(RNS) — Don’t believe anything you read about who is going to be the next pope — even what you read in this column. Conclaves have a way of surprising us.
This is especially true this time out, when the largest number of cardinals ever will be voting, and few of them know each other. The cardinals don’t even know what is happening. How could the media?
Most prognosticators, including gambling sites, are predicting that Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state, will be the next pope. I also believe he has a very good chance.
It is not unusual for a Vatican secretary of state to be a papabile, the Italian word for someone the cardinals are considering for pope. A vote for the secretary of state is a vote for continuity, since he has been a close collaborator with the previous pope. On the other hand, those who did not agree with his boss aren’t likely to vote for him.
Voting for Parolin would be voting for continuity in international relations especially, as this is his forte. On church issues, he supported Pope Francis, but the cardinal electors can’t be sure if that was out of loyalty or conviction.
The Vatican secretary of state is not only in charge of foreign policy, as the U.S. secretary of state is. He is more like a prime minister. He is the No. 2 man in the Vatican.
As a result, he bears some responsibility for the Vatican’s financial problems. Parolin’s supporters may argue that he paid attention to foreign policy but left the Vatican Curia and its finances to the now disgraced Cardinal Angelo Becciu. That was an expensive mistake.
Nor does Parolin have a charismatic personality. A professional diplomat, he chooses his words carefully, unlike the more spontaneous Francis. Some cardinals will prefer that, but will the people like it?
If the cardinal electors want charisma, they will have to look to someone like Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle or Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, the archbishop of Bologna. Both men are under 70 years of age, however, and their election could lead to a long papacy, which may make the cardinals think twice.
In the past, conclaves have led to surprises, as in the elections of Popes John XXIII, John Paul I, John Paul II and Francis. Few predicted these men would become pope. On the other hand, Popes Pius XII, Paul VI and Benedict XVI were sure bets.
I would argue that John XXIII, John Paul II and Francis were surprises in other ways. They did not turn out to be the kind of popes that many expected, including the cardinals who voted for them.
John was supposed to be an interim, do-nothing pope, yet he called the Second Vatican Council. Big surprise.
John Paul II was thought by many who voted for him to be more progressive than he turned out to be. Austrian Cardinal Franz König, a progressive, campaigned for his election but was disappointed by his papacy, which cut off theological discussion and debate.
On the other hand, Francis did not turn out to be the theological conservative many cardinals expected. They had heard that he was critical of liberation theology and was not liked by the Jesuits, his own order, which was considered too liberal by some cardinals. He had also supported Benedict in the last conclave. His papacy was full of surprises!
Papal elections so often surprise us because the cardinals, out of loyalty and deference, do not stray far from the papal party line while a pope is alive. As a result, we are never sure what they really think.
Once the pope is dead, they are no longer bound by loyalty. Neither is the man who becomes pope, who may then go his own way.
My advice is to wait until after the election and cheer the new pope, knowing it may be six months before you know what he is really like.
Above all, remember that everything I write here may be wrong.