Today would have been the 80th birthday of one of the great conservative cardinals of the era of John Paul II, Alfonso Cardinal López Trujillo (Nov. 8, 1935 -- April 19, 2008). He was appointed President of the Pontifical Council for the Family (PCF) exactly 25 years ago (November 8, 1990, his 55th birthday); he remained at this post until his death from cancer in 2008, at the age of 72. It can be argued that it was López Trujillo, even more than Ratzinger, who provided much of the steel behind John Paul II's war on the "culture of death" -- no surprise given the unusual militancy he showed against the Catholic Left and Liberation Theology when he was Secretary General of CELAM from 1972 to 1979 and Archbishop of Medellin from 1979 to 1990. (He was made Cardinal in 1983 at the age of 47.) The international media (particularly the BBC) and EU famously vilified him in 2004 over his remarks against condoms.
His two successors as head of the PCF, Cardinal Ennio Antonelli (2008 - 2012) and Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia (since 2012), have been virtually mute in comparison. In addition, Paglia has expressed or openly condoned positions on homosexuality and the divorced-and-remarried that would have absolutely horrified López Trujillo.
