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Tag: Conclave

  • Latest: Conclave is Black Smoke Again, No Pope

    Latest: Conclave is Black Smoke Again, No Pope

    Black smoke is again pouring out of the Sistine Chapel chimney, indicating no pope was elected on second or third ballots of the conclave.

    The smoke appeared just before noon after morning voting sessions to elect a successor to Pope Francis.

    The cardinals will now return to the Vatican residences where they are being sequestered for lunch. After that, they will go back to the Sistine Chapel for the afternoon voting session.

    Two more votes are possible today.

    What to know

    • How the pope is elected: The College of Cardinals, composed of 133 voting eligible cardinals, is sequestered inside the Vatican to pray, discern and vote for the next pope without distraction. A two-thirds majority is required for a new pope to be elected. Voting will occur regularly in the morning and afternoon until a pope is selected.
    • Smoke watch: After voting, ballots are burned in a special stove — black smoke signals no decision, while white smoke means a new pope has been chosen. Before the conclave began, the Vatican press office said that morning smoke would likely rise around 10:30 a.m. or noon local time, though cardinals overshot the office’s Wednesday estimates by hours.
    • Cardinals contenders: There are no official candidates for the papacy, but some cardinals are considered “papabile,” or possessing the characteristics necessary to become pope. Some names include Pietro Parolin, who will oversee the conclave, Luis Tagle, dubbed the “Asian Francis,” Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, a conservative cardinal native to the Congo, and Pierbattista Pizzaballa, potentially the first Italian pope in decades.
  • Black Smoke Signals No Pope Elected in 1st Round of Vatican Conclave

    Black Smoke Signals No Pope Elected in 1st Round of Vatican Conclave

    Black smoke rose from the chimney atop the Sistine Chapel on Wednesday, signaling that the first round of voting in the papal conclave failed to elect a new pope.

    Continuing a centuries-old tradition, 133 cardinal electors gathered at the Vatican to begin the process of selecting the 267th head of the Catholic Church, following the death of Pope Francis last month.

    The day commenced with a solemn mass at St. Peter’s Basilica, celebrated by Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, who also presided over the 2013 conclave that elected Francis.

    Afterward, the cardinal electors convened in the Pauline Chapel and processed into the Sistine Chapel, where the conclave is taking place.

    The Sistine Chapel, adorned with Michelangelo’s iconic frescoes, remains sealed off from the outside world until a new pope is chosen.

    Under the conclave’s rules, a two-thirds majority is required to elect the next pontiff.

    This year’s conclave continues a tradition dating back to 1492, when the Sistine Chapel hosted its first papal election—the same year Christopher Columbus reached the Americas.

    While the papal selection process once stretched on for years, as in the mid-1200s, more recent elections have moved swiftly. In 2013, Francis was elected after five ballots over two days.

    Pope Francis passed away on April 21 at the age of 88, following a series of health complications, including cardiac arrest.

    The conclave will resume voting on Thursday as the Church awaits the emergence of its next leader.

    If a new pope is elected, white smoke will billow out of the chimney and the formula “habemus papam” (Latin for “we have a pope”) will be pronounced by the cardinal protodeacon from the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica.

  • Potential Successors to Pope Francis

    Potential Successors to Pope Francis

    With no official campaign nor list of candidates and an election process shrouded in secrecy, speculation about who will succeed Pope Francis after the conclave beginning Wednesday is just that — speculation.

    But here are 15 cardinals among the potential favourites to succeed Pope Francis — so-called “papabili” — divided by region.

    Europe

    Pietro Parolin (Italy), Francis’s number two at the Vatican

    Parolin, 70, was secretary of state — the Vatican’s effective number two — during almost all of Francis’s pontificate and its most visible exponent on the world stage.

    Known for his calm and subtle sense of humour, the polyglot also has a fine grasp of the intricacies of the Roman Curia, the Holy See’s central government, and was part of a group of cardinal advisers to Francis.

    He is currently considered one of the leading candidates to become the next pope.

    Parolin played a key role in a landmark — and controversial — 2018 Vatican agreement with China on naming bishops.

