(NEXSTAR) – Pope Francis, the primary Latin American pontiff in historical past, has handed away after a lifetime of dedication to the Catholic Church, the Vatican introduced Monday.
Francis’ dying comes just a few months after he was admitted to Gemelli hospital in Rome for a respiratory disaster that developed into double pneumonia. He spent 38 days there — the longest hospitalization of his 12-year papacy — however appeared effectively sufficient to have fun Holy Week, and he even blessed believers at an Easter Mass in St. Peter’s Sq. the day earlier than his passing.
Plans for Francis’ funeral have but to be formally introduced. However the dying of the 88-year-old pontiff places into movement the method of choosing a successor, in response to longstanding Vatican traditions.
Upon the dying (or resignation) of a pope, a gaggle of clergy members generally known as the School of Cardinals is known as to convene in Rome for a conclave, the place they may resolve on the following chief of the Catholic Church. Throughout this interim interval — generally known as an “interregnum” — the camerlengo (the Vatican’s treasurer, basically) acts because the non permanent administrator of the Holy See.
The present camerlengo is Cardinal Kevin Joseph Farrell, the identical official who introduced Francis’ dying on Monday morning.
There are at the moment 252 members of the School of Cardinals, which incorporates Vatican officers and bishops from around the globe. Most members are positioned in Europe (114), although there are dozens every in Asia (37), South America (32), Africa (29) and North America (28). Central America (8) and Oceania (4) have the fewest members.
Of those 252 members, solely these underneath the age of 80 are allowed to vote on the following pope, that means 135 are at the moment eligible to solid ballots. The successor will doubtless be one in every of their very own (nobody exterior of the School has been chosen as pope since 1378), however technically any baptized Roman Catholic man is eligible for the position. (The ages of the members of the School of Cardinals additionally vary from 45 to 99, although hardly ever in latest historical past has a pontiff at such younger or previous ages been chosen.)
The eligible members of the School of Cardinals will collect on the Vatican for conferences within the coming weeks, the place they “focus on the wants and the challenges dealing with the Catholic Church globally,” the USA Convention of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) explains. Ultimately, they may convene at St. Peter’s Basilica within the Vatican to vote by secret poll, “processing one after the other as much as Michelangelo’s fresco of the Final Judgment, saying a prayer and dropping the twice-folded poll in a big chalice,” per the USCCB.
If no candidate will get two-thirds of the vote, the method is repeated as much as 4 instances (whole) per day. The general public is notified if the voting physique fails to succeed in the edge when black smoke begins rising from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel.
If and when two-thirds of the School of Cardinals vote to pick a particular candidate, that candidate is requested whether or not he accepts the position. If that’s the case, the ballots are burned with chemical compounds to create white smoke, which is distributed billowing from the chimney to sign the approaching formal announcement of a brand new pope.
It’s robust to say who, among the many eligible members, is perhaps favored for the place, because it’s thought-about uncouth to debate such issues publicly — and even poorer type to marketing campaign for the job.
To that time, a well-liked saying in Vatican circles is that when you “enter a conclave as pope, you allow as a cardinal” — a phrase which suggests the sacred course of isn’t any recognition contest or marketing campaign, however relatively the divinely impressed election of Christ’s Vicar on Earth by the princes of the church.
The Related Press contributed to this report.
