Conclave uses media to set agenda for vote on new pope
VATICAN CITY -- Just five hours after Pope John Paul II was buried beneath St. Peter's Basilica, Cardinal Francis George of Chicago stepped up to a bank of microphones to address reporters' questions on the election of a new pope.
George was not pushing his candidacy to the throne of St. Peter, or at least he went out of his way to make sure it didn't look that way. Still, the fevered pitch of the news conference Friday gave the setting the air of the final days of a political campaign, as the cardinal laid out the key challenges facing the church and what he sees as the defining issues inside the conclave of 117 cardinals who will pick John Paul's successor.
In this vote, there is no equivalent of the New Hampshire primary, no televised debates, or party convention. But electing a pope involves a discreet political process, and it has been transformed in the information age.
Just as John Paul II became the first pope to skillfully use the world's media to spread his message, this conclave is the first to use the media to set the agenda for election of the spiritual leader of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics.
Listing priorities that he felt were facing the church as it prepared for the next pope, George ticked off his top three ''talking points": aggressive secularism in America and Europe, the ongoing divisions between rich and poor countries, and the moral issues surrounding the sanctity of life amid modern advances in science. He had shed the more formal red vestments and ''zucchetto," or skullcap, and donned black clerical garb and smart, thick-soled shoes. He explained that there are ''discussions in public and private" and a process of the cardinals getting to know one another and discussing the concerns of their respective dioceses.
''When two or more people gather to discuss issues it could be called politicking," he said, but added that it was more than that -- it was a daunting challenge in which cardinals would reflect and pray that they make the right choice for the right man.
The more public politicking has been going on for the past week as cardinals from all over the world work the press office in the Vatican, queuing up on rooftop camera positions for live interviews on CNN and the BBC and speaking mostly in a code with buzz words laden with significance for Vatican watchers.
Last week, three days before the pope's funeral, the press room just off St. Peter's Square was a hive of journalists and analysts waiting for the next ''bulletino," or press release. Cardinal Achille Silvestrini, a dean among the Italian cardinals, moved quickly into the press room and was soon cornered by reporters. He discussed the need for ''communion" and ''collegiality," two buzz words that Vatican observers say indicate a desire to move away from the last papacy's centralized decision-making.
''The big idea is opening the windows of the church, bringing in everyone -- even those theologians shunted aside," said Silvestrini, who is over 80 and therefore too old to vote for the next pope. Speaking to Robert Moynihan, a Vatican commentator on CNN and editor of the Rome-based monthly magazine, Inside the Vatican, he added to be sure to ''get that message out."
Moynihan said, ''He didn't just wander in here for no reason. That is politics at work."
Moynihan explained that the kind of politicking that has been aired on television since the pope's death could strike some, especially American Catholics, as undignified. But he said it is as old as the church itself. The only difference now, he said, is that glimpses of the insular, sometimes Byzantine, world of the Vatican are being beamed out on satellite television.
Yesterday, the cardinals announced that they had agreed to step back from making comments to the media as part of ''a gentlemen's agreement," as one cardinal explained it. Whether that agreement will hold remains to be seen, but the cardinals emerged tight-lipped from their conference yesterday inside Vatican City.
The pope's funeral began nine days of official mourning. The process of electing a pontiff will officially get underway with the start of the conclave April 18. At that point, the cardinals will be sequestered in a new residence known informally as Santa Marta.
In the meantime, a special Mass will be held each day at the nine major Catholic churches of Rome. Each will be celebrated by senior cardinals, whose homilies will be scrutinized for hidden messages to how a cardinal will vote.
The cardinals will move their discussions and politicking inside the walls of the Vatican, in the residences of various cardinals in Rome, and in some of their favorite restaurants, such as Abruzzi and L'Eau Vive.
Such political machinations behind the scene are difficult to see, and as the conclave grows closer, the secrecy will deepen. But as John Allen, author of ''Conclave: The Politics, Personalities, and Process of the Next Papal Election," pointed out, ''The process and how it works sometimes surprises Americans or is seen as darkly secretive, but, hey, it worked pretty well last time. Look at who they produced."
The Rev. Thomas Reese, editor of the Catholic magazine America and author of ''Inside the Vatican: The Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church," said the key to understanding how the issues will be defined is to remember that all of the regions of the world will bring different perspectives.
For American and European cardinals, the issue is secularization -- the diminishing role of faith in public life that is leaving many church pews across Europe, and to a lesser extent in the United States, empty on Sundays. But for cardinals from Africa and Latin America, the more pressing concerns are poverty and AIDS, and how the church can continue to service the needs of their people.
Borrowing an oft-quoted line from the late Massachusetts Democratic speaker of the House, Reese added, ''Tip O'Neill was right: All politics is local. It's no different in the church."
