerical, and it was really incredible. The people lined the highway from Mexico City to Puebla, 60 miles. They came the day before and slept on the highway so that they would be there for the pope to pass. And when he got to Puebla, he got out of the car, walked across the soccer field, and offered a Mass, after being all day in the sun. Of course, in those days he was young and very robust. And then afterwards, he met with us. Everywhere he went in Mexico, millions of people came together to meet him. At that point he was sort of an unknown quantity, but he was the first pope to ever come to Mexico, and he spoke Spanish rather well.

Q. Why were you there?

A. At the time, I was in Washington. I was a priest working with immigrants, and the bishops' conference asked me to go along so that they would have someone who knew Latin America and spoke Spanish, and to deal with the American press.

Q. How many times did you meet John Paul II?

A. On five or six ad limina visits, and besides that I was with him in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Cuba, Paris, Mexico, Washington.

Q. He chose you for such difficult assignments. Did he ever explain that to you?

A. No. There was never any explanation. When I went into religious life, it was to serve the church, to serve God's people, and to be available. And we believe that, in obedience, we answer God's call, to do what he wants us to do. And that call comes through our superiors. These are not positions I aspired to or thought would come about in my life, but when they did come about, I thought this must be God's will for me somehow. In the mystery of our faith, you accept it and try and do your best.

Q. You can't call back and say maybe they have the wrong guy?

A. Well, the first time they told me, I said: ''There's a lot of Father O'Malleys out there. Are you sure you've got the right one?" And they said, ''Yes, we're sure." At that point, I was really blindsided. I was very young, I was a religious [Capuchin friar]. I had never studied in Rome. I wasn't a canon lawyer. I wasn't involved in the chancery. I was a street priest working with immigrants, and all of sudden being told, ''You're going to be a bishop." It was quite a shock. That's when I said, ''Are you sure you have the right person?"

Q. Were there particularly memorable interactions that you had with John Paul II?

A. Certainly one of the most moving for me was being in El Salvador with him, when he went to pray at the tomb of [slain archbishop] Oscar Romero, who I knew very well. We had a long relationship, and his death was quite a blow. And so when he [the pope] visited El Salvador, I was the only bishop invited from outside the country to accompany him and to be there and to pray with him at the tomb of this man who meant so much to me and who, I think, was truly a martyr for human rights. That was certainly a very moving moment.

Q. What were his reflections on the church in the United States?

A. He was very focused, in many ways, on the church in the United States. He was very interested in perfecting his English. And I think he was fascinated by the vitality of the church in the States. He certainly was very aware of the dangers of materialism, but I think he admired the religious sense of Americans, that is stronger than in Western Europe. People are much more likely to practice a religion and to see religion as an important force in their lives.

Q. Sometimes I hear echoes of his critique of US materialism and individualism in your homilies.

A. I think we coincide on that. I think it's a concern. I see where this is leading us, and I think it's very dangerous.

Q. What is the lasting impact of this papacy?

A. He certainly was a very modern man, philosophically and theologically, and moved us beyond the classic theology and philosophy of the church. He also had a much more global vision than the church had before. God bless the Italians -- they do have a very international flair about them -- but they're still Europeans and still very much tied to the traditions of the Holy See that are very much intertwined with the history of Italy. And this man, coming from another part of the world, and also having this Eastern look -- being a Slav, and being close to Russia, and even his experience of being raised in a village where a fifth of the population was Jewish -- he just had an entirely different look at reality than any other popes had had.

Q. What about the impact of this last week, with this extraordinary attention to the church?

A. I think it helps people to appreciate our catholicity. Sometimes Catholics, particularly in the United States, can be very congregationalist in their outlook, and then suddenly you see this church that is so multifaceted, international, and where we share the same sacraments, the same faith, the same leader, and the same sense of loss for his death. That has been something good for the church.

Q. Can you say anything about the controversy over Cardinal [Bernard F.] Law's role here?

I'd rather not. There's nothing I can say.

Q. Do you have any advice for the cardinals as they meet to choose the next pope?

A. Get the best man. I don't see that age is a factor. I think that the more that the church can approach this as a spiritual action, and the more we allow the Holy Spirit to be a part of it -- in the Acts of the Apostles, they write how the first bishop was chosen to replace Judas, and it was in a very prayerful atmosphere. The church needs to always choose their bishops in that way, and to step back from our ethnic prejudices or ideological conflicts, and try and let the spirit guide us to find the person that God wants for the job.