May 8, 2025 • 46 mins
As the world watches and waits for the white smoke, The Conclave Crew gathers inside Rome to tackle your most pressing questions about the secretive and sacred process of electing a new pope.
Host Raymond Arroyo is joined by Father Gerald Murray and Robert Royal as they take listeners deep inside the Sistine Chapel’s voting rituals — from cardinals disguising handwriting to why over-80s can’t vote. With humor, candor, and deep reverence, the panel explores everything from papal fashion and conclave leaks to the serious spiritual and cultural implications of this global moment.
What happens if a cardinal refuses the papacy? Could an American or African cardinal be elected? And what should Catholics do if they believe a bad pope is elected?
All this and more is answered — candidly and clearly — in this lively, insightful, and timely Vatican edition of The Conclave Crew.
Brought to you by Taylor Frigon Capital Management… Faith, Family and Finances - taylorfrigon.com
Brought to you by Floriani, revitalizing sacred music - floriani.org
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I know you all have questions about this conclave, and
we've gathered them all and we've got some answers, and
that ain't blowing smoke on this edition of the Conclave Crew.
Welcome to this Arroyo Grande series, The Conclave Crew, Vatican Edition,
Episode five. Can you believe it's been five? And this
(00:22):
series has been brought to us by our friends at
Taylor for Gone Capital Management, Faith, Family and Finances there
at TAYLORFGHNE dot com, as well as Floriani revitalizing sacred
music there at Floriani dot org. We have a lot
of your questions to get to. Let's convene the crew.
Father Gerald Murray, Canon lawyer of the Archdiocese of New York,
(00:43):
and Robert Royal, editor in chief of The Catholic Thing
dot org, and I'm Raymond Arroyo. Go subscribe to the
Arroyo Grande podcast wherever you get your podcasts, or you
can see the show A Royal Grande Show on YouTube
and like this episode, the cardinals are in the Sistine
Chapel conducting rounds of votes as we speak. Look, we
(01:03):
could get a new pope any minute, but until then
the world is on smoke. Watch last night. It was
also focused on a seagull and the chimney stack at
the Cistina for hours. I actually ran into that seagull
on my way home last night, and my friend was
with me. Who he saw this, no lie and they
ordered a dove. I guess of the Holy spirit they
(01:25):
got a seagull better than vultures.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
I guess.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
We have gotten so many questions from you. I want
to get right to the conclave clue. Are you ready?
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (01:32):
Yes, all right, Okay, here we go. First one for Bob.
Will the conclave be looking outside the box for a
successor of Saint Peter? How about the credentials of Bishop
Robert Barron or someone like that?
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Well?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
I love Robert Baron.
Speaker 4 (01:48):
I mean he's a controversial figure for some people, but
I think he's a very rock solid guy. He's very
well educated, very well spoken, speak several languages, understands really
very deeply. He understands the moment that we're in right now,
and it's a very difficult cultural moment as well as
it is an internal church moment.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
But unfortunately, I think.
Speaker 4 (02:10):
This time around, the bets have been laid largely that
the leading candidates are large are probably going to be
among the finalists that we're going to see, although I
think some of the ones like Padline, who are really
at the top at the beginning of their stars, have
sunk quite a bit. So we may see a surprise,
(02:31):
but it's very unlikely that they're going to go outside
the box, if what you mean is outside the cardinals.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Cardinals for a minute there, Bob, when you were talking
about Bishop Baron's language skills and everything, I thought I'd
have to go to ed Pentton and have them update
the College of Cardinals report and doing addendum with Baron
at the back. Maybe next time we'll do that. One
viewer wrote, father, I seriously doubt that this particular way
of voting goes back two thousand years. Well, let me,
I'm going to handle this one. It's called a tradition.
(02:59):
It evolved. You know, you're going to look at the
Acts of the Apostles. I did it this morning. In
Acts one, the apostles gather to prey and then vote
to cast lots if you will, to replace Judas, and
they choose between two men. Look it up. Over time,
that process evolved where you had the Priests of Rome,
then the Cardinals of Rome, then the larger College of
(03:21):
Cardinals by twelve seventy four. This form of gathering in
a single locked location, cut off from the world, was
formalized originally in the Quernal Palace, which it was the
seat of the Italian government. Later that moved to the
Sistine Chapel. So it does go kind of back two
thousand years, though it's evolved and the traditions have matured
(03:43):
with it. The beauty of the church, I think, father,
is that we bring all of that tradition into the future.
We sort of gather it up through the two millennia
and carry it, you know, to the present moment.
Speaker 5 (03:54):
Yeah, it was useful back then, it's useful now, I
mean too deep politicize.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
Let's say the whole process.
Speaker 5 (04:01):
There are no speeches being given in the Sistine Chapel,
and people's vote is a secret.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
It's not a voice.
Speaker 5 (04:08):
Vote where you could try to, you know, look at
people and persuade them to go along with you. So no,
it's a very respectful process to let people vote their conscience.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Yeah, and I like the way. I like that it
almost has a wave quality, you know, one candidate rises
and then others shift alliances because they're concerned and suddenly
somebody else comes up. There's something. Well, it's mysterious. It's mysterious.
It allows the Holy Spirit to operate a bit. Father,
this one's for you. Why the lady wrote this? I
(04:37):
didn't write this. Why are all the cardinals wearing red dresses? Father?
Is that a vera wang or an omani? Why are
they wearing red?
