A Conclave Like No Other

New York Times

04-05-2025

There are so many unfamiliar faces, cardinals are wearing name tags. The Vatican guesthouse for out-of-towners coming to choose the next pope is overbooked. Daily Vatican meetings have taken on the feel of theological speed-dating sessions.
'The cardinals don't know each other so well,' said Cardinal Anders Arborelius of Sweden, who has spent recent days in a crowded Vatican lecture hall listening to the concerns and learning the names of the record number of cardinals Pope Francis appointed who will choose his successor.
Cardinal Arborelius sat in a section reserved for a small group of newcomers from countries that never had cardinals before. They included one from Mali, who, he said, had 'disappeared' after the first day, and from Laos, who, many days into the meetings, 'hasn't turned up.' He himself, he said, felt 'lost all the time.'
Nevertheless, he and scores of other cardinals will file into the Sistine Chapel starting Wednesday afternoon to cast ballots for the next pope under seclusion and Michelangelo's frescoes, in one of the world's oldest dramas.
All papal elections are unpredictable. But this conclave has so many unfamiliar faces with unfamiliar politics, priorities and concerns that it could be more fractious than usual.
It also comes at a particularly perilous moment for a church that Francis left deeply divided, with progressive factions pushing for more inclusion and change, and conservatives seeking to roll things back, often under the guise of unity.
The first pope in centuries from outside Europe, Francis expanded the church's global reach to better reflect the faith's diversity. The conclave that chose him 12 years ago had 115 cardinals from 48 countries. This conclave is expected to have 133 voting-age cardinals (those under 80), representing about 70 countries. The new pope will need at least 89 votes.
Some cardinals are quietly holding spin sessions in the backrooms of churches and book-lined apartments or under the ornate chandeliers of religious orders. Vatican officials, experts, insiders and waiters — and even gossip columnists who usually specialize in socialites behaving badly — all claim to have an inside track on the dynamics taking shape about the obvious and clandestine candidates, chatty kingmakers, veteran operators and youngish impressionables.
In reality, no one knows who will emerge on the balcony overlooking St. Peter's Square after the white smoke signals the cardinals have made their pick.
The crowded hall makes for more 'anonymous' members, without strong international leaders, or even national blocs, said Andrea Riccardi, the founder of the Sant'Egidio Community, a Catholic group close to Francis and to some of the Italian cardinals seen as having a shot at becoming pope.
The result, he said, is a fragmenting of alliances and more of an assembly dynamic that 'benefits the well known' and allows for more 'moral pressure from, let's call them, older people.'
One of the most pressing questions before the cardinals will be whether to go farther up the road Francis pointed to, or to decide to bring the papacy 'home' to Europe.
The early favorites reflect those tensions. Among them are Cardinal Pietro Parolin, 70, an Italian who was the Vatican's secretary of state under Francis. He is seen as someone who might be able to straddle both moderate and more liberal camps, though is apparently objectionable to conservatives. In the days before the conclave, a right-wing Catholic publication from the United States blasted out the rumor that he had fainted in the hall. The Vatican said it was a lie.
Another oft-mentioned contender is Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, 67, of the Philippines, who embodies the impulse for a progressive from the church's expanding realms. And finally, Pierbattista Pizzaballa, 60, the Italian Patriarch of Jerusalem, who like Francis is known for his pastoral sensibility, but who is, again, Italian.
'There are three everyone knows: Parolin, Tagle and Pizzaballa,' said Cardinal Arborelius, who is himself sometimes mentioned as a possible pope, and who called himself part of a 'very special group' of newcomers.
The Newbies
Not everyone is thrilled with the acceleration of geographic diversity and the new crop entrusted to decide the future of the Roman Catholic Church.
Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller of Germany, a conservative who used to run the church's office on doctrine before Francis fired him from that job, recalled a meeting during Francis' pontificate when one of the new guys — 'a cardinal of 25 Catholics in an isle in the South Sea' — came into a subcommittee meeting.
'He said three things,' Cardinal Müller said. 'First, I don't speak English. Second, I know nothing of theology. And third, I didn't know why they made me cardinal. Now he is a voter of the pope.'
Conservatives complain that Francis stacked the college with cardinals far over its customary 120 members. He passed over archbishops in Western capitals, positions sometimes held by conservatives, to create a more global college that reflected his pastoral vision and bottom-up view of the church.
But it is not clear that all the cardinals Francis created are in his mold. On hot-button political issues dear to Western liberals, like inclusion of L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics and women, they can be more conservative.
