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The Papal Conclave starts tomorrow, and between popular media like “Conclave” and “The Young Pope” garnering tons of attention, and misconceptions around power hungry Cardinals vying for the top spot in the Catholic Church, Joe breaks down what we can expect from the upcoming Conclave, and how other REAL Popes felt when they took office.
Transcript:
Joe:
Welcome back to Shameless Popery. I’m Joe Heschmeyer and the conclave. To elect a new pope to succeed, Pope Francis begins tomorrow. Now, recent history is any guide. We’re probably going to have a new pope later this week, but the whole process of choosing a pope in a papal conclave is famously mysterious. Only a tiny handful of people in history have ever participated in the election of a pope, and the whole process is shrouded in secrecy. Hollywood depictions like the Young Pope or more recently conclave paint the papacy and papal conclaves in a cynical light that it’s all about power. Hungry men engaged in corrupt political schemes as they desperately vie for the papacy. But the truth is something far stranger that the men who become Pope seem by all appearances, to quite seriously not want to be Pope. So today I want to take an honest look at what we can really expect the conclave to be like, and also how wrong some of our preconceptions about this might really be.
Now I think you’re going to be surprised, but before we get there, I want to thank all of you who support this show over@shamelessjoe.com. I hope you’re enjoying an ad-free version of this video, and I know that I’m enjoying answering all of your questions in our two weekly live streams, and your direct support of this channel means a lot to me and to those of us here at Catholic Answers and it really does keep the show going. So if you haven’t joined yet, please visit shameless joe.com and join for as little as $5 a month. Okay, so we know the basic details. There’s a schedule of praying together and of voting, and once a single candidate has two thirds of the votes of his brother Cardinals, so that’s going to be 90 votes total. In this case, that man is elected Pope, but even the name conclave refers to the fact that the whole process is under lock and key with no communication to the outside world.
The Cardinals themselves are forbidden from discussing the specifics of the conclave for the rest of their lives upon pain of excommunication, like anything secret, particularly concerning one of the most influential roles on the planet, some people are going to look at the process with a hint of suspicion. This has given rise to a lot of speculation about what it’s really like and how someone really becomes Pope. Now, one of the most popular ideas is that the papacy works largely like a position of worldly power like political office and that there’s all the ambition and jockeying for power and politicking and the like that you would expect. Now, we’ve seen this most recently, I would say in the movie Conclave. Now that movie is based on Robert Harris’s book, conclave The Power of God, the Ambition of Men as the title suggests, it shows various cardinals trying really hard to become Pope and engaging in all sorts of plots and discovery and salacious secrets as they try to get ahead of one another.
CLIP:
It’s the report on the activities of Trembley. It’s an overwhelming premier FCI case that he’s guilty of simony, which of course is an offense stipulated in the I’m
Aware of what Simon is.
Thank you. He only obtained all those votes in the first ballot because he bought them. I could
Never become Pope in these circumstances. A stolen document, the smearing of a brother Cardinal, I’d be the Richard Nixon of Popes
Then stay clearer this, leave it to me. I’m willing to handle the consequences.
The child was raised in a Christian household and to this day he has no idea who his father is. If indeed it is me, we were very young. No, no, no, Joshua, she was very young. She was 19 years old. I am ready to take this burden. Does a single mistake 30 years ago disqualify me? There is no hope. After such a public scene, there will be rumors and you know what the cure is like. Nothing terrifies our colleagues more than the thought of yet more sexual scandals. I’m more sorry than I can say. You’ll never be pop.
Joe:
Now the movie is high drama and divorced from context. I think it’s pretty intriguing. It’s certainly well shot, but is this really what conclaves are like? Well, the best review of the movie actually comes from Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston, why he’s one of only 103 people alive today who’ve actually participated in a papal conclave before, meaning he’s part of a small handful of people who actually know how realistic the movie is. And his takeaway was, no, it wasn’t really like that. And that instead of a scene of political backroom plotting of how to get your candidate elected, it was instead an experience of very intense retreat where there was much prayer in silence in listening to conferences on spiritual themes that sounds less like a devious secret battle of ambition and more like a reverence, solemn contemplative experience and an undertaking done with great seriousness.
