Marathon runner among 21 new cardinals

(ANSA) - ROME, OCT 6 - A marathon running Algerian bishop is among the 21 new cardinals Pope Francis will create on December 8.
    Jean-Paul Vesco, a 62-year-old Dominican and archbishop of Algiers, competes for Athletica Vaticana.
    The bishop has a personal best of 2 hours 52'00" on the 42.195 km obtained in 1989 at the New York marathon, an experience that has remained etched in his memory, as has the experience of running on the streets of Rome.
    "He who runs prays twice," says the cardinal-elect.
    "As a boy I had a plan to be an athlete. As an adult, then, I took other paths but running burst into my life again and in New York I achieved my personal best".
    "The motivation in running these great distances - he explains - is not the competition with others but listening to yourself.
    "Running is freedom, because it transforms any path, even urban, into wide spaces.
    "Just putting on running shoes is enough for the interior and exterior universe to overcome its limits. "Saint Augustine says that singing is praying twice. I don't know what he would have said if he had been a runner, but for me running is a place of meditation and special interior availability". (ANSA).