After a beautiful funeral which put the catholicity of the Church on full display with our many languages and diverse liturgical expressions, Pope Francis has been safely and lovingly laid to rest in the Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome. The church had always been dear to him—he even visited it the day he was announced as Supreme Pontiff. I find it wonderful that his final resting place, near the icon of Salus Romani Populi (“[Mary], Health of the Roman People”), is across from the basilica’s Sistine Chapel—the “Chapel of the Nativity” where St. Ignatius of Loyola celebrated his first Mass in 1538.
There is something poetic about that: Pope Francis—our first Jesuit pope–being buried where he began his papacy across from where St.Ignatius began his priesthood.
We are currently in the midst of the Novemdiales—the nine-day period of mourning and prayer where Mass will be offered for the repose of the soul of the Holy Father. Shortly after that—on May 7th—the “Cardinal Electors” of the Church will convene in conclave to elect the 266th successor to St. Peter. These men, chosen from among the larger College of Cardinals, are all under 80 years of age and are bishops of important/influential (arch)dioceses, heads of Curial offices, and/or influential theologians who have advanced our understanding of the Faith. They were all “given the red hat” to honor them for their service to the Church and in anticipation of this moment when they are being asked to select the leader of 1.4 billion Catholics who will be, for many, the spiritual and moral voice for the world.
Theirs is a weighty responsibility…and they know it.
In this “interregnum” period, they have and will meet to discuss the needs of the Church and the world and begin to discern who might have the gifts to best respond to the needs they have seen as most pressing. When the conclave begins, each elector will be asked to vote for the one he thinks is that person. Unlike the ecclesial intrigue, that characterizes films like “Conclave,” the real convocation is a time of prayerful discernment.
In speaking of a “papal election,” we, and many of our media analysts, are tempted to view the proceedings in Rome through the lens of the political maneuverings and alliances that accompany things like presidential elections. But despite there being admittedly fallible people assembled, that’s not what goes on in the Sistine Chapel. Rather, the conclave is profoundly religious: beginning with Mass and ending with the new pope giving a blessing “Urbi et Orbi” (“to the ‘City’ [Rome] and the world”). It is not meant to be an occasion where human beings rely solely on their intellect and personal prudence to make a decision, but rather it is meant to foster a prayerful discernment of God’s will for His people and humble submission to it. Noted Cardinal Sean O’Malley as he reflected on his time during the conclave that elected Pope Francis:
My experience of being in at least one conclave was not that it was some sort of scene of political backroom plotting of how to get your candidate elected…It was an experience of a very intense retreat where there was much prayer and silence and listening to conferences on spiritual themes.
Indeed, as each elector casts his vote before the fresco of the Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel, he says:
I call as my witness, Christ the Lord who will be my judge, that my vote is given to the one who, before God, I think should be elected.
But who will be our next pope? Irish bookmaker PaddyPower has been giving odds (Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin coming in [at this writing] a favorite at 2:1; Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle is next “most likely” at 10:3; the Ghanaian, Peter Turkson, at 5:1; and so on). More names have come up on the myriad YouTube submissions that cross my screen, as have others as talking heads have been hired to fill networks’ 24-hour news cycles with insights that will keep viewers—and marketing revenues—coming.
Our new pope may well be one of those men, but I think we do well to remember the Roman dictum “He who goes into the conclave a pope comes out a cardinal.”
Recent history has shown this to be true: no one would have anticipated the election of a Pole in 1978. I can still remember reporters scrambling to find notes when Archbishop Jorge Mario Bergoglio was announced as Pope Francis: they simply could not conceive that the Argentinian Jesuit had a chance. Perhaps most surprising of all was the election of Angelo Roncalli as Pope John XXIII.
Pope John, at the age of 76, was—most experts concurred—elected as a transitional or “caretaker” pope. His role was to hold down the fort until another, at the time too young, candidate could be elected. John convened the Second Vatican Council, calling for an aggiornamento (an “updating”) of the Church so that she might better bring the Gospel to the world.
So much for holding down the fort.
The point is this: in those, and other cases, the men who emerged as pope from their conclaves weren’t the men people expected (or maybe even wanted), but rather they were the men the Church (and the world) needed. In conversations I have had over the past few days, many people have voiced concerns about who might be selected. As would be expected, some long for a pope more like Benedict XVI, others want a continuation of Pope Francis’s papacy. I suspect we will get neither—yet, I suspect, in some ways, he will probably be a bit of both.
When the Cardinals meet in conclave, they will ask the Holy Spirit to guide them: it is their vote that will give us a new pope. But we are very much a part of this process too. After all, the new pope will be our pope, our Holy Father, and so we need to pray. All of us.
Pray that the cardinals correctly understand what comprises the most pressing issues facing our Church and our world.
Pray that the person best suited in this moment to address those concerns will be made apparent to them.
Pray that the electors have the courage to be guided by the Lord in this most important of decisions, so that the new pope may truly be a pontiff, one who “builds bridges” and not, as Francis cautioned, “walls.”
And most importantly, pray that they elect, not so much the type of person we want to be pope,
But the person we need.
A.M.D.G. / B.V.M.H.