Posted on 02/13/2013 10:49:33 AM PST by haffast
Pope Benedict XVI’s sudden announcement that he would resign by the end of the month took the church and the world by surprise, in large part because it was a move without precedent in the modern world.
But what comes next is as old and familiar as the papacy itself: Speculating about who will succeed to the Throne of St. Peter.
Indeed, within months of Benedict’s own election in 2005, church insiders and online oddsmakers were trying to figure out who might be next, given that Benedict—now 85—was already aging, increasingly frail, and had himself declared that he did not expect his reign to be a long one.
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Will the conclave make the epochal break with the European monopoly and pick a cardinal from Latin America or Africa? The Catholic Church is booming in the Southern Hemisphere, as opposed to Europe and North America, where it is on life-support or barely treading water.
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“In my eyes it would be a good thing if a candidate from Latin America or Africa were elected at the next conclave,” Cardinal Kurt Koch, a Swiss prelate who is the Vatican’s top official for dialogue with other churches, said in December.
The future of the church “does not lie in Europe,” Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Mueller, a German who Benedict tapped last year to serve as the Vatican’s doctrinal watchdog, said in a separate interview in December. “I know a number of bishops and cardinals from Latin America who could take responsibility for the entire world Church.”
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(Excerpt) Read more at charismanews.com ...
What about Tarcisio Pietro Evasio Bertone?
Romana translated from Latin to English yields Roman :D People will find a way.
They look more like candidates for “Upper Class Twit of the Year”.
OMG..that’s a riot!
I like Cardinal Angelo Scola, but Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco would also be acceptable.
That last one ... there's something so evil in Bam-Bam's dead face expression that just makes my blood run cold.
We shoulda be so lucky!
Papa Guido Primo!
Hah...Pope PiousIII..(the turd)
I highly doubt they’d pick someone that young again, they don’t want them reigning for decades anymore.
If all else fails: he's the bishop of Rome in the office of Peter, shaazam, Peter the Roman, prophecy fulfilled.
:)
I’m cramming my Latin while looking forward to the televised debates.
It's not naive and I hope he does seriously believe it. While I admit that every human interaction has it's mundane and even political aspect the election of a Pope is a very seriously different occaision. The electors meeting in the Conclave are very human and very fallible but none the less they are the instruments through which the Holy Spirit will make known His choice for our next Supreme Pontiff.
All the politicking, and speculating and bargaining in the world will not make one tiny bit of difference.
I bet we'd be suprised how much politics there is.
Turkson is running. Which is why he’ll lose.
Keep an eye on Malcom Cardinal Ranjith of Colombo, Sri Lanka.
You saw it here first.
Don’t think for a minute that there are no politics involved.
If I were a betting man I would bet the new Pope will be black. Politics, certainly , and political correctness to boot.
More interesting would be speculations on what nick the next pope picks!
It's just a hunch, but I suspect it'll be someone younger than people are expecting.
I do like Tagle from what I've heard from him, though. I ran across a few things he's had to say while they've been fighting changes to laws in the Philippines and it seems like he's not worried about stepping on toes.
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