Conclave to Elect New Pope Is Set to Begin: Live Updates

Nonetheless, dialogue of potential names started way back behind the Vatican’s partitions and past. Because the cardinals started assembly in Rome after Pope Francis’ funeral, papal watchers scrutinized snippets of statements rising from their discussions, attempting to discern whether or not the electors had been leaning towards a candidate who would construct on Francis’ agenda or one who would symbolize a return to a extra conventional model.

Cardinals Pietro Parolin of Italy and Luis Antonio Gokim Tagle of the Philippines have been probably the most talked about candidates to exchange Pope Francis within the days earlier than the conclave, which begins Wednesday. However conclaves are sometimes unpredictable, and this one — with so many new cardinals from so many locations who have no idea one another nicely — has much more potential to shock. A protracted checklist of different contenders has already emerged.

Pietro Parolin

Plainly everybody is aware of Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state underneath Francis. Cardinal Parolin will preside over the papal election and has emerged as a number one compromise candidate.

A quiet, plodding Italian with a famously inscrutable poker face, Cardinal Parolin, 70, is deeply cautious. However at a time of worldwide upheaval, that isn’t essentially a disqualifier. Even his backers grant that he lacks Francis’ charisma and international symbolism — however because the chief of the Vatican equipment for the previous decade, he enacted Francis’ imaginative and prescient.

Cardinals have talked about Cardinal Parolin as somebody who might have a gradual, bureaucratic hand on the church’s wheel. His critics on the left query his previous feedback about same-sex marriage, which he known as a “defeat for humanity,” and his lack of pastoral expertise. His critics on the suitable criticize his function within the church’s efforts to make inroads in China, which has required negotiations with Communist leaders.

However few prelates who know him have robust emotions about him both means. And after the eventful and, for some, divisive dozen years underneath Francis, bland however competent could also be simply what the cardinals are on the lookout for.

On migration, for instance, whereas Francis excoriated the inhumanity of nice powers turning the Mediterranean right into a graveyard, Cardinal Parolin stated after a gathering with Italy’s right-wing prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, that immigration was “a really, very complicated topic.”

— Jason Horowitz and Patricia Mazzei

Luis Antonio Gokim Tagle

Luis Antonio Gokim Tagle, 67, a liberal-leaning cardinal from the Philippines, has for years been deemed a front-runner to be pope and can be the primary pope from Southeast Asia.

An ally of Francis who has labored on the Vatican in recent times, Cardinal Tagle has a extremely personable method in step with Francis’ consideration to the poor and people in want in growing international locations.

He additionally comes from a area of the world the place Catholicism continues to develop, and the place Francis paid explicit consideration to attempting to construct a church with a much less Eurocentric future.

On the Vatican, Cardinal Tagle has overseen missionary work. Extensively identified by his nickname “Chito,” he’s typically known as the “Asian Francis” for his means to join with the poor, his name for motion towards local weather change and his criticism of the “harsh” stance adopted by some Catholic clerics towards homosexual individuals, divorced individuals and unwed moms. Cardinal Tagle is fashionable for his humility, and his homilies have drawn the devoted to the pews and to Fb streams.

However as chief of the church within the Philippines, he was criticized by activists and fellow clergymen as being timid concerning the scourge of clerical sexual abuse. He has additionally been faulted by some as not adequately addressing former President Rodrigo Duterte’s drug warfare, during which tens of 1000’s of individuals had been summarily executed. Cardinal Tagle didn’t reply to a request for an interview.

— Sui-Lee Wee and Aie Balagtas See

Fridolin Ambongo

Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo, 65, the archbishop of Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, has been thought of a potential contender since Francis made him a cardinal in 2019.

Pope Francis had lengthy urged the Catholic Church to “go to the peripheries,” which means communities in Africa and Asia, the place the church is also probably the most vibrant. One persistent query has been when the church would possibly reinforce that dedication by selecting a pope from Africa. Catholics make up about 18 % of the continent’s inhabitants and generate extra seminarians than some other a part of the world.