Now of course there are probably cardinals out there who think in their heart of hearts that they would make good popes, but there’s a reason that there’s an Italian saying that the man who enters the conclave of pope leaves as a cardinal. Back in 2013, the media was convinced that the next Pope was going to be Cardinal Cola, and hardly anyone was focused on Jorge pergola of Argentina. So don’t expect to make sense of the upcoming conclave by thinking about it in political terms like a presidential election. Historically, the men who became Pope convinced that they had some great plan to fix the church or fix the world were often thwarted either by the circumstances of life or by the circumstances of their own death. While the greatest popes in the history of the church have often been the men who really, really did not want to become Pope, and perhaps this is fitting after all, the Pope is the successor to St.
Peter. In St. Peter’s reaction to Jesus was to say to him, depart from me for I’m a sinful man, oh Lord, and is only then that Jesus calls Peter to become a fisher of men. Worldly power makes men proud, but the office of the papacy makes men quake, and you don’t have to take my word for it, or even someone like Cardinal O’Malley’s, you can listen to the popes in their own words as they candidly confess how much they hated becoming Pope. It’s a side of them that we normally don’t really get to see. So for the second half of this video, I want to look at a variety of popes from five 90 to 1903, both the famous and the largely forgotten to hear from them what it felt like becoming Pope and how they handled the newfound power. I found their responses surprising. I think that it highlights a beautiful humility that you rarely find in secular heads of state in five 90. Pope Gregory, the first is elected Pope. He’s remembered to history as Pope St. Gregory the Great because he is truly one of the greatest popes in our history. He was a great combination of being both an excellent administrator and a tremendous spiritual leader. In the words of the Protestant pastor Dr. Gavin Orland
CLIP:
In the sixth century, you have a massive consolidation and expansion of papal power with Gregory the Great who’s an incredible leader, and I love Gregory the Great. His book of pastoral rule is awesome.
Joe:
I agree with Gavin on both of those things. In the 14 years that he was Pope Gregory really did change the course of history in some obvious ways. Now, you might imagine that when a man like Gregory became Pope, he would be enthusiastic about all of the ways he could perform the church or all of the ways in which he could feed the flock of Christ. But when you actually read Gregory’s letters, a rather different picture emerges and a letter to the patriarchs of the church. Gregory admits that when I consider how unworthy as I am and resisting with my whole soul, I’ve been compelled to bear the burden of pastoral care. A darkness of sorrow comes over me and my sad heart sees nothing else but the shadows which allow nothing to be seen. Okay, that is surprisingly dark. But why? Well, Gregory offers both spiritual and practical reasons for this experience he’s going through spiritually.
He points out that God calls men to serve as bishops so that they might intercede for their flock, and he’s on good biblical footing here. Hebrews 13 tells us that we should obey our leaders because they’re keeping watch over your souls as men will have to give account. That’s a serious accounting. And so St. James warns us, let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, for you know that we who teach shall be judged with greater strictness. So even though Gregory was a literal saint, he still the good sense and the humility to realize that by accepting the papacy, he was inviting a stricter judgment from God. That is biblical teaching. The more you’re giving, the more is expected of you. But Gregory is concerned about becoming the Pope for another reason as well. At the time of his election in five 90, Rome is a city in ruins.
There’s this myth that the Pope becomes more powerful over time because the popes are just power hungry or because, well, Rome is the capital of the Roman empire. But that gets history almost entirely backwards. In 3 30, 260 years before Gregory becomes Pope, and only shortly after Christianity is legalized, Constantine moves the capital of the empire from Rome to New Rome, Constantinople. And so for a quarter century, the Roman empire largely abandons the old city of Rome, allowing it to be sacked repeatedly by barbarians like the Lombards, a Germanic tribe that was at this point largely pagan. Still as the historian Richard Krautheimer points out, by the time Gregory becomes pulp, the lombards have conquered much of the area around Rome and the city of Rome is filled with thousands of hungry refugees, including some 3000 refugee nuns who couldn’t safely be in the path of the barbarians.