Speaker 5 (04:48):
Well, it actually comes from Target, you know, tell hers, Yeah,
pretty cheap. No, they don't wear dresses. The cassock is
not a dress. The cassock is that long garment meant
that the priests wear. It's black for your ordinary priests,
and then cardinals get red. They wear because that symbolizes
that they're willing to shed their blood to promote the
(05:10):
faith and be faithful to Jesus Christ. So, no, the
garment has an elegance to it. I think Raymond, we
would all say, and when you're wearing red ones where
everyone else is in black, it's very striking. They stand out.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Yeah, and the evolution of that is really something. I
mean that goes right back to Roman garb. And I
mean there's a lot of interesting Again, the church collects
up all of these bits and pieces from history and
carries it on and deserves it.
Speaker 3 (05:36):
Let me throw that in.
Speaker 5 (05:37):
I mean, yes, in Rome, important people were purple and
purple was the color of the nobility and the senators,
and so the church use that for the bishops. So
the bishops wear purple and the cardinals were red.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
Yeah, and you know, just as a side note, a
contemporary cultural side note, one of the most visited met
Gala exhibitions at the met for the costumes and and
you know, what do you call that? Finer fashion ended
up being the year that they focused on the Catholic
Church and what it did for fashion, and it was
(06:10):
mostly papal regalia, and you know, cardinal and bishop's outfits.
It's kind of cool, that's what they were looking at.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
Anyway.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Bob Maurene asks, is the new pope allowed to come
into the Vatican with his own entourage that he can trust?
Interesting question.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Well, look, the pope is a boss.
Speaker 4 (06:28):
He can come in with whoever he wants, and presumably
he is going to want to have people around him
that he can trust. We've talked about this before that
a pope can't rule a large entity like the Catholic
Church on his own. Although we In this recent papacy,
we saw a lot of the usual offices and channels
by which the pope rules were short circuited. Pope Francis
(06:50):
liked himself to make a lot of decisions, but any
wise leader of a large group, in particular a pope
needs to have a large group I think actually of
trusted advisors. So it'll be interesting, as it is when
we see like a president, you know, to put together
a cabinet, it will be interesting to see who he
brings in.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Along with him.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
And it's not a matter of being permitted. He's the
boss at that point, and he can he can even
reconfigure what the officers are going to be like with
the people who are going to help him, as Pope
Francis did.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Yeah, no, no, we're we're we are bracing for a
big shift here one way or that. It doesn't matter
who the man is, he inevitably will bring his own
sensibility and put his own stamp on this papacy.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
Father.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
What happens if a cardinal is elected and refuses the nomination?
Someone wrote in our comments does the conclavor zoom voting?
Speaker 5 (07:43):
Yeah, that's an excellent question, because yes, in order to
become pope, you have to accept the election. So it's
a very And it's similar if the pope names an archbishop,
let's say the Archbishop of Phoenix or somebody, and the
letter comes in and the man, the pre nominated archbishop
Phoenix says no, then he's not the Archbishop of Phoenix.
(08:03):
So likewise the pope can say no to the cardinals
and then in that case they would have to resume voting. Yep,
that's the way it is because it has to be
a free choice on the part of the person. And
some cardinals may say I'm not up to this job.
They may know that they have an illness that's going
to really debilitate them, or they may just say, you know, man,
(08:26):
you let's say they elect a man who's seventy nine
years old. He said, you know, I'm seventy nine. I'm
not going to have the energy needed to confront the
situation of the church. So it would be an active
humility actually for that man to say I'm sorry, I
do not accept this election.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Yeah, and then they go back to another round of balloting.
Can't make them happy, They've got to be you know,
this group wasn't too happy after the long stay in Rome.
I can't imagine what they're going through now. You know,
it's sequestered in the in the Sistine Chapel. You know,
all you see is only outside. You see is the
boss taking you back and forth from the Santa Marta
house to the assisting travel father. Can you explain about
(09:01):
the three types of cardinals and what they mean? What
are those rules and are they interchangeable or do they
and can they adapt? Can they change those three types
of cardinalsn't sure.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (09:13):
Within the College of Cardinals, there are three ranks or
levels cardinal deacons, cardinal priests, and cardinal bishops. And this
reflects the practice going back many centuries in Rome, where
you would have deacons, who are the first order of
sacred orders that they were serving in Rome, and actually
(09:33):
in Rome they organized their church or what they're called deaconries,
and deacons were in charge of charity. So they'd have
deacons and they have priests who would serve in the
different churches. So the pope would pick some of those
deacons and priests to be sort of like important people
who would have the right then to nominate and elect
the new pope. Cardinal bishops are there from what they're
(09:58):
called the sub or carrion diocese, so the dioceses that
are immediately surrounding the Diocese of Rome. Those bishops were
called cardinal bishops, and it became the tradition that all
of them were then cardinals, and they had a right
to vote in the conclict. Now all of that is
now ceased from the point of view of they're these
(10:19):
everyone who becomes a deacon cardinal deacon is already a
priest or a bishop, and likewise cardinal priests or priests
or bishops, same with cardinal bishops. But the within the
tradition now they maintained that, for instance, the leader of
the conclave is the cardinal dean, or in his absence,
the senior cardinal bishop. So the cardinal dean and the
(10:41):
vice dean are both over eighty. So Cardinal Paraline, who
was the senior cardinal bishop, he is then charged inside
the Sistine chapel of the conclave, and then the cardinal deacon,
the senior one, will announce from the balcony the name
of the new pope. So there are these roles, and
then of course, like an organization, so ancient seniority has
(11:04):
its role.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
So the bishops and priests and deacon cardinals all enter
according to their rank.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Wow. Yeah, that's cool the way it's broken up. And
again you see all that history there again, the church
preserving this history. Even when things have fallen away, the classifications,
the rank, the tradition remains. Bob. Vatican two, one of
our viewers wrote, Vatican two had serious problems, even heresy
within that has not been addressed. What about the heresy
(11:33):
of modernism that's devastated the church in the past sixty years?