Pope Francis, an Argentine, was the primary non-European to lead the church since 741. Even so, Francis was from a household with Italian roots.

But there’s a sure paradox concerned in selecting any successor from Africa. Whereas it could be a break from custom, the Catholic hierarchy in Africa is among the many most conservative.

Cardinal Ambongo was shut to Pope Francis, one in every of simply 9 members of an advisory group generally known as the Council of Cardinals. However the cardinal led the opposition to Francis’ 2023 ruling that clergymen might bless same-sex {couples}.

— Neil MacFarquhar

Anders Arborelius

Bishop Anders Arborelius of Stockholm, 75, who transformed to Catholicism at age 20, is Sweden’s first Catholic cardinal.

Though Sweden was as soon as predominantly Lutheran and is now largely secular, the Roman Catholic Church has grown there in recent times, and Cardinal Arborelius says that lots of the Catholics there have an immigrant background. Francis’ elevation of the cardinal in 2017 was seen as one other try to appoint cardinals in locations that didn’t have one earlier than, and to attain out to international locations the place Catholics are a minority.

In a latest interview, Cardinal Arborelius stated the largest challenges dealing with the church had been constructing bridges in a polarized world, giving better affect to girls throughout the church and serving to households cross on the religion.

Cardinal Arborelius, who belongs to the Carmelite spiritual order, has expressed help for migrants, as Francis did. Within the interview, he expressed deep concern about rising anti-migrant sentiments, together with in Sweden. As for the blessings of same-sex {couples}, he stated, “We’ve got to go to the homosexual individuals with a lot love,” including, “even when we can not acknowledge homosexual marriage.”

He performed down his probabilities of changing into pope. At 75, “I’d be too outdated,” he stated. He stated he was instructed that, in accordance to an A.I. chatbot, his possibilities had been 5 %. “I had to chortle,” he stated.

— Emma Bubola

Jean-Marc Aveline

Cardinal Jean-Marc Aveline, 66, from Marseille in France, has spent years selling dialogue amongst faiths within the port metropolis, which is understood for its various cultures and religions however can also be suffering from poverty and crime.

Having a background in interreligious dialogue not solely was necessary to Francis but in addition has turn out to be an necessary space for the Catholic Church.

Amongst candidates, Cardinal Aveline can be a much less apparent alternative. Working in his favor: He mixes Francis’ openness to dialogue with deep theological data. Probably working towards him: Conclaves haven’t been heat to French candidates because the 14th century, when a French pope moved the papacy to Avignon within the south of France.

He had a superb relationship with Francis and shared a equally easy private model; he has been identified to do his personal laundry and likes to drive his personal automobile.

In contrast to Francis, Cardinal Aveline has kept away from overtly taking stands on contentious points throughout the church, such because the blessing of homosexual {couples} or giving communion to divorced individuals, each of which Francis allowed. Each detractors and supporters describe Cardinal Aveline as embracing “traditional” positions on church doctrine.

— Emma Bubola

Charles Maung Bo

Cardinal Charles Maung Bo is well-known and influential amongst Asian leaders of the Roman Catholic Church. He has employed a fragile diplomatic contact because the chief of a Catholic minority in Myanmar, a predominantly Buddhist nation.

The archbishop of Yangon, he turned Myanmar’s first cardinal in 2015. And as his conflict-torn nation’s most distinguished Roman Catholic, he has been an outspoken spiritual chief, calling for peace and dialogue since a navy coup in 2021.

The cardinal has additionally defended Myanmar’s persecuted Muslim Rohingya individuals, a extremely delicate matter there.

He has described the Rohingya as victims of “ethnic cleaning,” however he additionally suggested Pope Francis earlier than the pontiff’s 2017 go to to Myanmar to keep away from utilizing the phrase Rohingya. It’s a contested time period in Myanmar, and the cardinal stated he feared backlash towards the nation’s Catholics if Francis uttered it.

Cardinal Bo, 76, has additionally reprimanded the worldwide neighborhood for inaction over the persecution of Uyghur Muslims in China.

