The man who will represent Africa when the guidelines for the Year of Mercy are unveiled today tells Hannah Roberts about the far-reaching impact of its theme When Cardinal Peter Turkson, one of the bookmakers’ favourites among the papabili at the last conclave, was asked how he felt about the possibility of taking on the Church’s top job, he mused that whoever became pope would have to make their own mark, “finding his own shoes to wear”. Two years later, meeting the president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace at his modest offices in the Palazzo San Calisto in Rome, it comes to mind that, had he been elected as the first African pope for 1,500 years, his “mark” might not be so different from the Pope we have.Like Francis, Turkson is imb