Published in its print edition on April 19 – 25, 2025
PICKING the next Pope would never be an easy task as Catholic cardinals will meet on May 7 to start voting at the Sistine Chapel under Michelangelo’s 16th-century ceiling frescoes, as the Vatican announced recently.
Vatican has reported that just a week after the death of Pope Francis, the so-called “Princes of the Church” or the Cardinals under the age of 80 will meet in the Sistine Chapel to choose a new religious leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics.
This is just two days after the funeral of Francis, who died on April 21 aged 88.
Only 135 are eligible to vote in the conclave even though 252 cardinals were called back to Rome. The Sistine Chapel will be closed.
Just las Sunday, about 70,000 mourners took glimpses at the pope’s marble tomb in the Santa Maria Maggiore Basilica in Rome.
Italian Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican’s secretary of state, and Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, the Metropolitan Archbishop emeritus of Manila, are shoo-ins for the post together with Ghana’s Cardinal Peter Turkson.
For the one to be chosen, it is said to be a leader who can unify and have a universal heart.
Praying for the best one.#