Speaker 4 (11:36):
You would say, what, Well, as I mentioned earlier, I
think that Bishop Baron has a good grasp on that.
And you know, we just have to recognize that we
all live in a culture that is deeply marked by modernism,
which is to say, a kind of a materialistic scientific.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
View of the world. I mean, there's nothing wrong with
true science.
Speaker 4 (11:56):
And the true study of the physical world, but that
has kind of encroached on our understanding of faith, of morals,
of what human beings are. Are we just animals or
are we something that go beyond that? And so I
think that this is not a cultural question that can
be solved very quickly. And some of these ambiguous statements
(12:18):
I would call them that came out of Vatican too,
were of course exploited by people who wanted to use
that modernism to advance progressive causes within the Church. Now,
in broader cultural terms, lots of people consider us to
be in postmodernism right now, which means that the old modernism,
that old materialism, scientific materialism, that's not so security longer.
(12:41):
I mean we see it in politics, we see it
in education. So there's a real opportunity for someone who
grasps deeply what's at stake, brings the graces and the
power of Christ into a culture that itself now is
searching groping around for what it's going to do. It
may take some serious restructuring of how people look back
(13:03):
at the Council and understand that as well. It's a
big task and it's one that I think the next
Pope has to undertake along with all the other things
that we've talked about with regard to sexual abuse, to
financial problems. That's a longer term problem, but we really
need to get on the case. John Paul and Benedict
started the response to it. I think we need to
(13:24):
take that forward very vigorously because in a century or so,
we could be in a very different culture unless we do.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Father. Here's an interesting question. Can a cardinal vote for
himself in a conclave?
Speaker 5 (13:37):
A cardinal can vote for himself, accept in the runoff,
and it's a technicality. So yeah, a cardinal can vote
for himself in each round leading up to I guess
it's the thirty third round. So if they haven't elected
anybody by around thirty three, what they do is the
top two vote getters enter into a runoff.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
The cardinals.
Speaker 5 (14:00):
The two cardinals who are in that category cannot vote
for themselves, so no one could say that they were
the deciding vote for themselves. And I think that's a
wise decision.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Well that was kind of a setup for this question
that one of our viewers has submitted, who would Jesus
vote for in the conclave?
Speaker 5 (14:23):
Well, you know, until the runoff number one, the Good
Lord was not a cardinals, so you know he's the
he's the God incarnate who the cardinals worship and obey.
So no, and you know, in the free Will, in
the rather excuse me, in the gift of free will
to mankind, God left in the church decisions to be
(14:48):
made by us, not by God directly. So we believe
in providence, in God's help, but we do not believe that.
You know, God is voting in the Each cardinal votes,
and hopefully they vote in a godly way. But got
to remember there are a lot of good men in
that college, so voting for one and not another doesn't
mean you're doing something that defends God.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Yeah. Well, when I read that question, I thought, if
Jesus walks into the Sistine Chapel, I could promise you
they'll all vacate. There'll be no need to have a
vicar of Christ if you have Christ, right. Yeah, well,
well wait till he goes back to heaven and then
you have another conclave. I guess here's an interesting question, Bob.
This lady, she says, I am confused as to what
(15:31):
the cardinal How do the cardinals vote on the fourth day?
It says they have to take a pause on the
fourth day according to the constitution of conclave that John
Pauled a second drafted or wrote promulgated. Bob, do they
take a pause for the full day for prayer and
meditation or only for part of the day.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Yeah, we talked about this the other day, and I
think they have some latitude in what they're going to do.
They could take the whole day off, they could take
the half day off. And I think there's a certain
prudence that if people are exhausted or they feel that
they kind of have reached an impasse about where the
vote is going, maybe it's a good thing to take
a whole day. And if it's Sunday and they back
(16:12):
off and they have a chance to pray, go to
Mass and have a little bit of recreation and come
back afterwards. But I don't believe there's any requirement that
this be a full day or a half day. Will
no doubt find if it gets to that stage, will
no doubt find out how much the people who are
running the actual conclave feel that they need a break.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
Father.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
Why do the cardinals have to change their handwriting when
writing their ballot? This viewer said, I heard that they
have to disguise their handwriting. Is that true?
Speaker 5 (16:48):
It is because the voting is anonymous. When you submit
your ballots, you don't put your name on it, and
when the ballots are deposited in the urn, those who
are counters are supposed to mix them up. So that's
like if you could see the last cardinal and he's
on the top of the stack and take his name
out first.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
Everybody know he voted for that person. So now the
goal here is to not allow the.
Speaker 5 (17:15):
Individual names or votes to be known, so that it
can't be a form of moral persuasion or even you know,
kind of like a certain amount of coercion that you
have to vote with cardinals x set. Now, disguising handwriting
presumes that the counters will recognize the handwriting of the others.
(17:35):
In the modern world, very few people send letters by snail.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
Mail, you know, they don't write out letters and email.
Speaker 5 (17:42):
You know, there's no signature unless you use that automatic
signature thing which is always made up. So no one really,
I think, will know the handwriting. But some of them
may know the handwriting of each other. So yeah, disguising
it as best you can, that's just another means to
try to preserve the anonymity and privacy of what's happening.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
And I've known older cardinals who've gone in and they
have an inframani, who's a person, you know, basically a
nurse somebody to help them, and they can if the
cardinal can't write, if they have the sheiks or a tool.
They'll write the name for them and actually do that,
which I didn't realize. But those functions those people do.
