Can someone help me understand

[Texasgal]

The conclave? I find it most interesting, but not being Catholic I don't understand how it works.

Any takers out there to help me understand it in English? :)

Peace to all!

[AngryOldDem]

1. Hope this helps

http://www.osv.com/catholicalmanac/conclave.asp

As an interesting aside, this will be the first conclave where the cardinals will be in relative "comfort." In elections past they have been housed in rather spartan surroundings. But John Paul II refurbished the apartments so that they are now more comfortable. I think I heard one of the news outlets over the weekend compare them to a luxury hotel. I see good and bad aspects to that.

[Texasgal]

4. Thanks for the link.

It's all so very interesting, I appreciate the link, it's hard for some of us who do not understand some of the Catholic principles! :)

[IronLionZion]

2. Here this link will help explain it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papal_conclave%2C_2005

The very simple version is that the cardinals get together for about 2 hours or so each day to pray and vote for the next pope. If they don't elect one, they signal it with black smoke and vote again the next day. When they do elect someone, they signal it with white smoke.

If someone looks like he's going to win, then he definitely won't. They will try to choose a "compromise candidate". It's steeped in tradition and is very private so don't pay much attention to any talking heads spewing their bullshit on TV.

Conclave takes place in the evening, Rome time.

[Texasgal]

3. Thank you!

That was really good info. It's pretty facinating stuff! ( The smoke and secrecy) It's almost mythical!

Thanks for the link!

[AngryOldDem]

5. I admit

...I got a little goose-bumpy when I just happened to turn on the TV this morning and saw white smoke coming from the chimney. Then came the announcement. :-(

The workings of the Roman Catholic Church are truly very fascinating!

[Texasgal]

6. Are you unhappy with the pick?

I am trying to make sense of it all, I don't know anything about this Ratzinger person. I am having a hard time following some of the threads because they are filled with alot of back-biting and nit-picking. :( It becomes hard to understand and focus on what this really means.

What is your personal opinion? I am truly curious about this whole process. It has so much tradition, it is truly fascinating! :)

[DemBones DemBones]

7. As you've seen, nobody here was backing Cardinal Ratzinger to be

the new Vicar of Christ. I'm a bit surprised he was chosen since the old saying is that he who goes into the Conclave as Pope comes out as a Cardinal, a fancy way of saying don't count your chickens before they're hatched. Ratzinger did go in as the favorite and came out as the pope; making him the exception that proves the rule. The Conclave also came to a decision a day or two earlier than I expected.

But as to the man himself, Cardinal Ratzinger was John Paul II's right-hand man. That's why he was the one who celebrated the funeral Mass for the late pontiff, why he celebrated the Mass to pray for the election of a new pope just before the Conclave began. He was also the head of the Congregation for the Preservation of the Faith (I think that's the correct title but I'm sure you'll soon be seeing it in news articles.) Centuries ago, he would, as someone said, have been the head of the Inquisition. Of course, the Inquisition became overblown and devolved into torture of suspected heretics in some places, particularly Spain. Terrible stuff, truly, but sort of typical of the times, and the initial impulse was good: to keep the Church free of heresies. The job Ratzinger has been doing has been just that. If a Catholic theologian persists in teaching and publishing heretical views, for example, Ratzinger would talk with him; but if the heresies persisted, ultimately he'd have to declare that that theologian didn't speak for the Church and remove him from any position of teaching authority. Kind of like it would have been if we'd had a Party chair who'd said Zell Miller did not speak for the Democratic Party and booted him out.

Besides dealing with heresies and "difficult" theologians, Cardinal Ratzinger had to deal with the problem of pedophilia in the priesthood (and the upside there is that he is very well-informed and presumably not a bit naive about this problem.) Because he was essentially an enforcer of Church law, someone dubbed him "the Rottweiler of the Church." I think his holding that position is the main reason people have negative opinions about him. We've read a lot of negative stuff about him in the mainstream media and some Catholic press.

Cardinal Ratzinger has written that being head of the Congregation for the Preservation of the Faith was "my most uncomfortable post" so apparently he didn't much enjoy being an enforcer. He tried to retire in 1991 and at least twice since then but Pope John Paul II would not accept his resignation. Ratzinger wanted to retire and write books but he also felt that if John Paul, in bad health, continued to serve, that he had to, too. Most people think that John Paul II very much wanted Ratzinger to succeed him, trusting him to continue taking the Church in the same direction he had.

