A Primer on Papal Elections
Well, this IS the hyperfixation dumping ground ...
N.B.: I watch cardinals and rising politics in the Church like someone watches college football, hotly anticipating Draft Day. Papal Election is effectively Draft Day for 1 of them. I have an advanced degree in medieval history, so I'm REALLY into papal elections as a cultural and historical phenomenon.
So what's the big deal about the Pope? How did he get to be leader of the Catholic Church?
This goes waaaay back. A see is a bishop's seat. A bishop is a man who handles the administrative duties of a geographic area known as a diocese, as well as the sacramental (baptizing babies, giving Communion, marrying people, giving Extreme Unction, hearing confessions) and pastoral duties (caring for parishioners, distributing charity, preaching sermons, reading the Bible) of a priest. It's a position of leadership, enabling the bishop to create new priests. Per Catholic tradition, the first man to be the Bishop of Rome was St. Peter, Jesus's bestie/right hand man/leader of the original 12 Apostles. During early centuries of the Church, the see of Rome was always considered to be a little more special than the other ancient sees of Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Byzantium/Constantinople because of that association. This is called Petrine Doctrine (Rome is special due to Peter being the first holder of the position). This was made concrete in 451, when Bishop Leo of Rome somehow managed to prevent the Huns from sacking the city. It was perceived as a miracle and an indicator that there truly was something special about Peter's See and the man who occupied it. By 500, we have the Pope -- papa, or father, to the whole Church in Western Europe.
It's important to know that minus the Oriental Orthodox Church, the Coptic Church, and a few others that made their own church in response to doctrinal differences, there was only one mainline Christian church across Eurasia. This was the case until 1054.
How did we get a conclave in the first place?
The Papacy -- the government of the Pope -- runs as an elected monarchy. It has done so since 1059. In 1054, the Great Schism between the Western Latin and the Eastern Greek Church happened, wherein the Bishop of Rome (Pope) and the Patriarch of Constantinople mutually excommunicated each other over doctrinal differences, including clerical celibacy, married priests, the dominance (or not) of God the Father, and others.
The Western Latin's Church's response to this was, "We effed up. We need to get rid of corruption." Thus a massive series of reforms followed. Some of these reforms post-1054 included changing the way the Pope was chosen. Prior to this, sometimes, the people of Rome picked him. Other times, the dying Pope chose his successor. And sometimes, kings and emperors would give their input/pressure.
Essentially, there was no systematic way to choose the Pope. That was a vulnerability that led to corruption and abuse of office. Thus the establishment of a papal election. Bishops and Archbishops that were particularly esteemed were given the title of Cardinal and a red hat. The red hat isn't just sartorial -- you can vote for who the next pope is. The first elections were tiny -- less than 10 cardinals. First papal election under this system was Alexander II in 1061.
Conclave -- the election happening in behind closed doors -- only kicks off in the 1200s, when it was concluded that even with only cardinals choosing the Pope, they could still be corrupted by external influences. Also, the number of cardinals -- bishops and archbishops who oversaw an ever-increasing Christian population -- was higher. Somewhere between 30 and 50 cardinals participated in the conclaves regularly during the Middles Ages.
You know that "papal election that took 3 years" that the internet/newspapers are talking about? Yeah, to fix that problem (which was the 1268-71 election of Gregory X), the Church made conclave in 1276. 1276 was a particularly bus-firey year in which 3 conclaves were held, because 3 pope died within 6 months of being elected. Indeed, the last Pope voted in 1276 died in 1277 due to the ceiling collapsing on him while he was working one day (John XXI, who was a doctor of medicine who was still practicing even as Pope).
Conclave and Recent History
English speakers have a tendency to smoosh things together. Char le Magne = Charlemagne. Timur the Lame = Tamerlane. Con clave = conclave. "Con clave" means 'with key', literally. It meant any lockable room, but it's taken on special meaning with the papal conclave, or the secret election of the pope. While the pope is in office nobody talks about what went down in the conclave that elected him. (This did create an awkward situation when Benedict XVI resigned, ending his papacy but not his life; people could talk about his conclave while he was still alive, which is weird. We'll talk about him later.)
When a pope dies or resigns, a conclave is called. The cardinals go to Rome to vote. Since 1492, the vote has been held in the Sistine Chapel in Vatican Palace. Yes, it is a museum today, but it's also a living workplace. I advise you not to rush through the Vatican Museum tour to get to the Sistine Chapel -- it is the last room, and you will miss out on all of the other marvelous artworks commissioned by the Church from Raphael and other great artists.
Up until 1996, the cardinals literally ate, slept, and bathed in the Sistine Chapel. Yes, it sucked as much as you think it did, which is why John Paul II permitted the cardinals to bunk over at the St. Martha Guesthouse. St. Martha's has gotten a lot of attention in recent years because Pope Francis refused to move out -- he came to the conclave as Cardinal Bergoglio, and then returned to his rooms as Pope Francis. Thus he remained, never moving into the Papal Apartments. Francis was notoriously anti-swag, much to the distress of ecclesiastical tailors in Rome -- no more fancy robes to make. As a result, there's literally only one left now within Vatican City walls.
Since the 1830s, the conclaves have taken less than a week. However, there are up to 4 votes a day, so you still get multiple rounds in that time. John XXIII was the last pope to go over 10 rounds, with 11 rounds in 3 days in 1958. This was a byproduct of the Cold War, with two cardinals unable to attend due to Communist regimes. Politics was definitely on the platter, and Roncalli, the future John XXIII, duked it out with a much younger Armenian cardinal, Agagianian. Roncalli won it, despite his age, because Agagianian was not only Armenian (no non-Italian pope since Adrian VI in 1523), but also only 52 years old. Long papacies are not always desirable.
John Paul II is the most recent election that went over 5 rounds. In 1978, conclave was called to elected a pope after Paul VI died. They elected Albani Luciano, who took the name John Paul. Very cute, done in under 5 votes.
Then John Paul corked it 33 days later. The second Conclave of 1978 was complicated by the fact that the consensus candidate was now dead. As a result, after 7 rounds of the Italian heavyweights slugging it out, on the 8th round, a 58-year-old Polish cardinal named Karol Wojtyla was elected in an October Surprise. And again, the non-Italian and age factors do matter.
So since I've hit upon age and national origin, I think that's the topic of the next post.