Nurses if you will, they are allowed in, but they
(18:20):
too are under the oath of secrecy. Bob, What could
a group of Catholic cardinals do in the case and
I'm reading this and at the moment of the election
of a cardinal who is clearly heterodox or suspected of heterodoxy,
between the very brief moment of the proclamation of the
result of the vote and the moment when the elected
cardinal accepts the office, is there an option that would
(18:42):
allow Catholic cardinals to oppose an election on the grounds
that the elected man is not Catholic, is not truly Poppibaly.
Speaker 4 (18:51):
I think the answer, unfortunately, is there's nothing that they
can do that. It's kind of like the popular vote
in a presidential election or whatever other type of election.
If the process has been followed, one hopes that both
because of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and the
prudence of the men in the room, that that would
(19:13):
not result in somebody who was obviously and openly heretical.
That would have been worked out before that I can't
imagine how they would know that at that given moment.
But it's a good thing to raise these issues because,
you know, funny things happen in the course of elections
and whatnot, and we know, you know people we started
out talking about how the conclave has not always been
(19:36):
carried out in this formula. We've had periods when there's
more than one pope and decisions have to be made
about who was actually the legitimate pope, and there have
been long periods of no pope at Also, we tend
to see these things the way we see other events
on television and through social media. In fact, someone has
said this is the first social media conclave where there's
(19:58):
almost instantaneous respect to what's happening.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
And so if.
Speaker 4 (20:02):
People were watching this see a figure who's elected who
they suspect of heterodoxy, they're gonna, you know, they're going
to react and they're hope that that someone can be saved.
This is a different kind of process. This is is
a slower, older type of process, and that can be frustrating,
but at the same time it may provide some safeguards.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Next question, what do the cardinals do in between votes?
Father do they talk amongst themselves. Do they get up
and speak, do they read? Do they pray? What's the
protocol for dinner's lunches and the in between periods in
the Sistine Chapel. I'll let you both talk about that.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Sure.
Speaker 5 (20:40):
No, well, all of the above. You know, they're once
they leave the Sistine Chapel, then they're going to be
able to speak to each other. They get on the
bus which takes them that short distance from the Sistine
Chapel around the back of Saint Peter's over to the
Saint Martha House.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
Inside they can take.
Speaker 5 (20:57):
A walk, you know, around that area where there's a
sort of like parking lot air in front of Saint Martha's.
The better said, and then the Vatican gardens are up
the hill a little bit.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (21:08):
They can certainly go in and discuss at dinner. They
can also relax with a book. But they can't do
is call anybody, send emails, listen to the radio, watch television,
watch the Royal Grande podcast. They can't do any of that.
So and I guess our shot. I know, but no,
(21:29):
it's you know they are. It's it's similar to being
on a retreat because there are times of prayer and silence,
and certainly that's what's happening in the Sistine Chapel. But no,
in fact, those are the times when they can look
at compare notes and say, well, we think Cardinal X
is the right one, but he couldn't get enough votes,
and now I'm going to go for Cardinal Y.
Speaker 3 (21:46):
What do you think?
Speaker 1 (21:47):
Hmm. Yeah, that's when the that's when the heavy the
heavy pressure and the politicking sort of begins.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
Bob.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
But I was told that they whisper and talk to
the people aside them in the in the Sistine Chapel
as well.
Speaker 4 (21:59):
Yeah, yeah, look, they're they're they're free because they are
actually behind kind of a paywall, if we want to
put it that way, right, you know, I sometimes worry
how how much behind uh anonymity they actually are. I mean,
they take all these steps, they bring in, you know,
security experts to sweep for bugs. But we've seen in
(22:20):
the past that in such events somehow always managed to
leak it to a certain extent, if not immediately then
then after the fact. And they're not supposed to even
leak after the fact. That right, Look, this is all
to the good. The more that they talk with one another.
The more the possibilities are working out some things, understanding
who's who. We keep saying over and over again, they
don't know each other very well. And maybe in that circumstance,
(22:44):
which is a bit of a pressure pressure cooker, I mean,
I think, you know, there's the outlet of prayer and
relaxation and whatnot, But in that pressure cooker, you may
begin to see things about people's characters. It will help you,
how that, to see how they will operate when they're
in the pressure cooker.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Being the pope, yeah, father, speak to that for a moment.
The I mean, when Pope Francis was elected, suddenly you know,
there was a journalist, Austin Ivory who came out with
a book. He had letter in verse of not only
the agreements made before the conclave, but conversations had in
the vote com I mean today he was sending out
(23:20):
the vote com Oh. At this point, Francis was already
up ten points. I thought this was supposed to be
secret under penalty of excommunication.
Speaker 5 (23:29):
Now that's actually the canon law. It's supposed to remain.
So you're not supposed to speak about anything concerning the election.
Now that doesn't mean you can't say I walked in
and my seat was uncomfortable because it was a plastic
you know, wooden bench.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Rather, that was not a nice seat. That's trivia.
Speaker 5 (23:48):
But you cannot come in and say, you know, I
saw a cardinal Lets get up and then everybody was smiling.
And no, you're supposed to keep it all secret, but
people do leak. This is one of the had realities
of the modern world that people do not take odes seriously.
And this we see it in courts of law, and
now we see it.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
You're right.
Speaker 5 (24:09):
There have been many books written about how the voting
went in the last papal conclave and it's stunning. Now
I'll say I'll be completely honest here. Poe Francis himself
talked about yes, he did the voting subsequently, and people
noted that, wait a minute, you're not supposed to do that.
(24:29):
Now you could say, since he's the lawgiver, he could
dispense himself from observing that law post facto.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
But you know the.
