By Greg Wilson

Cardinal Timothy Dolan is quick with a quip and, more often than not, he is the target of his own sense of humor — a trait that will continue to serve him well if he is to become the first American pope.

While archbishop of Milwaukee a decade ago, Dolan once wore the Green Bay Packers‘ trademark “cheesehead” hat during a homily. Last September, he shared a stage at Fordham University with Comedy Central’s Stephen Colbert for a moderated discussion of humor and faith and more than held his own in generating laughs. And when named a cardinal last year, Dolan joked to a reporter at New York‘s fabled St. Patrick’s Cathedral that he’d pondered holding the title as a little boy growing up in Missouri.

“When I was 6 years old, I wanted to be Stan Musial!” Dolan replied, referring to the late baseball Hall of Famer.

In a more serious moment, Dolan, who grew up the eldest of five and the son of a McDonnell Douglas engineer and a homemaker, acknowledged that as a boy he would pretend to celebrate Mass.

“I can never remember a time I didn’t want to be a priest,” he said.

The self-deprecation of the New York archbishop has been known to soften a sharp intellect, staunch conservatism and formidable fundraising skills, traits that would appear to have him on the short list to succeed Pope Benedict XVI, who retired on Feb. 28. As head of the second-biggest U.S. archdiocese with 2.5 million Catholics, Dolan also has used his wit to deliver a message to critics. When some questioned his invitation to President Obama to attend the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner over the president’s views on gay marriage and abortion last October, Dolan took to his blog to reply.

“If I only sat down with people who agreed with me, and I with them, or with those who were saints, I’d be taking all my meals alone,” wrote Dolan, 63, who had earlier strongly condemned Obama‘s signature health care law, which he believes violated rights of employers by forcing them to provide health insurance that covered abortion and birth control.

Dolan is not immune to the stain of sex abuse scandals that plagued the church in past decades. The Milwaukee diocese he led from 2002 to 2009 was one of eight to file for bankruptcy since 2002 amid a flood of civil claims. Dolan publicized the names of priests accused of molesting children and also authorized $20,000 payments to predator priests to get them out of the church. Dolan called claims that the disbursements were payoffs “false, preposterous, and unjust.” Supporters say the moves showed a willingness to confront the problem head-on, in contrast to how the church had long handled the scandal.

The Rev. Donald Hying, auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, said Dolan left a lasting impression during his time in Wisconsin.

“He never really stopped being a parish priest,” Hying recalled. “What struck me the most about him was his radical availability to …read more
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