“No
Americans are among the papabile. Modern popes generally have come from
countries with little political or military power. If an American were elected,
says [Jesuit priest and author Thomas] Reese, ‘people would think the election
was fixed by Wall Street or the CIA.’”— Jeffery
L. Sheler and Eleni
Dimmler, “The Next Pope,” US News and World Report, May 11, 1998
As I’ve
gotten older, I have increasingly delighted in coming across past analytical
journalism to see how well they predict what will come to pass. For all the
hours these scribes devoted to their beats, you’d be surprised how many flunk
this basic test.
This US
News and World Report article from a quarter-century ago is a good case in
point. It took another seven years after its publication before Pope John Paul
II died. In that time, he appointed several dozen cardinals. Just as important,
several were of such an advanced age that they were no longer considered papabile
by the end of his pontificate. Some were even too old even to vote by this
time.
Few fields
lend themselves less to such thumb-sucking exercises as papabili prognostication.
Reporters look at the Roman Catholic Church, see an institution whose dogma has
changed little, all things considered, over the centuries, and believe that
they can scope out which cardinal will ascend the throne of St. Peter.
As far as
I’m concerned, they’ve been blowing smoke about the white smoke at the end of
these conclaves for years. Somehow, though, it feels worse with the one that
will start on May 7 to replace Pope Francis.
I chuckled
when I read the line in the above quote about how the trail of unsuccessful
front-runners “has never stopped Vatican observers from compiling lists of papabile.”
Precisely—the US News and World Report piece was doing just that!
My
question: have Vatican insiders been compiling these to guide their personal selections
for the next pope—or to amuse themselves as they take languid lunches with
journalists desperate to please their bosses back home?
In many
respects, I part company with the neoconservative author George Weigel and his
brand of ultra-traditional Catholicism. He notes, for instance, that
notwithstanding efforts by Francis to broaden Church governance, he was “the
most autocratic pontiff in centuries.” Really? While Weigel might not be guilty
of heresy, he certainly is of hyperbole—so much so that you couldn’t even get a
devil’s advocate to argue his case convincingly.
Even so, I
must agree with three points he makes in his Wall Street Journal
analysis from a week ago about the upcoming conclave:
*“The
cardinal-electors don't really know each other”;
*Popes,
even with their appointment of many cardinals, can’t control the election of
their successors;
* “Every
conclave is a unique micro-environment, psychologically and spiritually.”
Considering
these three points, why are so many people foolhardy enough to think they’ll
know what will happen?
The speculation
about the winner at the conclave has become ridiculous. A combined $17 million
have changed hands on the prediction markets Polymarket and Kalshi, according
to Alexander Osipovich’s article in this weekend’s Wall Street Journal.
Complicating
all of this even further is the misleading lens through which the media
interprets the factions within the Church in general and the conclave in
particular. Whatever divisions exist in the hierarchy—and they are real—they don’t
neatly align with Democratic and Republican policies.
For all
their orthodoxy on sexual issues, for instance, Popes John Paul II and Benedict
XVI were largely indistinguishable from Pope Francis on matters of war and
peace and their deep skepticism of unrestrained capitalism.
So there
is a strong possibility that whoever is selected at the end of this process
will fulfill neither the greatest hopes nor worst fears of those watching the
proceedings with burning interest.
I hope—no,
I pray—that the cardinals conclude their deliberations swiftly. I just
don’t think I can take much more of this ill-informed silly season.
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