— Patricia Mazzei

Pablo Virgilio Siongco David

Cardinal Pablo Virgilio Siongco David, 66, from the Philippines is taken into account an out of doors contender to succeed Pope Francis.

Consultants say that whereas Cardinal Tagle, additionally from the Philippines, has attracted extra consideration, Cardinal David’s barely decrease profile would possibly assist, at the same time as his relative youth might rely towards him.

Shortly after being appointed bishop in Manila in 2015, the prelate was confronted with tough selections when a wave of executions by law enforcement officials and vigilantes hit his diocese.

The killings had been set off by the marketing campaign by Mr. Duterte, then the president, to remove unlawful medication, and the local weather of violence that prevailed made staying quiet a safer alternative. As a substitute, the bishop, who was elevated to cardinal in December, started conserving an inventory of these killed in his diocese, arrange mission stations to present help to locals and publicly denounced the killings.

In an effort to talk Catholic instructing extra successfully to lay individuals as bishop, he arrange a weekly present on YouTube. He additionally frequently took half in neighborhood efforts to clear up native rivers, partly to present that Catholic leaders shouldn’t be cloistered in fantastic buildings.

— Matthew Mpoke Bigg

Peter Erdo

Cardinal Peter Erdo of Hungary, 72, an skilled on canon regulation, is anticipated to be a front-runner amongst cardinals who lengthy for a return to the conservatism of Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI.

He has spoken out towards permitting divorced Catholics to obtain communion, for instance. However Hungarians who’ve labored with him say he’s much less doctrinaire than some followers consider.

Identified for his diplomatic expertise and command of a number of languages, he has constructed bridges with Catholic leaders in Latin America and Africa and reached out to Hungary’s Jewish neighborhood.

However he has devoted most of his profession to scholarship and has had little direct expertise coping with the day-to-day issues of churchgoers, which might work towards him because the church tries to reverse a drift towards secularism throughout Europe.

Cardinal Erdo has usually averted intervening in Hungary’s polarized politics however dismayed liberal-minded Hungarian Catholics by failing to defend Francis towards a marketing campaign of abuse by the media machine of Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orban, throughout Europe’s migration disaster.

— Andrew Higgins

Fernando Filoni

Cardinal Fernando Filoni, 79, is a seasoned Vatican diplomat who might greatest be identified for his function because the Holy See’s envoy to Iraq, the place he refused to depart as bombs started to fall in the course of the American-led invasion in 2003.

As an Italian multilingual diplomat, Cardinal Filoni is seen as a potential candidate for pope partly due to his prolonged and high-profile service abroad. He has served in Sri Lanka, Iran, Brazil, Jordan and Hong Kong, the place he lived whereas he was the Vatican’s official envoy to the Philippines, and was additionally answerable for the Vatican’s relationship with China.

Cardinal Filoni was shut to each John Paul II and Benedict XVI, however analysts steered that Pope Francis appeared not to favor him.

Due to his worldwide expertise and function overseeing missions, the cardinal got here into the conferences that preceded this week’s conclave to choose Francis’ successor figuring out lots of his fellow electors.

Cardinal Filoni has not overseen a parish or a diocese, roles which might be normally thought of necessary conditions for a pope. However Vatican specialists have praised his dedication to his diplomatic work. He was one of many few high-profile Western figures to stay in Iraq in the course of the warfare. He turned a witness to the facility cuts, kidnappings, murders, declining well being care and failing infrastructure that affected the residents of the nation, and he was seen as a protector of minority Christians there.

If chosen, Cardinal Filoni would possible serve a shorter time as pope, observers say, and will permit youthful cardinals time to mature and be thought of for the highest job.

— Motoko Wealthy

Mario Grech

Cardinal Mario Grech, 68, comes from Malta, an archipelago within the Mediterranean with a comparatively small inhabitants.

Nonetheless, the cardinal — the previous bishop of the Maltese island of Gozo — has emerged as a candidate for pope due to his function as secretary basic of the Synod of Bishops, a Vatican physique that considers “questions pertaining to the exercise of the church on this planet.”