    Pierbattista Pizzaballa (Italy), Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem

    Pizzaballa, 60, is the top Catholic in the Middle East with an archdiocese encompassing Israel, the Palestinian territories, Jordan, and Cyprus.

    He was made a cardinal in September 2023, shortly before the war broke out between Israel and Hamas.

    The Franciscan has appealed for peace from both sides, and at Christmas in 2024, led mass in both Gaza and Jerusalem.

    Matteo Maria Zuppi (Italy), Archbishop of Bologna

    A member of the Roman lay community of Sant’Egidio, Zuppi has for more than three decades acted as a discreet diplomat for the Vatica,n including serving as Pope Francis’s special peace envoy for Ukraine.

    Known for riding his bicycle around Bologna, 69-year-old Zuppi is a popular figure for his decades of work on behalf of the needy. He also advocates for welcoming migrants and gay Catholics into the Church.

    He has been president of the Italian Episcopal Conference (CEI) since 2022.

    Cristobal Lopez Romero (Spain), Archbishop of Rabat

    Spanish-born Cardinal Cristobal Lopez Romero, 72, has spent decades of his career in South America and has Paraguayan nationality. He is now based in Morocco, in majority-Muslim North Africa.

    Lopez is seen by some as a successor to Francis due to his support for migrant rights and inter-faith dialogue, while his career is emblematic of the late pontiff’s push into the Catholic Church’s “peripheries”.

    But Lopez himself told AFP that the new pope “doesn’t necessarily have to be a Francis mark II, a Francis impersonator”.

    Francis named Lopez an archbishop in 2017 and promoted him to cardinal in 2019.

    Jean-Marc Aveline (France), Archbishop of Marseille

    Born in Algeria, 66-year-old Aveline has spent most of his life in the French port city of Marseille.

    Like his close friend Pope Francis, he has been a voice for welcoming migrants and promoting interreligious dialogue.

    Appreciated for his discretion, intellectual abilities, and people skills, Aveline has carved out a reputation as a cardinal to watch since his elevation in 2022.

    Anders Arborelius (Sweden), Bishop of Stockholm

    Appointed in 2017 as Sweden’s first cardinal, Arborelius is a convert to Catholicism in the overwhelmingly Protestant Scandinavian country, home to one of the world’s most secularised societies.

    He is the first Swedish Catholic bishop since the Protestant Reformation and a staunch defender of Church doctrine, notably opposed to allowing women to be deacons or blessing same-sex couples.

    Like Francis, 75-year-old Arborelius advocates welcoming migrants to Europe, including Christians, Catholics, and potential converts.

    Mario Grech (Malta), Bishop Emeritus of Gozo

    Born into a small village on the tiny Mediterranean archipelago of Malta, 68-year-old Grech is a peace broker and potential compromise candidate for the papacy.

    He was secretary general of the Synod of Bishops, a body that gathers information from local churches on crucial issues for the Church — such as the place of women or divorced spouses who remarry — and passes it on to the pope.

    He had to perform a delicate balancing act following Pope Francis’s lead on creating an open, attentive Church while acknowledging the concerns of conservatives.

    Peter Erdo (Hungary), Metropolitan Archbishop of Esztergom-Budapest

    An intellectual and respected expert in canon law, Erdo speaks seven languages, has published more than 25 books, and is recognised for his openness to other religions.

    But the 72-year-old has faced criticism for his ties with the government of nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban, whose harsh views on migration clashed with those of Francis.

    Known for his enthusiasm for evangelism, Erdo — who grew up under Communism — is a conservative on such issues as gay marriage and the divorced who remarry.

    Jose Tolentino de Mendonca (Portugal), prefect of the Dicastery for Culture and Education

    A Portuguese theologian and poet, Tolentino has led the Vatican’s dicastery, or department, of culture and education since 2022.

    A former archivist and librarian of the Holy Roman Church, the 59-year-old was made a cardinal by Francis in 2019.

    Regarded as progressive within the Church, his stance on welcoming homosexuals has earned him the hostility of some conservatives.

    With a doctorate in biblical theology, he has published books and articles on theology as well as poetic works, which have earned him several literary awards.