Speaker 5 (24:37):
Casualness nowadays with which people assume, well, we say that
for public consumption, but in reality we call our journalist friends.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
That's something I think that needs to be stamped out.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
Yeah, Bob, I saw it today. I'm walking I'm walking
home from the from the Vatican. There are people on
the phone after the first vote, and they're relating tallies
and I hear this one's moving up, and that one's
in the li and this one lost some votes. I'm like,
what app are these people on?
Speaker 4 (25:06):
Yeah, I've been looking at the Italian press, which is
not always reliable. In fact, it's quite unreliable, but they
are very reliable in that they convey every rumor that
there is floating around in it and around the room
at the same time.
Speaker 3 (25:19):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 4 (25:20):
I mean there's a story that was told. This is
an interesting story by Messagero that before they closed the
doors today, the Cardinal Ray, who gave the homily at
the final Mass before they possessed into the conclave, said
to Cardinal Paroline, he used an expression that I've never
heard before, alguti dopey. He says double good fortune. And
(25:47):
since he's a leading candidate the way that the Italians
are interpreting this and Cardinal rays a little hard of hearing,
so he said it really loudly, so that everybody heard
it as he.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
Was going in.
Speaker 4 (25:57):
What they heard that this as meaning is I hope
you win number one, but also I hope you do
well in managing, because he's also the manager of.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
What's going on inside the room there.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
So this is kind of thing that the Italians look
at and they think that maybe it's going to tell
things one way or another. I'm a little skeptical, but
it's interesting the way that they read every tiny detail.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
Every utterance. Yeah, it's kind of cool. Are you looking
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finances there at Taylorfogne dot com. Bob, what should the
Pope elect do to help resolve and correct the China
deal that remains secretive?
Speaker 4 (26:59):
One of our viewers, right, Oh man, this is a
hard question.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
I know.
Speaker 4 (27:07):
Yeah, if it's Cardinal Paroline, it's I mean, it's his baby,
so he's going to have to go back on some
of the things that he did there. Still, you know,
we don't know what's in there. But we do know
that the Chinese they're just running ahead with naming bishops
and reforming dioceses and and actually changing the way that
that masses are said inside the church with President G's
(27:30):
image there, and they're trying to cynicize all religions, and
especially the Catholic Church because of the Catholic Church as
a what they regard as a foreign leader. I don't
know what they can do. I think the first thing
to do is to publish the accord. They aren't supposed
to be private accords like this in the modern world.
They should publish that. People should be able to know
(27:53):
what the details are so they can at least criticize
the Chinese if they're doing something they're not supposed to
be doing. But I think this is the to take
a much more severe approach, and it may it's going
to require them to be willing to confront China. They
haven't been willing to confront Cuba and Nicaragua and Venezuela lately,
which had been putting a lot of pressure in Catholic priests.
(28:15):
But it's not only the matter of a diplomatic arrangement.
This is also the life and death of ordinary lay people,
priests and bishops in China, and we can't abandon them.
We need some vigorous action to rescue them.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
You know, Bob, it's interesting to say that I ran
into a few African and South American cardinals and they
were mentioning John Paul. We need a John Pole the
second like pope because of what you just raised. He
did confront Nicaragua, he did confront the Russian regime. He
(28:50):
did confront these fascists and demanded religious freedom in them
and brought the moral suasion of the church. I know
it's a balancing act, but a fellow like Perline, I
don't think he'll ever roll that back. But I think
the next pope pastor not only expose it, but roll
it back. It's it's it's outrageous. Father, which continent besides
(29:10):
Europe one of our viewers' rites is most likely to
produce the next Pope?
Speaker 3 (29:17):
Well, my estimation is would be Africa.
Speaker 5 (29:22):
You know, if we get a European this time, who
knows how long he'll reign over the church as pope.
But you know, the African Church is growing all the time,
and the African cardinals, you know, assume, you know, great
relevance in the life of the churches. They represent an
area where Christianity is not dying. It's sad to say
in Europe statistically, Christianity is losing numbers and influence in
(29:48):
an unimaginable way. You know, if you think at the
end of the Second World War, when Christianity was viewed
as the renewal force to try and bring back a
continent which have been destroyed by two worlds wars, and
look at it today where Christianity is on the run
in almost every single European nation. Eastern Europe is apart
(30:10):
where there is a revival. But so I think Africa
would be that they answer that question would be where the.
Speaker 3 (30:16):
Next a pope? Now, where the future will come from?
Speaker 1 (30:20):
Which wouldn't be the first time. In the early centuries
of the Church we had a string of Africans, mostly
from Tunisia, right.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
Yeah, North Africa.
Speaker 5 (30:29):
Yeah, they were you know the Roman North Africa is
the Roman province, so the Christianity spread there.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Yeah. Bob william asks why are the older cardinals over
eighty not allowed in the conclave, and especially why not
allow them to be involved given that their knowledge is unparalleled.
Speaker 4 (30:47):
Yeah, I think that's a bit of a sore point.
But look, look, you have to have rules about when
when people can be active in an organization, when when
they cannot. I mean, it's simply the case in the
Catholic Cheurche that bishops at age seventy five are supposed
to send a letter to the Holy Father presenting their resignation.
(31:09):
The Pope can accept it right at that moment, or
we can say, well, you know, I want you to
stay on. Very often people will stay on. Cardinal Dolan
from New York, for example, his past seventy five, but
he hasn't been removed from his position as Cardinal Archbishop
of New York. Look, we've all known people over eighty
years old. Some of them are very wise. I think
(31:32):
of Cardinal zen who was just he's a dynamo, he's
still got all his marbles, he's got energy, he's got courage.
