Quevedo to quit in March

MANILA, Philippines—Cardinal Orlando Quevedo on Saturday announced he would resign as archbishop of Cotabato when he reaches the mandatory retirement age of 75 on March 11.

Cardinal Orlando Quevedo. AP FILE PHOTO

“On March 11, I will be 75. I will be writing my letter of resignation to the Holy Father as Archbishop of Cotabato,” he said in a television interview Friday.

The Code of Canon Law requires that Catholic bishops tender their resignation on their 75th birth anniversary.

In the same TV interview, Quevedo, who was elevated to the cardinalship by Pope Francis on Feb. 22, admitted feeling insecure and inadequate about his new appointment.

“I feel very insecure. I have always been very self-confident but this one fills me with trepidation, with a sense of great inadequacy. Not only because I’m being raised with a new title and new authority, but as an advisor to the Pope. But how can one advice the Pope with others who are much older and much more experienced?” he said.

“Not only as an advisor of the Pope, but also to act as a cardinal in Mindanao and be some kind of unofficial spokesman for the bishops of Mindanao, for the Church in Mindanao. From now on if I speak I cannot say I speak for my own name … I have to know the issues, I have to know the opinions of my fellow brother bishops about certain burning issues about peace, political, social so it fills me with a sense of inadequacy,” he said. Tina G. Santos

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