But since many of the farmers have fled, food is also scarce and those former farmlands are turning into malaria infested swamps. And amidst all of this, the Roman Empire is doing nothing. Gregory is predecessor. Pious II sent a delegation, but probably included Gregory himself to beg the emperor for help. But the emperor was too busy fighting Persians and building up new Rome to care what happened to old Rome. And to top it all off, they were then devastating floods and the outbreak of a terrible plague, probably bubonic plague in five 90 and one of the first victims is Pope Pelagius ii. So this is the mess that Gregory is stepping into. And his concern isn’t that the situation is hard or messy or even that it’s too much to handle. It’s that in handling it, he’s going to be one occupied by external cares and that it risks turning him into an earthly noble more than a spiritual shepherd.
Remember, that’s the life that he gave up to enter the church because you see, Gregory had been born into in aristocratic Roman family. He could have lived that life of a worldly noble if he wanted to, but he gave it up to try to live the simple life of a monk. He even converted his family’s villa into a monastery, a monastery run by St. Augustine, the future Archbishop of Canterbury, by the way. But the church kept calling him into these positions of service in the world. First is a papal diplomat and then his pope. And so instead of passing his life in quiet prayer, he instead finds himself tasked with feeding and closing the poor and the refugees of Rome, including these thousands of displaced nuns. And somehow in the midst of this, he finds the time and energy and resources to start coordinating the ransoming of Christian slaves.
Now in this way, the papacy comes to replace much of the role that had once been occupied by the Roman Empire in the West. But this isn’t because of power hungry popes because the Roman emperors are refusing to care for the poor and refugees of Western Europe. And Gregory knows well that true religion is visiting orphans and widows in their affliction and keeping oneself unstained from the world. I’ve got to say not bad for a guy who seemed heartbroken at having become Pope. I want to actually jump now all the way from five 90 to 1829 because in 1829, the College of Cardinals elect Pope Pius viii, and he quickly writes his brother Bishops and in document that outlines the program for his pontificate. You don’t always see that just laying out like, here’s the agenda, here’s the plan. He begins that he’s speaking in the papal we by describing how this office has been granted to us even though we are humble and unworthy.
And then he tells them how we open our heart with joy to you venerable brothers whom God has given to us as helpers in the conduct of so great in administration, we are pleased to let you know the intimate sentiments of our will. We also think it helpful to communicate those things from which the Christian cause may benefit. And honestly, Pius eight’s reaction is more or less what I would’ve expected. Maybe it’s just because used to listening to winning political candidates, talking about how they’re honored and humbled and ready to get to work and all of their acceptance speeches. I suppose I more or less thought popes were going to speak the same way. And that does seem like what Pius eight sounds like. And to be fair, of course, he’s quick to point out all of the saddening and disheartening things facing the church as well.
But he seems upbeat about their collective ability to tackle these problems together. And all of this only heightens the great irony that as his Wikipedia page notes, the pontificate of PII was the shortest of the 19th century and is likely the least remembered. So to put it in context, PIIC died in 1830 the year after his election is Pope. And for the next 73 years, there’d be only three other popes. This was an era of extremely long pontificates. You had a Pope who reigned for 15 years, then 32 years, then 24 years. So needless to say, in comparison to that, Pius eight’s ambitious plans came to nothing. Well, let’s turn to one of those long serving popes Pius thei. He’s in fact the longest serving Pope in history and he led the church on earth in a time of great tumult. Two years after his election is Pope Europe is plunged into what are known as the revolutions of 1848.
This was a series of revolutions. They start in Italy, but they spread across Europe, and really they end up in 50 different countries around the world. So at the time of great chaos and upheaval in late 1846, the newly elected Pius shares with his brother bishops about his disquietude and anxiety about becoming Pope. He seems to recognize the revolutionary spirit in the air, and he tells him that if the burden of the apostolic ministry is rightly considered to be at all times exceedingly heavy and beset with dangers, it is to be dreaded, most particularly in these times. Sure, so critical for the Christian Commonwealth. It’s striking to hear Pope talk about how dreadful it is to become Pope, but Pius reminds him and perhaps us that in times of weakness and instability, it’s all the more important to turn to God rather than to despair that God never abandons those who hope in him, and that God delights in using weak instruments to accomplish his will, including using weak men to serve as Pope.
