Cardinal Arinze captivates audience

Cardinal Francis Arinze, one of the most powerful men at the Vatican, is known for an acerbic wit in defense of church teachings.

He did not disappoint 112 people who had paid $250 to hear him at a benefit dinner in the LeMont restaurant Friday night, where miniature papal flags on toothpicks decorated their creme brulee. But Arinze was as critical of conservative Catholic foibles as of liberal ones, and his descriptions of his own work were charmingly self-effacing.

Arinze spoke for an hour, drawing rave reviews.

"He made the complicated issues of faith very clear and very joyful," said the Rev. Joe Codori, parochial vicar at St. Theresa of Avila in Perrysville.

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