Pope Francis made the newest synod far more inclusive and participatory, and Cardinal Grech’s function in stewarding these efforts to open up the church stand in distinction to a few of his personal historical past. Whereas he was bishop of Gozo, from 2005 to 2020, he held conservative stances on a number of points, together with homosexuality and the legalization of divorce, which he opposed when Malta held a referendum in 2011.

He modified his tone underneath Francis, a progressive, and the cardinal is now seen as somebody who would deliver continuity to the papacy.

At a time when many cardinals are new and never nicely acquainted with each other, Cardinal Grech would possibly profit from his dealings on the Synod, the place he met dozens of them in individual. He has additionally taken up international causes that had been shut to Francis. Malta is a key level of entry within the Mediterranean for migrants arriving from Africa, and Cardinal Grech has known as on Europe to open its doorways, not shut them.

Like different senior church leaders during the last 20 years, Cardinal Grech has been accused by a few of not doing sufficient to reckon with sexual abuse that came about in his diocese. Cardinal Grech didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.

— Elisabetta Povoledo

Claudio Gugerotti

Vatican officers have talked about Cardinal Claudio Gugerotti as a possible kingmaker within the conclave to select a brand new pope thanks to his ties to church buildings and influential figures world wide.

Cardinal Gugerotti, 69, is Italian and speaks Armenian, English, Greek, Kurdish and Russian. In recent times, he led the Vatican workplace that oversees the Japanese Catholic Church buildings, 23 self-governing our bodies, primarily in Japanese Europe, which have their very own liturgy and traditions.

After years of working in Rome, he additionally is aware of his means across the Vatican.

Regardless of his connections, some Vatican observers consider his candidacy is an extended shot since he has by no means served in a pastoral function as a bishop. Pastoral expertise is broadly seen as a prerequisite for changing into pope, particularly after Francis put it on the middle of his hold forth.

Cardinal Gugerotti is aware of the previous Soviet area nicely, which has been particularly necessary in church diplomacy since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. He has served as papal envoy in former Soviet republics like Belarus and Georgia and, in 2015, took on that place for Ukraine.

Some Ukrainians who’ve handled him have stated that he has not executed sufficient to make it clear, amid requires peace, that Russia was the aggressor within the warfare. Cardinal Gugerotti didn’t reply to a request for remark for this text.

— Matthew Mpoke Bigg

José Tolentino Calaça de Mendonça

Cardinal José Tolentino Calaça de Mendonça, 59, wouldn’t the primary poet to turn out to be pontiff ought to he be chosen: There have been a number of in historical past, together with Leo XIII, who in 1887 printed poems in Latin, and John Paul II, who penned poems all through his life.

However Cardinal de Mendonça’s poetry has acquired a number of literary prizes in his native Portugal, and when Francis gave him his pink cardinal hat in 2019, he instructed him, “You’re the poetry.” He’s additionally a biblical scholar; he’s nicely regarded in mental circles exterior the Roman Catholic world and he’s well-known internationally.

The 2 males first met in 2017, and Francis known as him to Rome in 2018 to be the archivist and librarian of the Vatican Library, a put up he held for 4 years. In 2022, Francis named him the Vatican’s tradition chief, and in that function he was behind a number of initiatives reaffirming the church’s dedication to artwork and its want for dialogue with the up to date world.

In that spirit, he introduced worldwide artists and comedians — together with these identified to be controversial — to meet with Francis on the Vatican. His workplace was additionally concerned in drafting a doc, printed in January, that warned concerning the potential for “the shadow of evil” in synthetic intelligence, which it stated supplied “a supply of large alternatives but in addition profound dangers.”

He’s thought of to have been shut to Francis, and his papacy would almost certainly be one in every of continuity. He has been supportive of outreach to L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics, and a few conservatives have been crucial of him.

— Elisabetta Povoledo

Seán P. O’Malley

Cardinal Seán P. O’Malley is the lately retired archbishop of Boston.

