New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan, who will become a cardinal this weekend, has said that part of his new job will be to convince the Vatican that his city is not a modern-day version of the Biblical cities Sodom and Gomorrah.

“New York seems to have an innate interest and respect for religion and I’m going to bring that up because I don’t like that caricature that New York is some neo-Sodom and Gomorrah” he told reporters after celebrating Mass on Thursday in Rome’s Santa Maria Maggiore Basilica.

Dolan was referring to the two cities which according to the Old Testament were destroyed by God because their people were sinful and wicked. Dolan, who also holds the powerful post of president of the U.S. Bishops Conference, will be made a cardinal by Pope Benedict on Saturday at a solemn Vatican ceremony known as a consistory. After that, he and 17 other new cardinals under the age of 80 will be eligible to enter a secret conclave to elect the next leader of the world’s some 1.3 billion Roman Catholics after Benedict’s death.

“I’m here as archbishop after three years to let you know that, yup, there are instances of secularism and materialism and paganism in New York as there are everywhere and as there is in the human heart but I have found the New York community to be very religious and innately respectful of religion, interested in religion,” he said.

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