In an interview for the campus newspaper of the Catholic University of Louvain, Archbishop André-Joseph Léonard, who is the university’s Grand Chancellor, speaks about the future, which includes what may well be his last year as Archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels.
Archbishop Léonard will reach his 75th birthday on 6 May 2015, little over a year from now.
“The rule is that you tender your resignation to the Pope around your 75th birthday. It is up to him to decide what happens then. Sometimes, depending on the situation and your health, he will ask you to stay on a bit longer. The archbishop of Cologne, Cardinal Meisner, is 80! In other situations you retire. I will do what will be asked, and enthusiastically so. It is a wonderful duty. I meet so many people, from soldiers to prisoners, from professors to young families. That gives an unimaginable wealth to life. If I am allowed to continue doing that a while longer, I would be very grateful. When I retire, I will also enjoy that very much. Didn’t I say a priest had to be flexible?”
In a television interview, the archbishop said a bit more about his retirement plans.
“Once retired I would like to live near a shrine in Belgium or France, to hear confessions or give conferences. I do intend to leave the dioceses of Mechelen-Brussels and Namur, since I have already been active there for so many years.”
André-Joseph Léonard was a priest of the Diocese of Namur from his ordination in 1964 to 1991, when he was appointed as that diocese’s bishop. In 2010, he was appointed as archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels.
The rest of the interview, which also touches upon the Catholic identity of the Catholic University of Louvain, science and faith, the archbishop’s work as Grand Chancellor, priesthood in past and present, the future of evangelisation, Pope Francis and Archbishop Léonard not being made a cardinal, can be read in my translation here.
Photo credit: KU Leuven – Rob Stevens
In Caelo et in Terra 
My way is the highway – Godsee more
Archbishop Leonard does not need any retirement, he did protect priests who were involved children sex abuse since many years. The prove is that he was condemn recently by a justice court in Liege Belgium. When is the cover-up going to stop? At the end of second world war, Nazis did denied what they did, into the 21st Century, the catholic church is denying in most cases what priests and Bishops are doing.
A 70 years old victim of priests abuse and know that this will not be posted.