Certainly one of Pope Francis’ trusted allies, he took over the archdiocese of Boston in 2003 when the sexual abuse disaster was erupting within the Catholic Church, changing Cardinal Bernard Regulation, who resigned after revelations that he had protected abusive clergymen for years. Cardinal O’Malley led the area by means of a painful interval of rebuilding and reform earlier than stepping down from the function final yr.

In some methods, he’s a long-shot candidate. At age 80, he’s too outdated to vote for the subsequent pope, and the voting cardinals virtually at all times select their successor from amongst their very own ranks. As well as, the prospect of an American pope’s being elected is broadly thought unlikely.

However Cardinal O’Malley is understood to be revered throughout political divides. He was made a cardinal by Pope Benedict XVI in 2006, and a month after his election in 2013, Pope Francis included him as the one American in an inside circle of counselors. Pope Francis additionally made him a pacesetter of the Vatican’s workplace on sexual abuse, and he was an adviser within the reform of the Vatican forms.

At a second when questions of American energy, within the church and worldwide, fear many church leaders in different elements of the world, Cardinal O’Malley can also be seen as globally minded whereas nonetheless understanding the difficult dynamics of the American church. He speaks not less than eight languages fluently and is a Capuchin Franciscan friar identified for sporting his behavior as an expression of humility.

Tender-spoken and but authoritative, Cardinal O’Malley is understood for talking out not solely towards abortion but in addition towards gun violence, and he has known as repeatedly for a ban on assault weapons.

— Elizabeth Dias

Pierbattista Pizzaballa

Though Pierbattista Pizzaballa, 60, turned a cardinal solely in 2023, his expertise within the Center East, one of many world’s most heated battle zones, helped him rise to prominence.

Within the days after Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, the cardinal, the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem, supplied himself up as a hostage in change for the liberty of youngsters who had been kidnapped to Gaza. The provide, reported by Vatican Information, the Holy See’s information portal, was not taken up, however it however drew consideration to him.

As an Italian, Cardinal Pizzaballa would deliver the papacy again underneath the management of a rustic that dominated it for hundreds of years, after a spot of virtually 50 years.

However Cardinal Pizzaballa is seen as a Vatican outsider, provided that he has spent many years within the Center East relatively than constructing alliances nearer to house. Some cardinals and different members of the Roman Catholic Church’s hierarchy are additionally involved that Cardinal Pizzaballa could also be too younger for the job.

His reverence for conventional components of church apply has made him palatable to some conservatives. However his positions on many points which have triggered division within the church aren’t identified.

— Matthew Mpoke Bigg and Isabel Kershner

Robert Francis Prevost

There has by no means been a pope from the USA, and the traditional knowledge stays that any American can be an extended shot.

But one American who some Vatican watchers say might scrape collectively sufficient votes is Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, 69, a Chicago-born polyglot who’s seen as a churchman who transcends borders. He served for twenty years in Peru, the place he turned a bishop and a naturalized citizen. He then rose to lead his worldwide spiritual order. Till the dying of Pope Francis, he held one of the crucial influential Vatican posts, operating the workplace that selects and manages bishops globally.

The cardinal, who’s a member of the Order of St. Augustine, resembles Francis in his dedication to the poor and migrants. Usually described as reserved and discreet, Cardinal Prevost would depart stylistically from Francis. His supporters say he would almost certainly proceed the consultative course of began by Francis to invite lay individuals to meet with bishops.

It’s unclear whether or not he can be as open to homosexual, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Catholics as Francis was. Though he has not stated a lot lately, in a 2012 tackle to bishops, he lamented that Western information media and fashionable tradition fostered “sympathy for beliefs and practices which might be at odds with the Gospel.” He cited the “gay way of life” and “various households comprised of same-sex companions and their adopted kids.”

The cardinal, like many others, has drawn criticism over his dealings with clergymen accused of sexual abuse. Makes an attempt to attain the cardinal weren’t profitable.