He even reminds him and us of an important spiritual lesson. One reason God seems to delight in using weak men is so that we can never forget that it’s ultimately God himself and not us, not even the Pope who keeps the church afloat. But I really want to talk about the third of the three Pius here, which is St. Pius ii. I’m not sure any Pope in history has wanted to be Pope less than Pope Pius II did. And yet once again, he was an excellent spiritual father and effective leader and a literal saint. But in 1903, when Pope Leo 13 died, a French cardinal suggested to Pius that he wouldn’t be eligible to become Pope since he didn’t speak French, since that was one of the major issues facing the church, anti clerical France. And in response, the future Pope says, thank God I am not eligible for the papacy.
Well, it turns out God’s not French I kid, but the College of Cardinals, they seemed poised to actually elect a different cardinal, but then for complicated political reasons involving a national veto from the Austrian emperor that I’m just going to skip over. The Cardinals go back to the drawing board and they turn their attention to Cardinal Giuseppe Sarto, the future Pope Pius ii. So how does he react to this news? Well, one of the first things Pius does is he gets rid of the national veto, that whole thing that led to him becoming the Pope. But even before he does that, he writes this work called Eup Supreme. It’s a beautiful papal in cyclical on the restoration of all things in Christ. It is his first public address to his brother Bishop, and he begins it by reminding them with what tears and warm insistence he tried to ward off this formidable burden of the pontificate.
He actually compares his situation that of Saint Ansel of Canterbury, who grieved, wept and turned pale when the bishops and Abbots and other nobles dragged him off to the church carrying him as he objected and protested all but forcing him to become the Archbishop of Canterbury, until he finally concluded that he was resisting not just men but God and so gave in. And St. Pius explained why he was terrified as St. Anselm had been. Why was Pius terrified of becoming Pope? Well, he cites three reasons, number one, his own unworthiness. Number two, the difficulty of following immediately after Pope Leo 13th, whose nearly 26 year reign was the fourth longest in history. And number three, what he called the disastrous state of human society today. Remember, this is 1903, and the Pope, I think rightly diagnosed secular society with a terrible and deep-rooted malady, which developing every day and eating into its endless being is dragging it to destruction, and which he correctly predicted was going to get even worse.
Now, Pius lived just long enough to see his terrible prediction come true with the outbreak of World War I. Is it any wonder then that cognizant of his weakness, he should recoil in terror from a task as urgent as it is arduous in restoring the world to Christ? Now, I think Pope Clement the 14th actually provided us a faithful with something really practical. He summed up the situation facing the pope’s, both of his day and our own when he wrote back in 1769. Since we have been elevated to the papacy by the inscrutable Council of Divine wisdom and goodness, and by no merits of our own while acknowledging the gift of God, we also fear his judgment. And so as often as we seriously contemplate the task entrusted to us, we are frightened by His gravity. Our awareness of the weakness of our own resources deeply disturbs us.
If we were not confident of his help, we could lose courage altogether without the help of God. No Pope is holy enough or strong enough to do what needs to be done. And so Clements says, therefore, we implore the help of all Christians and invoking God to strengthen us, to fill us with the knowledge of his will and to pour into us the spirit of wisdom and understanding the spirit of knowledge and holiness and the spirit of counsel and fortitude. So that’s a great checklist of traits you should be praying for in the man that the College of Cardinals chooses as the next Pope. And remember that the next Pope, whether he’s the guy you were rooting for or not, he needs your prayers because the role that he’s about to take on is too big for him. That’s what it is to be a successor of Peter. Even Peter himself struggled with the role that God had called him to. We often talk about this in the context of Matthew 16, but for my money, one of the most underappreciated passages is actually Luke 22. So what happened at the Last Supper that points to Peter as the first Pope and how does he respond to it? Well click here to find out for yourself for Shameless Popery. I’m Joe Heschmeyer. God bless you.