Re: Is it Time to Go?
A formal prohibition against discussing who is going to be the next pope until the reigning pope is actually dead dates back a long way in history - 15 centuries to be exact. <br /><br />Pope Felix IV was a 6th Century pope who fell foul of the local clergy and the Roman Senate by trying to nominate his own successor. The Senate objected and passed an edict forbidding any discussion of his successor during a pope's lifetime. <br /><br />Walking through the splendidly frescoed corridors of power inside the Vatican during these crisis days when the absent Pope lies stricken and mute in hospital, at first sight everything seems terribly normal. <br /><br />Cardinals wearing their distinctive red sashes, or more simply dressed in simple clergymen's black suits, glide from office to office clutching their black briefcases. <br /><br />Nowadays they rarely wear the black cassocks with red piping which used to enable you immediately to identify their lofty rank. <br /><br />Little time to plot <br /><br />Behind the scenes at the Vatican however, behind those thickly padded doors which still protect the privacy of the top cardinals who run the Church, the gossip level about who is going to succeed John Paul has reached a new intensity. <br /><br />One well-known cardinal was heard to declare that one of his fellow Princes of the Church was an "idiot" for sounding off about the subject. <br /><br />There is only a small window of opportunity for the so-called "papabili" - the shortlist of real candidates for the job - to meet together and plot voting strategies at the Conclave, the electoral body of cardinals summoned from around the world on the death of the pontiff to elect his successor. <br /><br />The Conclave takes place not less than 15 and not more than 20 days after a pope's death. <br /><br />After the funeral they have little more than a week for informal secret discussions about the personality profile and job qualifications they are going to demand for their new leader. <br /><br />Even discussion about what would happen if the Pope were to go into a coma, or become mentally impaired, with disastrous possible consequences for the smooth functioning of the Vatican's well-oiled bureaucratic machine, is officially frowned upon. <br /><br />Eyebrows were therefore raised last month when the cardinal secretary of state, technically the Pope's number two, speculated in public about what would happen if the Pope felt he could no longer carry on as leader of the world's 1.1 billion Roman Catholics. <br /><br />Could he not resign, the cardinal was asked. That would be a matter for the Pope's own conscience, the cardinal replied, implying that resignation was still on the cards, despite the Pope's frequent insistence that he intends to carry on "while there is breath in my body". <br /><br />Looming limbo <br /><br />But no-one really seems to have budgeted for a prolonged absence of the Pope in hospital. <br /><br />The moment the Pope dies, every important official at the Vatican immediately loses his job, until he is confirmed in office by the next pontiff. <br /><br /> <br />Cardinal Angelo Sodano will always be in the Pope's shadow <br />The headquarters of the Church goes into a sort of limbo, to use the terminology the Church adopts to describe that halfway house between heaven and hell for souls destined neither for eternal punishment nor eternal bliss. <br /><br />The technical name is a "Vacancy of the Holy See". This is important because it highlights the absolute, monarchical power of the office of pope in the organisational structure of the Catholic Church. <br /><br />Once he is elected, every important appointment, every big policy decision has to be personally taken by him. <br /><br />Of course the Pope is assisted by his heads of department, and the Vatican bureaucracy is so finely honed, that it chugs along very well by itself, even if the Pope, like the current one, chooses not to interfere too much in the ordinary day-to-day running of Church administration. <br /><br />But the man usually described as Pope's number two, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, an Italian, can never pretend to exercise the same powers as those enjoyed by the Pope himself. <br /><br />So if John Paul were to lapse into a coma, or were to become impaired to the extent that he is unable effectively to exercise his powers, the implications for Church governance are grave. <br /><br />Modern medical progress can create administrative, as well as ethical problems.
I always thought that "POPES" stayed till they died<br /><br />When the black smoke comes out of the chimney the "Pope" has past on and time to select a nother to take his place!!!!