But how many and he's over ninety, how many people
over eighty would be would you want to trust to
have that degree of lucidity? And if you make an
exception for one, why not another? And then you get
(31:53):
into a whole quarrel over that.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
So it's a rule. In some cases it's.
Speaker 4 (31:58):
Probably unjust, but it would be unjust no matter how
you kind of cut it. So you make a decision
and that's how it goes for.
Speaker 6 (32:06):
Yeah, I think it was Paul the six rule, right, father, Yeah, Yeah,
Can I throw in on this one, yeah, because yeah,
Paul the Six put that rule in place, and it
was understood at the time to be an effort to
diminish the influence of older, presumably more conservative.
Speaker 3 (32:19):
Cardinals in the next papal election.
Speaker 5 (32:22):
The irony is, of course that you cannot vote for
a pope if you're over eighty, but you can be
a pope if you're overeatey.
Speaker 3 (32:31):
So you know.
Speaker 5 (32:33):
Which is more important. Being a pope is more important
than voting for one. So if you can do the greater,
you can do the lesser. That's the usual principle of law.
So I think I also say the retirement of bishops
of seventy five is not of that was only introduced.
Also after the Second Vatican Council we got into the
managerial mindset of efficiency, I think, you know, which is
(32:54):
remember the managerial revolution after the Second World War.
Speaker 3 (32:57):
You know, we're going to fix the world's problems by
better man. The jury is in on that.
Speaker 5 (33:04):
Yeah, Yeah, I don't think I don't think we should
have these rules because I would much rather have cardinals
Zen voting than simply being an advisor to the others.
Speaker 3 (33:13):
Because he's a man of extreme lucidity and experience.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
Yeah, and then people look to the elders, particularly if
they're venerable like Zen and have been through the fires
of you know, facing down a regime like China and
still you know, waving the flag. Here's father. This is
one for you. Why can't there be an American pope?
Speaker 3 (33:32):
There can be.
Speaker 5 (33:33):
It's just, you know, the church exists in history, so
historical factors have to be examined, you know. I mean
my colleague here, Bob Royal, has written the whole history
of theology in the twentieth century. You have to look
at the way things develop, you know, theologians react to
secular trends and then challenges and then biblical studies and
all the rest. So on a political scene, I would say,
(33:56):
what position does America operate in the world? Back in
the eighteen fifth these we were a mission territory since
the Second World War, with a unique dominant power opposing
for the Communists and now other forces China and the rest.
So I think the idea would be the dominant secular
power should not also have one of its members be
the head of the chur church honor.
Speaker 3 (34:18):
But I'd been through what Bob had to say.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
Yeah, Bob, that's the concern, right, you don't want the
superpower having the other superpower.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
I think you're running, Bob. That's why you were talking
all those cardinals this week. You were trying to slip
them the bill.
Speaker 4 (34:39):
I mean, look, if they were the proper candidate. And
some people think that the Cardinal Prevost, who has been
the head of the bishops the committee that selects the bishops,
and spend time in Latin America is a front runner.
He's a possibility, even though he kind of just appeals
to some of the Latin America because he spent time
(35:01):
in Latin America, and of course he's been in Rome
a lot. I just don't know what kind of pope
he would be. I think an American who spent more
time in America would have a better grasp on a
lot of what's.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
Going on in the world.
Speaker 4 (35:17):
It's not necessary that a pope grasp you know geopolitical things.
Certainly Pope Francis did not.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
John Paul did.
Speaker 4 (35:25):
Jean Paul happened to be a man who came from
a country where he was in the midst of everything
that was going on in the world at that moment.
But why not, you know, there could be an American
at some point. I think at this moment there's a
fair degree of anti Americanism, and I think the Trump
factor would maybe play into that as well, unfortunately, But
anybody can become a pope, any person from any country
(35:48):
around the world, and we may be surprised even this
time around.
Speaker 1 (35:51):
Do you feel as I look out as I talked
to so many of these men and we all did
this week, it seems that this is why I kind
of when I heard Prevost and so started looking at
him and reading and watching interviews. It seems the pope now,
the pope that everyone collectively is yearning for, whether they
give you a name or not, is a sturdy man.
(36:12):
John Paul was that sort of sturdy man of faith
who had kind of been through the fires and was
ready to complete the mission and declare the Gospel in
a compelling way that came from a lived experience. Father,
Am I totally off base? Is that? Do you feel
that that's sort of where we are now.
Speaker 5 (36:34):
I think there's a desire for, you know, a strong
father figure and you know, and you know, this is
where you know, somebody said once, you know, gentleness is
a sign of true strength, and I think that's what
we all expect from our dads. You know, they lay
down the law, but then you know they restrained the
punishment to a degree in order to teach us good lessons.
(36:56):
So you know, that's one reason why African cardinals are
so attractive. You know, I've dealt with African parishioners in
New York. One of my parents was majority African parishioners.
They were French speaking. I have two African priests with me. Now,
you know, Africa is a place where Christianity really was
light to get people out of the fear of paganism
(37:19):
and to bring to them, you know, the true fatherhood
of God and brothership in Christ. So I think, you know,
that is a very important factor. Now Africans aren't the
only ones can do that, you know, again, going back
to cardinals, en, we're talked about if there was ever
a father figure it's him. You know, his flock is
being persecuted by communists and he opens his mouth and
(37:41):
says stop. Jimmy lay Sarah would also fit the bill.
Speaker 1 (37:45):
I mean he faced down a fascist regime down there
Obongo the same. I mean, these people suffer for their faith.
Of some of the Sudanese bishops, they've got, you know,
marauding groups of Islamisists burning down villages and killing people.
So they know what it means to suffer for the
faith in the way that we in the West. You know,
I'm going to play golf today. I'm going to skip
(38:06):
the masks. Our African brothers and sisters don't understand that approach.
