At Ceremony, Mahony Wears Symbols of Past : Catholicism: A bishop’s ring and a pectoral cross belonged to his two predecessors in the Los Angeles archdicese.

When Archbishop Roger M. Mahony was elevated to cardinal in Vatican ceremonies Friday, he wore symbols of the office worn by his two predecessors in Los Angeles.

He wore a bishop’s ring that belonged to the Los Angeles Catholic Archdiocese’s first cardinal, James Francis McIntyre. Created a cardinal in 1953, McIntyre was given the ring by Pope Pius XII.

The pectoral cross worn by Mahony belonged to Cardinal Timothy Manning when Pope Paul VI elevated him to the College of Cardinals in 1973. An anonymous laywoman gave Manning the cross in 1958. Mahony said Manning felt the cross represented the millions of dedicated Catholics in what has become the nation’s most populous archdiocese.

Mahony said he chose to wear the items to link his own elevation to the two deceased predecessors. Both prelates, who he said had different qualities and ways of viewing the Roman Catholic Church, “had a deep impact upon my own life as seminarian, priest and bishop.”

McIntyre was a financially astute prelate who learned church administration in the New York archdiocese. He kept the archdiocese’s expansion in churches and schools apace with suburban growth as Los Angeles archbishop from 1948 to 1970. His socially conservative stances, however, sparked public battles with reform-minded nuns, liberal priests and Latino activists in the late 1960s.

Manning succeeded McIntyre in January, 1970, and introduced a low-key period of reconciliation, steady growth and accommodation to the increasing numbers of Latino and immigrant Catholics. He retired in mid-1985 and was replaced by Mahony.

Contrary what many believe, Mahony is not the third “Irish” cardinal to the Los Angeles archdiocese.

Although McIntyre was of Irish descent and Manning was born in Cork County, Ireland, Mahony has more German heritage than anything else. His mother, whose maiden name is Baron, is from a family completely German. “Her parents spoke German quite fluently,” said Mahony, who was born in North Hollywood. His father’s side has a mixture of German, Italian and Irish ancestry, “so I guess you could say I am mostly German.”