The Next Conclave

If you haven’t seen the movie “Conclave”, now is a good time to watch it. The College of Cardinals will huddle soon in a conclave to pick the next Pope. Just like in the movie, but hopefully with far less drama.

We won’t know anything about the inner workings of the conclave other than grey smoke from the chimney means no consensus and white smoke indicates the Cardinals have agreed on a new Pope.

The tensions in the Catholic Church and in the executive body of all organized religions is no less than what we see on the political stage. Liberals and conservatives vying for power, those who are able to put ancient narratives in proper context wrestling with those who take the text at face value. There are geopolitical pressures like having the first Asian or African Pope. Then there are the secrets handshakes that shove controversy under the rug.

Popes have an enormous portfolio that is united under a single umbrella. No other religion has a supreme leader like the Pope who leads 1.4 billion Catholics.

The Catholic Church is the largest Christian denomination and dwarfs the other denominations by an order of magnitude. In comparison, non-Catholic churches have 600M followers. As for other religions, there are 2B followers of Islam, 1B of Hinduism, 500M of Buddhism and 15.8M of Judaism. The “irreligious” account for 1.2B.

The word “Catholic” was coined by Ignatius of Antioch about 100 years after the passing of Christ. It is rooted in the Greek word “katholikos” which means “toward the whole” or that the Church is a gift of Christ to all people.

Catholics are spread throughout the world with Brazil having the highest concentration, about 12%. Mexico, Philippines, US, Italy, Colombia, France, Spain and Congo account for 50%.

65% of Europe was Catholic in 1910. This number has dropped to 35% now. The decline has been offset by growth in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Asia-Pacific region. As a result, the percent of Catholics globally has remained more or less constant at about 17%.

Pope Francis led a church rooted in 2,000 year old teachings in a world that is drastically different from when the Bible was written. The church’s history of abuse is incredibly challenging to reckon with. As a result, the Pope’s guidance was not without controversy, especially in the early years of his papacy. He was, nonetheless, a pastoral Pope who inspired dedication to social justice, war against poverty and environmental care.

In keeping with the global rightward swing, the next Pope may be more conservative. It’s also possible that the conclave will pick another person like Francis to continue modernizing the Church.

Regardless of whether we are religious, agnostic or atheist, it is time to send good thoughts to the one in six people among us for whom a new spiritual leader will be picked in the coming days with a process that has not changed in 800 years. Imagine that!

Image source: https://www.thesistinechapel.org/conclave