Some close allies of Francis waved away the concern.
'You can find opposition figures in every country in which he made cardinals,' said Cardinal Michael Czerny, a Canadian progressive and Jesuit who was a close adviser to Francis, noting the pope had passed them over. 'I don't think he is choosing people who disagree with him completely.'
Other cardinals privately worried the new members of the college might get star-struck by the big names or would be easily manipulated by Vatican power players, resulting in a quick conclave that elects a favorite.
On the other hand, the newcomers, having yet to forge alliances, could be hard to herd, attenuating the voting.
The Italians
There is a feeling among some in the room that 'now we need an Italian pope,' noted Cardinal Arborelius, the newcomer from Sweden. Other cardinals, too, have noticed the Italians seem to be suffering papal withdrawal.
'For how long have they not had a pope?' Cardinal Juan José Omella of Barcelona said with a smile.
The answer: 47 years. Forever, in Italian time.
After Adrian VI, a pope from Holland, died in 1523, the Italians held a tight grip on papal power for 455 years until John Paul II of Poland emerged from the conclave in 1978. He was succeeded by Benedict XVI from Germany, and then Francis from Argentina.
The Italian cardinals, often fractured by ideological, personal and cultural conflicts, traditionally do not vote as a bloc. Some backers of non-Italian candidates argue that is still the case.
But a reduction in the Italian ranks by Francis may prompt more cohesion than usual among the remaining 17 Italian voting cardinals, church insiders say.
With about 12 percent of the total vote, they remain the largest national group, and they have strong candidates and kingmakers among them.
But some church traditionalists argue that doctrine and theology should outrank all other considerations. To them, the Italian effort to bring the papacy home is silly.
''One of us,'' Cardinal Müller said, mocking the Italian rallying cry. 'It's childish.'
The Unlikely Allies
There are no shortage of potential coalitions.
Voting blocs may form around geography, ideology, language or cultural sensitivities. Or around priorities like financial transparency or doctrinal issues. They may even form around old-fashioned score-settling or antagonisms.
Some Vatican officials said the Asian cardinals were considered well organized and tight-knit, making themselves a powerful bloc that could join with more progressive Americans and South Americans who do not want an Italian, for instance.
Instead, the speculation goes, they could line up behind someone like Cardinal Tagle of the Philippines.
To do that, they would have to override the likely objections of conservatives who have rolled their eyes at Cardinal Tagle weeping when he received his red cardinal's hat from Pope Benedict in 2012 or videos widely shared recently of him dancing in a church and singing 'Imagine' by John Lennon.
'He cries,' Cardinal Müller said with a shrug, adding that he considered the Filipino 'extroverted.'
Conservatives appointed by the previous pontificates are considered a cohesive group, even if they do not have decisive numbers. Some liberal cardinals worry the conservatives will seek a force multiplier by looking to Africa.
Africa is home to one of the church's most booming Catholic populations, and to some of its most conservative cardinals, many of whom are deeply opposed to inclusion of L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics.
The most frequently cited candidate from Africa is Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, of the Democratic Republic of Congo. He was a favorite of Francis, who appreciated his pastoral pedigree.
But he opposed a rule change Francis made permitting blessings of same-sex unions. Instead, he has pushed other priorities, like pastoral care for polygamists.
The emphasis does not thrill European conservatives, and the question is whether they are willing to overlook it to advance other priorities.
It has also infuriated liberals who call for more inclusion of L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics and women in the church, and who see a clear, politically motivated, double standard.
'Which is more widespread? Polygamy or homosexuality?' said the Rev. James Martin, an American who personally received encouragement from Francis for his ministry to L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics. 'Why does one deserve pastoral consideration and the other condemnation?'
Cardinal Ambongo is hardly the most conservative African cardinal. Cardinal Robert Sarah of Guinea led the resistance to Francis and is feared by liberals who see him as someone who would yank the church backward.
'I can think of some African cardinals — they make me shudder,' Cardinal Czerny said. Asked whether conservatives were rallying behind an African pope as a Trojan Horse to further their agenda, Cardinal Czerny said, 'Certainly, certainly, certainly, and that's why,' he added, 'it's so, so, so stupid to say things like Africa's time has come.'
Some progressives argue that, instead, the church should look east. Conservatives charge that a tacit progressive prejudice against Africa may be behind the pivot to Asia.
'Asia!' Cardinal Müller said. 'I think there's hidden prejudices that Africa is not so developed. Nobody would say it, but deep in the heart, no?'