    Asia

    Luis Antonio Tagle (Philippines), Metropolitan Archbishop emeritus of Manila

    Tagle, Asia’s front-runner for the papacy, is a charismatic moderate who has not been afraid to criticise the Church for its shortcomings, including over the sexual abuse of minors.

    Fluent in English and active on social media, the 67-year-old is an eloquent speaker with self-deprecating humour and, like Francis, a leading advocate for the poor, migrants and marginalised people.

    Nicknamed “Chito”, he was made a cardinal by Benedict XVI in 2012 and was already considered a candidate for pope in the 2013 conclave in which Francis was elected.

    Charles Maung Bo (Myanmar), Archbishop of Yangon

    Myanmar-born Bo became the Buddhist-majority country’s first and only cardinal in 2015, appointed by Francis.

    Bo has called for dialogue and reconciliation in his conflict-ridden country, and after the military coup of 2021 appealed to opposition protesters to remain non-violent.

    The 76-year-old has defended the mainly Muslim Rohingya, calling them victims of “ethnic cleansing”, and spoken out against human trafficking uprooting the lives of many young Burmese.

    He was head of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences (FABC) between 2019 and 2024.

    Malcolm Ranjith (Sri Lanka), Archbishop of Colombo

    Sri Lanka’s conservative Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith has long been considered a dark horse for the papacy, but his credentials were boosted in the wake of the island’s worst terrorist attack in 2019.

    The 77-year-old Sinhalese prelate has pursued a campaign in the ensuing years, petitioning the United Nations and the international community for justice over the suicide bombings of Easter Sunday in April 2019 that killed 279 civilians.

    Ranjith’s efforts have placed the 167 Catholic victims of the attacks on the path to sainthood, after the Vatican declared them “Witnesses of the Faith” last month.

    A former papal nunio, or ambassador, to Indonesia and East Timor, Ranjith was made a cardinal in 2010 by Benedict XVI. He is considered a traditionalist who has prohibited cultural practices borrowed from other religions and supports the Latin Mass.

    Africa

    Peter Turkson (Ghana), Archbishop emeritus of Cape Coast

    One of the Church’s most influential cardinals from Africa, 76-year-old Turkson has for years been mentioned as a possible first black pope.

    Made a cardinal by Pope John Paul II in 2003, the multilingual Turkson has been a papal envoy and mediator, including in South Sudan.

    He also served between 2016 and 2021 as the first head of a top Vatican department, the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, which deals with human rights and migrants, among other issues.

    Born into a humble family of 10 children, Turkson has criticised anti-gay legislation in Uganda, but defends Catholic sexual morality and has denied that homosexuality is a human rights issue.

    Robert Sarah (Guinea), former prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments

    Had Francis lived a few more months, conservative prelate Robert Sarah, who turns 80 on June 16, would have been too old to join the conclave to choose his successor.

    As it is, though, he has found himself championed by conservative Catholics in the French-speaking world as a candidate to turn the clock back on progressive reforms.

    An ardent opponent of what he called in 2015 “Western ideologies on homosexuality and abortion and Islamic fanaticism”, he denounced Francis’s 2023 text that paved the way for the blessing of same-sex couples.

    Experts believe his views make him too conservative to win a two-thirds majority at the conclave — but even a possible candidacy has boosted his profile.

    Americas

    Robert Francis Prevost (United States), Archbishop-Bishop emeritus of Chiclayo

    A native of Chicago, Prevost was in 2023 appointed prefect of the powerful Dicastery for Bishops, which is charged with advising the pope on appointments of new bishops.

    The 69-year-old spent years as a missionary in Peru and is the Archbishop-Bishop emeritus of Chiclayo in the South American country.

    Made a cardinal by Francis in 2023, he is also the president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America.

  • World’s Most Secretive Election: How The Next Pope Will Be Chosen On Wednesday

    World’s Most Secretive Election: How The Next Pope Will Be Chosen On Wednesday

    The world’s most secretive election begins Wednesday, when 133 Catholic cardinals will be locked inside the Sistine Chapel to choose a successor to Pope Francis.

    Each cardinal will have sworn an oath of lifelong secrecy, as will every staff member supporting the process—from doctors and dining staff to Vatican officials. Anyone who breaks the rules faces excommunication.

