Keystone-SDA
“If I am elected, I run away in Sicily”: four days from the start of the election of the future Pope, a cardinal has thrown in the towel on Saturday, while the consultations will accelerate in the Vatican.
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03 May 2025 – 18:31
(Keystone-ATS) “I have absolutely no ambition. I could never imagine myself in this role, ”said he messaggero the archbishop of Rabat Cristobal Lopez Romero.
The approach is rare, even if the 72 -year -old cardinal with ideas close to François did not appear among the favorites, because the greatest discretion usually reigns in public positions on the name of the future Pope.
But the papacy is not desirable in the eyes of this prelate emblematic of the “peripheries” dear to François: “Those who wish are pushed by thirst for power”, he added.
Four days before the start of the conclave on Wednesday, the suspense remains whole on the name of the future pope, while the cardinals met on Saturday morning for the ninth time in “general congregation”. A total of 177 cardinals were present, including 127 voters (those under the age of 80), said Matteo Bruni, director of the Vatican press service.
There will be no meeting on Sunday, the day of celebration of the masses. But Monday consultations will accelerate since the general congregations will also meet in the afternoon at 5:00 p.m., in addition to their morning session.
These meetings allow prelates to discuss the challenges of the Church and to share their reflections – Saturday morning discussions addressed communion, solidarity between Churches and the role of curia in particular.
” Hope “
But it is also an opportunity for a speaker to be particularly convincing, or to draw his standard profile of the next pope. On Saturday “the wish was issued by a next prophetic pope” and “that the church does not close on the cenacle” but that it “brings light to the world which desperately needs hope”, explained Mr. Bruni.
Who will meet these criteria? In front of the Vatican Paul VI room where the meetings are held, the cardinals inevitably ask themselves the question by journalists who await firm foot the reckless on foot.
Will he be in the line of Pope Francis, reformer with the sliced speech? “We recognize what he has done but no pope is perfect, nobody can do everything,” said the Archbishop of Singapore William Seng Chye Goh, classified among the conservatives.
“We are going to find the right person to succeed Saint-Pierre” at the head of a Church with some 1.4 billion Catholics in the world, he added.
For his part, the Archbishop of Algiers Jean-Paul Vesco, classified among the progressives, “deeply hopes” a future pope in the continuity of François who “was like the father of the prodigal child who opens his arms and his heart great, that’s what we expect from a holy father”.
But before this historic vote “we do not feel ready, of course not,” he added, explaining: “We must discover the one that the Lord has already chosen. We would have needed much more prayer time together, but I am sure that at the right time, we will be ready and we will give the Church the Pope that the Lord wanted ”.
House Clos
The choice will be done behind closed doors, between the walls of the Sistine Chapel where the 133 cardinal voters will lock themselves up until a name collects a majority of two thirds. White smoke will then come out of the chimney installed on the roof of the chapel.
On Saturday, the Vatican press service broadcast a short film testifying to the progress of the preparations, in the chapel where a false floor was built, arranged tables, and the famous stove announcing the future pope installed.
A few hours before, American president Donald Trump had published on his social network a portrait of him, probably generated by artificial intelligence, showing him dressed in papal outfit.