Priests who know Cardinal Ratzinger have said he has an undeserved reputation for being a hardnosed conservative, that he is actually a warm person and no more conservative than John Paul II. They say he is a good listener. Since he's now Pope Benedict XVI, I'm going to pray for him and give him a chance. I think he will focus more on administrative details than on the worldwide evangelization that John Paul II did, but if John Paul II had a fault, it was that he didn't micro-manage as much as he might have, particularly that he didn't handle the American pedophilia scandals better.

I admit I'm an optimist and I like to give people a chance to prove themselves. But I've also been through five papacies in my lifetime, with the new pope being the sixth pope I've "known." All the first five were widely loved and widely mourned at their deaths so I'm hopeful that we will come to love Pope Benedict XVI as well. He knows as well as anyone that John Paul II will be a hard act to follow but I think he will try his best to fill his shoes.

[Texasgal]

8. This is a thought provoking

and very eloquently written post. I appreciate you taking the time out to give me your true thoughts and opinions on the new Pope.

I am not Catholic, I am Methodist, however as a child I visited many Catholic Churches because my Grandmother was an organist. She would play at many Sunday masses. I went accompanied her to may different Catholic Churches and I always thought that the services were beautiful. I still to this day go to every midnight mass on Christmas eve.

I am able to understand this better. I find it highly noble of you to "give this Pope a chance" before labeling him or dropping your faith. You are a true progressive, this is what we are really all about.

Thank you.

[DemBones DemBones]

9. Thank you for your very kind words.

I don't think I'm being "noble" -- I just see it as facing reality and saying "OK, we got the cardinal nobody really wanted so let's see what we can find that's GOOD about him." I taught for a number of years and found that many kids with bad reputations turned out to be pretty good kids when they were treated well.

Monsignor Lorenzo Albacete of Liberation and Communion is saying on CNN that Cardinal Ratzinger spoke in his last book about Christianity not being convincing and suggested that small Christian communities living their faith would convince people of the worth of Christianity; i.e., the faith has to be witnessed, not merely preached. The monsignor concluded by saying that this approach has been tried before, by Saint Benedict, the first pope called Benedict and the founder of Western monasticism. That's probably why Ratzinger a) chose the name Benedict and b) has been supportive of Liberation and Communion, Focolare, and, probably, Opus Dei; all are faith-based movements within the Church. John Paul II also encouraged us to build smaller faith groups within our parishes.

You shouldn't see any big changes in the midnight Masses on Christmas Eve O8) except that I think this pope may encourage more use of Latin in the liturgy for the sake of universality of the Church. Not a return to Mass entirely in Latin, but more use of Latin prayers throughout the world. I'd welcome that myself.

P.S. I LOVE that captioned picture of * and John Paul II.

[Texasgal]

10. Hmmm... more Latin

in services eh? I think that would be awesome! Like I said in my last post, I was very lucky to have been able to attend mass at many different Catholic churches. I have been to many Latino services as well as some Korean ones. I loved the latin masses, they were so pretty, even though I didn't understand what they were saying!

My Mother in law passed away last year, she was a Latino Catholic all the way. Her service was a very strict Catholic service done by a Latino priest. I thought it was a beautiful celebration of her life.

Thank you for allowing me to better understand this. I really appreciate your time. :)

And thank you for the compliment on my sig line, I was thinking that I should erase it out of respect, but I have had so many people asking me to keep it up. :)

[DemBones DemBones]

11. Definitely keep your sig line! I'd like to think

that's what John Paul was thinking at the time. :evilgrin:

I like attending Masses in other languages, too, because I've always been interested in languages and the liturgy is still recognizable despite different languages. At least that's true in Italian and Spanish; Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox were not easy for me to follow but their liturgy is not the same as Roman Catholic liturgy, either. Lovely services, though.

The timelessness and universality of the Latin was something I always found moving; the liturgy was literally the same everywhere in the world in those days. Unfortunately many Catholics in other parts of the world apparently didn't understand the Latin and didn't have missals in the pews to show the vernacular translations of the Latin prayers (which we did have here.)

So it was a helpful change for many but I miss the Latin, would be delighted to see it used again at times.

Thanks to you for showing an interest in learning about Catholic ways -- it's a pleasure to talk with someone who's not throwing figurative bricks at us! ;-)