    Electronic devices are banned, and all participants must surrender phones, tablets, and smartwatches. The Vatican enforces strict isolation, with rooms swept for bugs and electronic jammers in place to prevent any communication with the outside world.

    “There are no TVs, radios, newspapers or even open windows,” said Monsignor Paolo de Nicolo, a former papal household chief. “The cardinals are completely incommunicado.”

    The conclave is not just secret—it’s also secure. Vatican police, walkie-talkies for emergencies only, and heavily vetted staff ensure total lockdown until a new pope is chosen. The result is announced to the world by white smoke from the Sistine Chapel chimney.

    Despite the religious framing, political undercurrents are hard to ignore. Media speculation has swirled around potential successors, and books and videos promoting certain cardinals have circulated. But inside the conclave, external lobbying is blocked out.

    “It’s meant to be a decision guided by the Holy Spirit, not by headlines,” said Ines San Martin of the Pontifical Mission Societies.

    Cardinals have been meeting daily in “general congregations” to prepare for the vote. Many are new and unfamiliar with each other, thanks to Pope Francis’ diverse appointments.

    By Wednesday morning, voting cardinals—those under age 80—will be sealed off behind Vatican walls. Over the following hours or days, they will vote up to four times daily until one of them receives a two-thirds majority.

    The stakes are global: the pope leads over 1.3 billion Catholics and commands immense influence on moral, social, and political issues worldwide.

    As John Allen of Crux put it: “The Vatican takes isolation seriously. This is one of the biggest decisions of their lives.”

  • Wait For Vatican White Smoke Fires Up Social Media

    Wait For Vatican White Smoke Fires Up Social Media

    ​Hype has been building on social media around the Catholic Church’s secretive, centuries-old tradition of conclaves to elect a new pope, animating users from the White House on down.

    US President Donald Trump on Saturday posted an apparently AI-generated image of himself wearing papal vestments and sitting on a throne, one finger directed to the heavens.

    The striking picture was the most notorious among thousands that have bubbled up since the death of Pope Francis on April 21 and ahead of the cardinals’ gathering from Wednesday.

    More than 1.3 million tweets have been published on X about the conclave, according to monitoring platform Visibrain, while TikTok videos on the topic have been viewed over 363 million times on the network with unparallelled reach among the young.

    Particularly passionate pope-watchers can fire up online game “Mantapa” to pick their favourite cardinals and make predictions for the next pontiff in a style similar to sports betting.

    – Pomp and secrecy –

    The mystery, pomp and ritual around the conclave — from the opulent Sistine Chapel surroundings to the ethereal black or white smoke signalling ballot results — “lends itself to the narrative formats of social networks” said Refka Payssan, a researcher in information and communication sciences.

    “A conclave means both gilt, protocol, ceremony, but also secrecy and mystery” cannily nurtured by the Vatican, agreed Stephanie Laporte, founder of digital strategy consultancy OTTA.

    “Young people love to speculate” about outcomes, Laporte added.

    “Everyone on social networks has an opinion and everyone wants to decode the news, look for clues, know which cardinal will become the pope. It’s almost like an ‘escape game’,” she suggested.

    Payssan noted that the conclave fires up the “curiosity of seeing history happen live”, marking a rare event — the first in 12 years — with potential global consequences.

    Even if not Catholic themselves, “young people are very conscious of the pope’s influence on hundreds of millions, even billions of people, whether it’s in his stance on contraception or the environment,” Laporte said.

    – Digital turn –

    Conclave fever is also a reflection of the Vatican’s successful turn to digital communications in recent years to build bonds with younger generations.

    Created by Benedict XVI in 2012 but mostly used by Francis, the papal X account @pontifex reaches 50 million followers across its nine languages.

    And Francis’s own Instagram account had more than 10 million followers.

    The Church has backed many cardinals’ own ventures into the digital realm, with some becoming bona fide internet stars.

    New York prelate Timothy Dolan has been publishing videos about the run-up to the conclave to his almost 300,000 X followers and 55,000 on Instagram — without giving away any sensitive information.

    Moderate Philippine cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle has made his mark online with karaoke videos, tallying 600,000 Facebook followers.