— Motoko Wealthy

Joseph W. Tobin

Cardinal Joseph W. Tobin is the archbishop of Newark, which has one of the crucial ethnically various archdioceses in America.

When Pope Francis named him a cardinal in 2016, he was the primary to maintain the put up in Newark, throughout the Hudson River from New York Metropolis in New Jersey. He changed an archbishop who refused communion to politicians who supported abortion rights and who additionally failed to be sure that a priest who was convicted of kid sexual abuse would haven’t any entry to kids.

Cardinal Tobin is understood for his help of ladies, homosexual individuals and immigrants. His views had been formed after working as a parish priest, after which spending years touring the world as chief of his spiritual order, the Redemptorists.

Pope Benedict introduced him to the Vatican to assist lead the workplace that oversees spiritual orders, however after he defended nuns who had been being investigated by the Vatican for inadequate adherence to orthodoxy, he was despatched to Indianapolis to function its archbishop. There, in 2016, he insisted that the church would proceed to resettle Syrian refugees even after Mike Pence, then the governor of Indiana, tried to block the transfer.

He has proven help for the concept of ladies changing into deacons and stated that he didn’t see “a compelling theological purpose why the pope couldn’t identify a lady cardinal.”

— Elizabeth Dias

Peter Turkson

Just a few years in the past, Cardinal Peter Turkson of Ghana was on many shortlists to be the subsequent pope.

He was thought of a favourite within the 2013 conclave that elected Pope Francis, and he labored carefully with the pontiff on main points. However his star dimmed after Francis accepted his resignation from operating a significant church workplace.

Cardinal Turkson, 76, remains to be thought of among the many most distinguished African cardinals who might proceed Francis’ imaginative and prescient on social justice, financial equality and the surroundings. However he’s now given solely an out of doors shot.

In a 2017 overhaul of the Vatican forms, Francis saved him on as the top of the workplace for Selling Integral Human Improvement, which turned a bigger and extra empowered division. The workplace adopted social justice, migration and environmental points key to Francis’ agenda and was thus seen as central. Cardinal Turkson represented the Vatican on the highest ranges world wide, together with on the United Nations.

However an investigation into the workplace’s governance and operations was quickly adopted by Cardinal Turkson’s resignation. Cardinal Turkson framed it merely as the top of his time period, however some Vatican observers took it as a unfavorable judgment on his administration means.

Born right into a household of 10 kids with a once-Methodist mom and a Muslim paternal uncle, he stated he discovered interfaith dialogue at house, and he went on to research in seminaries in Ghana and New York. A speaker of six languages, in accordance to a Vatican profile, Cardinal Turkson studied in Rome for a doctorate in scripture research. He climbed the ranks, turned an archbishop underneath John Paul II and headed up a Vatican workplace underneath Benedict XVI.

— Jason Horowitz

Matteo Zuppi

Cardinal Matteo Maria Zuppi of Italy, 69, stands out among the many contenders who replicate Francis’ view that the church needs to be consultant of and help the poor. Francis promoted this progressive native of Rome to the rank of cardinal in 2019 and assigned him a number of necessary missions.

Cardinal Zuppi is carefully tied to Sant’Egidio, a Catholic neighborhood identified for its service to the poor and battle decision.

Vatican watchers say the group turned an more and more necessary foyer underneath Francis, however that hyperlink has additionally raised considerations that, if elected pope, he can be overly influenced by the group.

In 2015, Francis named him archbishop of Bologna, one of the crucial necessary posts in Italy. There, Don Matteo, as he’s identified, continued to work with poor individuals and migrants. “Welcoming migrants is a historic problem for Europe,” he has stated. “Christ invitations us to not flip away.” And in recent times, Francis appointed Cardinal Zuppi to the important thing function of envoy for Ukraine issues.

He has additionally been welcoming to L.G.B.T. Catholics, writing the preface for the Italian version of the Rev. James Martin’s 2017 guide, “Constructing a Bridge,” which known as for the church to discover new pastoral methods of ministering to homosexual individuals.

— Elisabetta Povoledo