Advisory: Cardinal Arinze gave 1999 commencement address
Cardinal Francis Arinze, often mentioned in news reports as a possible successor to Pope John Paul II, delivered the May 17, 1999 commencement address at Wake Forest University.
Arinze spoke at Wake Forest when his nephew, Niki Arinze, was a Wake Forest student and member of the men’s basketball team. Wake Forest President Thomas K. Hearn Jr. extended the invitation to speak at Wake Forest during a personal audience with Arinze in Rome.
“Many problems and challenges do not respect religious frontiers,” Arinze said at Wake Forest’s commencement. “There is no Catholic hurricane or Baptist drought. There is no Jewish inflation or Muslim unemployment. There is no Buddhist drug addiction or Hindu AIDS.”