    Selfie snapshots are in the mix, with Tokyo’s archbishop Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi posting a photo with colleagues from the bus on the way to pray at Francis’s grave.

    Cardinals “are absolutely fascinating personalities who’ve taken their place in pop culture,” firing public enthusiasm for the event, Laporte said.

    That fascination has been stoked by pop culture blockbusters like Dan Brown’s novel “Angels and Demons”, adapted for film in 2009, or the acclaimed thriller “Conclave” released this year, based on a book by novelist Robert Harris.

    (AFP)

  • Church at a Crossroads: Cardinals Gather to Elect Pope Francis’s Successor

    Church at a Crossroads: Cardinals Gather to Elect Pope Francis’s Successor

    Catholic cardinals will enter a sealed conclave this week to choose a new pope, with the Church’s 1.4 billion members holding their breath over an uncertain outcome.

    Around 133 “Princes of the Church” will meet Wednesday to elect from among their number a successor to Pope Francis, who died on April 21 aged 88.

    At issue is whether the new pontiff will follow the popular Argentine’s progressive line, or will the Holy See pivot to a more conservative traditionalist?

    Francis ran the Church for 12 years and appointed 80 percent of the cardinal electors.

    Hailing from five continents and with around 70 countries represented, the group is the largest and the most international ever.

    Some experts say the progressive camp will have the edge, seeking a pope that will follow in Francis’s footsteps and energise his supporters.

    – ‘Calm the waters‘ –

    But no one can predict how voting will go once the cardinals are shut inside the Sistine Chapel and begin an open-ended series of votes seeking a two-thirds majority for one of their number.

    Among the pilgrims and sightseers who gathered outside St Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican on Sunday, as the Church ended Francis’s nine-day mourning period, opinions varied widely.

    Canadian priest Justin Pulikunnel did not hide his frustration at the direction Francis tried to take the Church, seeking a return to more traditional leadership.

    “Well, I hope and I pray that the new pope will kind of be a source of unity in the Church and kind of calm the waters down after almost a dozen years of destabilisation and ambiguity,” he said.

    But others like Valeria Sereni, a 30-year-old Italian, expressed hope that the new pope would follow in Francis’s more open spirit on issues of sexuality, human rights and the environment.

    “Francis has opened a new path and someone has to carry it on,” she said.

    “We’ll be very fortunate if we find somebody as good as the previous one,” agreed 72-year-old Wayne Gosper from Australia, sounding a note of caution that secular politics might influence the cardinals’ choice.

    “The world is turning right wing, right? And we lost a left-wing pope,” he said.

    The conclave begins Wednesday afternoon and could continue for days, weeks or even months before the smoke from the chapel’s chimney turns white to signify a new pontiff has been chosen.

    But on Monday, lengthy preparatory meetings known as general congregations were continuing both with morning and afternoon sessions for the first time.

    All cardinals are invited to these, not just those under 80 who are eligible to vote in conclave, and they take the opportunity to discuss the issues that will face Francis’s successor.

    These are not supposed to be political events, but the prelates are getting to know each other and some admit that they discuss names at meals and on the sidelines.

    “Nobody campaigns, for crying out loud. That would be extraordinarily stupid and indiscreet, and improper and counterproductive,” said Cardinal Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York.

    “But you just want to get to know folks, and it works well,” he said on his own podcast.

    – ‘Spectacular’ conclave? –

    “And I don’t apologise for the fact. That should be. I mean, we would speak about one another. We would speak about the guys that we find tantalising,” Dolan said.

    “But that’s different from politicking, because we always say grace builds on nature, right? So, we know, ultimately, it’s the illumination of the Holy Spirit, for which we pray to be open.”

    Dolan himself is among the conservatives whom cardinals might vote for, while Luis Antonio Tagle from the Philippines is a leading candidate among progressives within the Church.

    From Europe, Italian cardinals Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, and Pietro Parolin, secretary of state under Francis, are some of the best known “papabili”, or potential popes.

    But many more names have been discussed, and just like when Francis — then an Argentinian known as Jorge Bergoglio — was picked in 2013, a surprise candidate could emerge.

    Vatican affairs specialist Marco Politi told AFP that the conclave could be “the most spectacular in 50 years”.

    (AFP)