The Senegalese cardinal, who took part in the Second Vatican Council and was a great promoter of the inculturation of the faith in Africa, died Tuesday in a geriatric hospital in Aix-en-Provence, France. He was 83.
«I want to render homage to this noble son of the Senegalese nation, who gave himself generously to his brothers serving Christ and his Church,» and becoming «an enlightened voice of Africa,» the Holy Father said in a telegram sent to the cardinal’s successor in Dakar, Archbishop Théodore-Adrien Sarr.
Pope John XXIII named Hyacinthe Thiandoum archbishop of Dakar in 1962, substituting Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre.
The Senegalese became a mediator during the split between the Holy See and the founder of the Society of St. Pius X, according to Vatican Radio. Paul VI made the African a cardinal in 1976.
With the death, the College of Cardinals has now 190 cardinals, including 125 electors who could vote in a conclave for a pope.
