A senior canon lawyer and member of the Vatican's supreme court has
hinted that Pope Benedict XVI will pardon his former butler.
Cardinal Velasio De Paolis told the Italian newspaper La Repubblica
that there was precedent for the Pope to pardon Paolo Gabriele, who has
been accused of stealing confidential papal documents and leaking them
to the media.
He cited Blessed Pope John Paul II's forgiveness of the
Turkish man who tried to assassinate him in 1981, Mehmet Ali Agca.
Asked whether Gabriele would be jailed or pardoned, he said it only
the Pope could decide.
But he added: "I feel I can say that, with a full
confession of honest remorse and the absolute certainty that the crime
cannot be committed again, popes have always issued, in favour of the
condemned, measures dictated by the mercy that is the essence of the
Church, which is always close to her children, even those found guilty."