When white smoke billowed out of the chimney of the Sistine Chapel on March 13, 2013, alerting the general public that the 115 cardinal electors inside had concluded their voting, few members of the general public might need anticipated the Catholic Church’s 266th Pope to be Jorge Mario Bergoglio.
At 76, Bergoglio was thought of too outdated to be included on most media lists of papabili, or doubtless candidates for Pope. Previous to his papacy, bishops and cardinals sometimes submitted their resignations at 75. And the cardinal electors, who’ve at all times elected one in all their very own ranks, have an age cap of 80.
Hailing from Buenos Aires, Argentina, Bergoglio turned the first Latin American Pope and the primary non-European Pope in over 1,200 years. He was additionally the primary Jesuit Pope—a Catholic spiritual order that emphasizes service to the marginalized. Upon his election, Bergoglio took the title Francis after Saint Francis of Assisi, who was identified for his asceticism and ministry to the poor. Total, Francis was thought to be much less conservative than his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI.
Learn Extra: Pope Francis’ Greatest Achievement Was Emphasizing Mercy
With Francis’ death on Monday, at age 88, as much as 135 eligible cardinal electors will resolve on his successor. 100 and eight—or 80%—of them have been appointed by Francis throughout his papacy. It’s a proven fact that has left some questioning if the late Pope primarily “packed the court” to ensure a continuation of his legacy. However consultants counsel it’ll be as difficult to predict as Francis’ personal election was.
“The historical past of the papacy of many a whole bunch of years suggests it’s very troublesome for a Pope to manage the election that follows his personal demise,” Miles Pattenden, a historian of the Catholic Church at Oxford College tells TIME. Cardinals are “their very own males,” and even these picked by Francis could have their very own opinions.
“It’s very simplistic to say cardinals simply vote alongside ideological strains as if they’re a part of political events,” Pattenden says. “That’s not how the Vatican works.”
Pattenden additionally factors to an Italian proverb: “After a fats Pope comes a skinny one.”
“The concept of that’s primarily that the cardinals fairly often concentrate on what they didn’t like concerning the earlier Pope, all of the issues they thought have been his faults and flaws, they usually search for somebody who cures these.” The primary query on cardinals’ minds will likely be whether or not they need change or continuity.
This conclave is already more likely to be totally different from these up to now, nevertheless, Pattenden says. Firstly, it’s the biggest variety of eligible cardinal electors—the truth is, it’s the primary time that the variety of eligible electors at a conclave has exceeded the normal cap of 120, though Pattenden says it’s unlikely that the cap will likely be enforced. Secondly, the cardinals now are extra geographically various than ever.
In 2013, 51% of cardinal electors have been European. Now, around 39% are, whereas around 18% come from the Asia-Pacific, 18% from Latin America and the Caribbean, 12% come from Sub-Saharan Africa, 10% from North America, and three% come from the Center East and North Africa.
Francis performed a giant function in that shift. Of the 108 he appointed, 38% got here from Europe, 19% from Latin America and the Caribbean, 19% from the Asia-Pacific, 12% from sub-Saharan Africa, 7% from North America, and 4% from the Center East and North Africa.
Francis appointed cardinals from 25 nations that had by no means earlier than had one. His appointments embody Chibly Langlois, the primary cardinal from Haiti, Charles Maung Bo, the primary cardinal from Myanmar, and Hyderabad Anthony Poola, the primary of India’s Dalit caste.
On many papabili lists, the vary of candidates embody a number of who could be historic firsts as pontiffs from Asia, similar to Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, or Africa, similar to Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Turkson.
Learn Extra: How a New Pope Is Chosen—and Who It Could Be
Francis prioritized inclusion inside the Vatican, Pattenden explains, and so in appointing cardinals, he appeared the world over, typically to small Catholic communities that had not been represented earlier than: He felt that “it shouldn’t simply be the case that large, well-established, wealthy, outdated Catholic communities get illustration on a regular basis,” however ideologically, “Francis can’t essentially have identified how all of those new cardinals will assume, definitely their colleagues received’t know—they might not even know themselves.”
Carlos Ireland, a professor of historical past and spiritual research at Yale College, nevertheless, thinks it’s doubtless that these Francis appointed will certainly lean ideologically left, noting that Francis didn’t appoint many conservative bishops to the School of Cardinals and that, whereas geographic variety was a precedence of his, theological variety was not. Francis, for instance, appointed American Robert McElroy in 2022, who is understood for his advocacy on immigration and the atmosphere and inclusion of LGBTQ+ Catholics, whereas reportedly bypassing extra conservative archbishops. “In terms of spiritual points,” says Ireland, “additionally it is extremely doubtless that they are going to lean away from traditionalism.”
“Voting for a Pope shouldn’t be a lot totally different from some other sort of voting. The voters have their preferences,” provides Ireland. “The one distinction between this conclave and the Home of Representatives or the European Parliament is that the cardinals pray for steering from the Holy Spirit.”
However, Pattenden says, it might come down extra to charisma, competence, and piety than to ideology.
On that measure, the geographic variety of the School of Cardinals might make this conclave significantly unpredictable. “They don’t know one another in addition to earlier teams of cardinals may have carried out, and that’s certain to have an effect,” Pattenden says. “When you must concentrate on one particular person’s title to jot down down on that poll paper, it could or is probably not simpler in the event you truly know the man or in the event you’ve simply met him per week or two earlier than.”
If the results of that favors higher identified cardinals, Pattenden says Tagle from the Philippines, who is named some of the charismatic figures within the faculty, or Pietro Parolin, who’s the highest-ranking cardinal within the electing conclave, could be frontrunners.
If neither of these two—or some other candidate—achieves the required two-thirds majority to win, it’s doubtless that cardinals “begin casting a wider web,” says Pattenden, to candidates who could not have been their first selection.
“It’s a really secretive course of … The Church could be very, very cautious that we don’t actually know what occurred,” Pattenden says, and what stories do come out later are sometimes nonetheless not verified.
“This issues quite a bit when it comes to the theology of the election: the concept is that God, by way of the Holy Spirit, comes down on the cardinals and evokes them and their selection. However the extra that we find out about what was stated to who and who voted for what, the much less believable that concept is.”
