The conclave to elect the new pontiff, successor to Pope Francis, will begin on May 7. This was decided this morning by the General Congregation of Cardinals.

The week's calendar includes congregations in the morning at 9:00 and, in the afternoon at 17:00, the "novendiali" masses in the Vatican Basilica: the cycle of nine days of suffrage, which began on Saturday with the funeral mass presided over in St. Peter's Square by the Cardinal Dean Giovanni Battista Re, will end on Sunday 4 May. After that - as mentioned on 7 May - the entrance into the Sistine Chapel and the extra omnes that opens the Conclave.

The 135 "electors" (134 considering the forfeit for health reasons of the Cardinal of Valencia Antonio Canizares Llovera) are converging in Rome. Many will know each other directly in the congregations, where, in terms of strategies that will lead to the election of the new Pope, the weight of non-electors will also count a lot, that is, the cardinals 'over-80', who maintain their ability to influence and direct consensus. A sort of 'great electors', in short, even if then in the seclusion of the Sistine Chapel everyone answers to himself and, according to what is the Catholic yardstick, to the Holy Spirit.

THE BECCIU CASE – Among these 'grand old men' there is certainly the 91-year-old dean Re, who could also be the key man for the participation of Cardinal Angelo Becciu in the next Conclave. Re, who with his homily on Saturday retraced Bergoglio's pontificate, is said to be in favor and has already spoken about it with the Sardinian cardinal. While the camerlengo Kevin Joseph Farrel reported in recent days Francis' will to keep him out. A will that is also said to be written in black and white in two letters signed "F" that are said to be in the hands of Pietro Parolin: one dates back to 2023, the other is from March, when the Pope was already at the Gemelli . But there are those who maintain that these documents have no value for canon law.

The Becciu case is central because in the event of exclusion he could also challenge the election of the new Pontiff . The Spanish magazine Vida Nueva revealed that the orientation of the sacred college would be to "put the participation" of the Cardinal of Pattada to the vote during a "pre-Conclave". Probably between May 4 and 5. But there is also the hypothesis of an ad hoc commission, formed by five members, including Becciu himself.

THE GREAT OLD MEN – Among the cardinals with the ability to move votes, and not present in the Conclave, there are also former presidents of the CEI such as Camillo Ruini and Angelo Bagnasco , and then, among the foreigners, the cardinal of Boston Sean Patrick O'Malley, the most active promoter of the fight against sexual abuse, the cardinal of Vienna Christoph Schoenborn, a fine theologian and former student of Joseph Ratzinger and trustee of Pope Bergoglio in leading roles of various Synods such as those on the family, or the former prefect of bishops, the Canadian Marc Ouellet, also influential in Latin America, as former president of the competent Pontifical Commission.

Yesterday, the scene among the "papabili" was all for Pietro Parolin, former Secretary of State, who presided over the second mass of the "novendiali" in St. Peter's Square, in front of the 200,000 participants in the Jubilee of Adolescents. As a close collaborator of Pope Bergoglio, the sobriety, the confident but also affable and humane attitude with which he carried out the celebration recalled those of the then Prefect for the Doctrine of the Faith and Dean of the College of Cardinals Joseph Ratzinger when he officiated the funeral of John Paul II twenty years ago, emerging as the only true candidate for succession.

(Online Union)

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