L'Affaire Dani

Paris has been called la ville mere du scandale--the mother city of scandal. Few scandals seemed better spiced for its Gallic taste than the one that has become known as "the Danielou affair."

Its central figure, Jean Cardinal Danielou, was an internationally famous Jesuit theologian, a prince of the Roman Catholic Church, a personal friend of Pope Paul VI, and an honored "immortal" of the French Academy. After he died of an aneurysm one afternoon in May, supposedly on the street, Danielou, 69, was lavishly eulogized by the French episcopacy, the Jesuit Superior General and the Vatican.

Then rumors began appearing that Danielou had died in the apartment of a young blonde married woman named Santoni, who reportedly works in a cabaret. The rumors proved to be true. It also turned out that the French Catholic heirarchy and French Jesuit headquarters had tried to hush up the circumstances surrounding Danielou's death, claiming he had died outside the house of "friends." The satirical anticlerical weekly Le Canard Enchaine exposed the event in a story full of damning innuendoes. Two weeks ago, Le Monde, France's most prestigious newspaper, confirmed that Danielou had indeed died in Mme. Santoni's flat.

But Figaro, La Croix and other defenders of Danielou sharply challenged Canard's suggestion that Danielou had died in flagrante delicto. The French episcopacy denounced the "grave insinuations" concerning the cardinal's death, insisting that "his apostolate extended to the most diverse realms, often to the most disreputable and downtrodden persons both inside and outside the church."

Unusual Circles. Old colleagues agreed that Danielou had long been a clerical bohemian who traveled in unusual circles. Even after he turned theologically conservative a few years before becoming a cardinal in 1969, he remained a political and social progressive, and something of a chaplain to the demimonde. The cardinal was "profoundly compassionate," explained Fellow Jesuit Xavier Tilliette. If he also "ran risks to the point of imprudence," he was only following "the example of the Divine Master, [who] ate and drank as a friend of publicans and sinners."

So far, the woman Danielou visited has remained as mysterious as the circumstances of his death. Her first name is unknown, though Canard calls her Mini. Only the gossipmongering scandal sheet Le Meilleur claimed to have talked with Mme. Santoni, who insisted that the cardinal's visit was entirely platonic. "He was fully dressed," she reportedly told the paper. "[He] collapsed after climbing the four stories to my flat." She seemed unimpressed by all the furor: "Too much fuss is being made about this quite unimportant affair."

Conservative French Catholics, who believe that Danielou has been slandered because of his staunch support of the papacy and priestly celibacy, do not agree. They have demanded that the French bishops and the Interior Ministry uncover the full truth about the cardinal's ill-timed demise.

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