Speaker 5 (38:10):
I'll just throw in Nigerian bishops, you know, the cardinals
in Nigeria are as Bob has recently said in a
public presentation, no country in the world has suffered as
many executions of Christians, i e. Martyrdoms than Nigeria.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
Okay, I'm going to there are a couple of other
questions here. I'm going to try to get this quickly
in what was the actual state of liturgical practice in
the church before that it can too and they're asking
I'd love to hear your views on the role of
Latin in the Church. It seems discussion center on one
pole of the other tridentine or no Latin at all.
Perhaps we could intstoll more Latin in the and keep
(38:47):
the homilies in the vernacular. Bob, I'll start with you.
I mean, that's sort of what Benedict the sixteenth was
trying to accomplish.
Speaker 4 (38:56):
Yeah, you know, some people who write for us at
the cat thing and who are advocates of Latin, as
I myself am, have pointed to the fact that during
Vatican Two a lot of the speeches were in Latin,
which not all the cardinals, bishops, et cetera at that
time understood very well. So some of the problems that
(39:16):
we see in the end, may I've had something to
do with that. We've seen in this past week that
there's a lot of Latin that is being used, as
in this run up to the conclive and even in
the entry into the Conclive. And this really puts a
question in front of us because if it's not going
to be Latin, which is you know, you know, you
(39:36):
say whatever you want about Latin, it is the historic
official language of the Western Church, going back to the
last The first few centuries of the Church actually started
kind of in Greek but moved into into a Latin format.
But what language is going to be the official language
of the Vatican Otherwise, I mean that there has to
be some some medium in which everybody can can discuss.
(40:00):
And not everybody speaks Italian, by the way, So you
know some people who proposed that English should now become
the official language or at least the working language in
the Vatican, because it's much more likely that people can
handle that than to have studied it. They probably have
to have studied in Rome to know Italian.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
But this question is not going to go away.
Speaker 4 (40:20):
There needs to be a universal language, and either it's
going to be the universal language of the Old Empire
or it's going to be the language or the New Empire. Probably,
And that also touches on turgical matters which I'm not
going to touch, but I'll leave to the cannadist to explain.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
Okay, resident candidates, you're up, so I'll start by me.
Don't speak in Latin though.
Speaker 5 (40:41):
No, no, well, bell leaeve the lingual Latin side. No,
I want to endorse a Bob just said English should
be the language of the curia, and the reason being
it's the language that most the largest number of Catholics
in the world either speak and English as the first
language or learned it. So therefore it's useful. It's not
because of anglosphere domination, just the reality. I mean, we're
(41:04):
just following Hollywood and the economic world. The diplomat French
is no longer the diplomatic language of choice. So and
it would be very useful, I would say, because yet
we're never going to recover spoken Latin in the church.
And part of the reason is when you when the
liturgy became vernacular, there was no need for priests to
(41:24):
learn Latin anymore. So now priests who do learn Latin
have a particular interest in it, but there are very
few Latin teachers who can go all over the world
and spread this knowledge. So it's I regret that and
maybe that can be revived and you know, now back,
let's go to liturgy. Yeah, the liturgical practice before the
council is a great treasure and value and hopefully, you know,
(41:49):
we can go back to the John poll second Benedict approach,
which is let both forms of the liturgy it coexists
and influence each other.
Speaker 3 (41:59):
Because for those who do take the trouble to.
Speaker 5 (42:00):
Learn Latin and pray in it, you know, peace and
joy come from that beautiful association with the historic worship.
Speaker 3 (42:07):
Of the Church. For people who go to the New Mass,
which is in the vernacular, they've come to learn to
appreciate that, and that should be allowed to continue. Also, yeah, yeah,
that's a great point.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
And he did try to reconcile the Latin and the
tradition of the Church with the vernacular, and they do
fit together. They can fit and enrich one another. To
pity that with stup. Okay, here's a question that came in.
I've been giving a lot of these questions, so it's
a good way to answer it. Are you going to
be live during the conclave? Are you all going to
be on site at Saint Peter's. Well, I'll take first
(42:42):
crack at this. We're all going to be live, but
we're going to be at different networks. I'll be on
Fox News, Fathers on Newsmax. Bob has been bouncing around
several different networks. We're doing the world over on Thursday,
but e WTM decided not to have us anchor their
live coverage, And to be very clear, because I've heard
a lot of erroneous things over the last few of
the days, this was not our decision. In fact, we
(43:05):
paid our own way to come here to make ourselves
available to e WT, and you know, for whatever reason,
they decided to go in a different direction. So unless
anybody else wants to chime in on that, I'll leave
that one there. Question from down under, what do we
laity do if we get a bad pope?
Speaker 4 (43:23):
We all head to the back country in Australia and
pray like grace.
Speaker 2 (43:28):
Look, you know.
Speaker 4 (43:32):
This may be sound like a flip answer, but every
human being is bad to a certain extent.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
We're all sinners.
Speaker 4 (43:37):
Every pope is going to have, you know, limitations. John
Paul wasn't a particularly really good administrator. Benedictine wasn't either,
but they were great men, great great men in various ways.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
What you do with you, you do what a Catholic does.
Speaker 4 (43:52):
You go to Mass, you go to confession, you bring
your children upright, you practice charity, you keep your faith
and don't allow extraneous especially in this media environment where
every day everything has to be a you know, histrionic
and dramatic and it's the end of the world. I mean,
(44:13):
our faith is in the name of the Lord who
made heaven in earth. This affair goes right. So if
he made heaven on earth, he can probably keep us
on the right track, you know, even if there is
a bad But we're more, even more than one bad
pope in a row, so be a Catholic.
