Well, the suggestion of playing an "old" character is kind of cool.
-3 each Str, Dex Con
+2 each Int, Wis Cha.
Role-playing opportunities abound. The frail, old sorceror who is wise as well as intelligent and powerful.
Plus a bonus to skill points (since he's starting at first level, even though old - a "late bloomer", as it were), bonus to Will Saves and better sorceror powers.
Not very strong, nimble or healthy. Seems to fit, more or less, with what The Cardinal wants. And it's in the core rules. You might even talk the DM into giving you some sort of bonus for taking the bigger physical attribute penalties - maybe a hefty starting money bonus representing your life savings, or the goodies your sons have brought back from far and wide, or whatever.
I think you could make a great background story about why you decided to start adventuring at such a late point in your life - I would think you would have been forced into it somehow - possibly a personal, family-type quest that was too importnat and personal to palm off on someone else, and, well, what with the wife long dead and the kids recently wiped out by that weird magical pestilance, you're the only one left. So, reluctantly, off you go to find and punish those who are responsible for the disease - before no-one else is left alive in the village.
Or maybe all your sons were killed while trying to avenge your brother's death - you are the only one left, so you leave your wailing wife (who begs you not to go) and off you go to near-certain death.
What fun, eh?
