A Conclave Is Coming

The death of Pope Francis means one thing: It’s conclave time. Thanks to Edward Berger and Ralph Fiennes, we all know how that works now. And, much like in the movie Conclave, the Catholic Church will soon decide if it wants to keep moving in the vaguely progressive direction the late pope was taking it or if it wants to slide back toward conservatism. That is the sort of decision that gets made at — you guessed it — a conclave.

The past two papal conclaves both began 16 days after the former pope died or resigned, so it’s fairly safe to assume that this one will start in early May. In the interim, the 135 voting cardinals will make their way to Rome. Usually, this would mean that a lot of men who already sort of know each other would be gathering and lobbying for their candidates. However, Pope Francis made sure to appoint dozens of cardinals from outside of Europe, which means that the voting body is more spread out than it used to be. Speaking to Politico back in February, Church historian Miles Pattenden explained that this was done with a future conclave in mind.

“Francis came up with this pious rhetoric that the Church needs to appoint Catholics from all across the Catholic communion and have broader representation,” Pattenden explained. “But it was also a clever way of ensuring cardinals didn’t know each other so well, that they don’t call each other, that they don’t interact in their routine business as much as they did.”

Drama! Well, now all these guys are going to get to know one another very quickly. They do have the internet on their side, though. The College of Cardinals Report website, a project that Vatican journalists Diane Montagna and Ed Pentin launched late last year, has profiles of all the cardinals, including in-depth reports on the candidates considered “papabili” (literally translated to “pope-able”). So, in advance of heading to their little dormitories in the Vatican, these cardinals are putting on their Isabella Rossellini glasses and learning as much as they can about the men they might be voting for. As you can probably guess, people are already really excited about it.

But who is going to take home the grand prize of becoming the most recognizable religious leader in the world? There are already a few front-runners, and if you want to be an informed conclave-watcher, you should know their names. Here are the main five guys you’ll be hearing about over the next few weeks.

Cardinal Péter Erdő

A conservative cardinal from Hungary, Erdő is one of the more A-list cardinals. He was elected to the Council of European Episcopal Conferences in 2005 and 2011, which means he’s well known among the European cardinals who make up the majority of the voters. In that role, he also got to know many of the African cardinals, thanks to regular sessions with African bishops’ conferences. Erdő certainly has name-brand recognition among his peers, but he’s also a conservative pick. In the past, he compared a parish taking in refugees to human trafficking, saying, “We would become human smugglers if we’d taken in refugees.” After meeting with Pope Francis, he changed his tune, saying, “We will readily and happily follow [the pope’s] advice on taking in and helping refugees.” Erdő is also against opening up the Church to LGBTQ+ people, having said, “There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God’s plan for marriage and family.”

Cardinal Pietro Parolin

Italian cardinal Pietro Parolin is the secretary of state for the Holy See, which means that he handles all of the diplomatic and political affairs for the Vatican. This also makes him a well-known candidate for Pope status among his fellow cardinals. He’s the moderate pick, which for Catholicism means that he doesn’t think women should be ordained, but he’s also vehemently against the Traditional Latin Mass (this is a hot-button issue for Catholics, with traditionalists pushing for Latin and the more progressive crowd arguing against it). Speaking to the U.N. in September, he criticized safe and free access to abortion and said, “As far as ‘gender’ is concerned, the Holy See understands the term as being based on biological sexual identity, which is male or female.” On the other hand, he also wants to focus on climate change. In short, being a moderate in the Catholic Church means you feel like “not all people should have the same rights, but they do all deserve to live on a planet that isn’t actively burning.”

Cardinal Luis Tagle

Could we be getting the first Asian pope? It seems unlikely that that will happen this time around, but if it were, it would be Cardinal Tagle. The 67-year-old Filipino cardinal is a little young for a lifetime appointment (some cardinals like to vote for an older candidate to ensure a shorter tenure), but he would be a good pick if the cardinals wanted the Church to continue on in the direction Pope Francis was taking it. Tagle has spoken out against the “harsh” and “severe” language used to describe adultery and homosexuality, and he urged the Church to be more welcoming to those outside the western world.

Cardinal Matteo Zuppi

This is the Bernie Sanders of cardinals, a.k.a. the most left-leaning of the cardinals who are in the running for the papacy. Cardinal Zuppi — who you might have guessed correctly is Italian — has called for the Church to “be itself, with an open mind, a courageous heart, and a far-sighted understanding.” That means being open to blessing gay couples, reconsidering the Church’s stance on contraceptives, and having some flexibility about priestly celibacy. That does not mean he’s down to ordain women, though. That’s still off the table.

Cardinal Robert Sarah

If Cardinal Zuppi is on the far left, Cardinal Sarah is on the total opposite side of the spectrum. The Guinean cardinal would be the first African pope since the fifth century and would take the church to a much more conservative place. He considers the idea of blessing same-sex couples “heresy” and once said that access to contraception led to “social legitimization of homosexuality.” Sarah has said that the church needs “a profound, radical reform,” which he believes starts with priests, who he thinks should only partake in activities that can “be put to the service of sanctity.”

So when the white smoke billows out of the Vatican in a few weeks, will one of these guys be the pope? Maybe. These are just the heavy hitters at this specific moment — according to Church experts, there really is a lot of lobbying and discussion that takes place in the weeks leading up to the conclave, and once the cardinals get together in person, there are opportunities for everyone to share their vision for the future. So who really knows how this will net out. Maybe we’ll get a dark-horse pope fostering a secret that will change the Church forever. Or maybe a pope who vapes?