Speaker 2 (44:28):
Yeah, that'll work.
Speaker 1 (44:29):
Father, you're what should the lady do if we get a.
Speaker 5 (44:32):
Bit, Well, they had to have faith in God and
continue to pray, remain faithful to the doctrine of the faith.
You know, I'm reflecting back. You know, we had immoral
popes in the in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance period,
and I can't remember which pope was, but he made
the statement he had illegitimate children. That's the lead into it.
He said, in all the world calls me father, except
(44:53):
my children call me uncle, you know, because that's that's
how they were explaining to the children why they're close
he's your uncle, whereas he loved with their father. So
we can laugh about that. Of course, on chastity is
not his immortal sin, and it's a horrible thing.
Speaker 3 (45:09):
But yeah, we faithful.
Speaker 5 (45:14):
I mean, we've had so many problems. The Reformation was
a time of great upheaval. Now, the popes, you know,
defended the Catholic Church against the Protestant Reformers, but many
clergy didn't and they fell in with it. And then
of course secular rules persecuted. I mean here in Rome
we have the Venerable English College, which sent countless priests
back to England to be martyred. So, you know, if
(45:37):
they could be faithful in the midst of turbulence, we
can too.
Speaker 1 (45:41):
And when you look at the really bad popes and
the venal ones, some of whom you mentioned, Father, they
did leave this amazing art and architecture. You know, they
there was something that they were used for to contribute
to the ages, even though they were pretty despicable characters themselves.
But God is away of taking care of those people,
(46:01):
and he has the final judgment.
Speaker 3 (46:03):
Thank God.
Speaker 1 (46:04):
The Arroyo Grande Conclave crew, we'll close it out there.
This Vatican addition will continue. Don't miss our next episode.
Subscribe to a Royal Grande Show on YouTube or a
Royal Grande podcast wherever you get yours. And this episode
is brought to you by our friends at Taylor for
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Taylorforgan dot com. On behalf of Robert Royal father Gerald Murray.
(46:28):
We will convene again, gentlemen. I'm Raim at Royo from
Rome Joo Arroyo. Grande is produced in partnership with iHeart
Podcasts and is available on the iHeartRadio app or wherever
you get your podcasts
I know you all have questions about this conclave, and
we've gathered them all and we've got some answers, and
that ain't blowing smoke on this edition of the Conclave Crew.
Welcome to this Arroyo Grande series, The Conclave Crew, Vatican Edition,
Episode five. Can you believe it's been five? And this
(00:22):
series has been brought to us by our friends at
Taylor for Gone Capital Management, Faith, Family and Finances there
at TAYLORFGHNE dot com, as well as Floriani revitalizing sacred
music there at Floriani dot org. We have a lot
of your questions to get to. Let's convene the crew.
Father Gerald Murray, Canon lawyer of the Archdiocese of New York,
(00:43):
and Robert Royal, editor in chief of The Catholic Thing
dot org, and I'm Raymond Arroyo. Go subscribe to the
Arroyo Grande podcast wherever you get your podcasts, or you
can see the show A Royal Grande Show on YouTube
and like this episode, the cardinals are in the Sistine
Chapel conducting rounds of votes as we speak. Look, we
(01:03):
could get a new pope any minute, but until then
the world is on smoke. Watch last night. It was
also focused on a seagull and the chimney stack at
the Cistina for hours. I actually ran into that seagull
on my way home last night, and my friend was
with me. Who he saw this, no lie and they
ordered a dove. I guess of the Holy spirit they
(01:25):
got a seagull better than vultures.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
I guess.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
We have gotten so many questions from you. I want
to get right to the conclave clue. Are you ready?
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (01:32):
Yes, all right, Okay, here we go. First one for Bob.
Will the conclave be looking outside the box for a
successor of Saint Peter? How about the credentials of Bishop
Robert Barron or someone like that?
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Well?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
I love Robert Baron.
Speaker 4 (01:48):
I mean he's a controversial figure for some people, but
I think he's a very rock solid guy. He's very
well educated, very well spoken, speak several languages, understands really
very deeply. He understands the moment that we're in right now,
and it's a very difficult cultural moment as well as
it is an internal church moment.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
But unfortunately, I think.
Speaker 4 (02:10):
This time around, the bets have been laid largely that
the leading candidates are large are probably going to be
among the finalists that we're going to see, although I
think some of the ones like Padline, who are really
at the top at the beginning of their stars, have
sunk quite a bit. So we may see a surprise,
(02:31):
but it's very unlikely that they're going to go outside
the box, if what you mean is outside the cardinals.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Cardinals for a minute there, Bob, when you were talking
about Bishop Baron's language skills and everything, I thought I'd
have to go to ed Pentton and have them update
the College of Cardinals report and doing addendum with Baron
at the back. Maybe next time we'll do that. One
viewer wrote, father, I seriously doubt that this particular way
of voting goes back two thousand years. Well, let me,
I'm going to handle this one. It's called a tradition.
(02:59):
It evolved. You know, you're going to look at the
Acts of the Apostles. I did it this morning. In
Acts one, the apostles gather to prey and then vote
to cast lots if you will, to replace Judas, and
they choose between two men. Look it up. Over time,
that process evolved where you had the Priests of Rome,
then the Cardinals of Rome, then the larger College of
(03:21):
Cardinals by twelve seventy four. This form of gathering in
a single locked location, cut off from the world, was
formalized originally in the Quernal Palace, which it was the
seat of the Italian government. Later that moved to the
Sistine Chapel. So it does go kind of back two
thousand years, though it's evolved and the traditions have matured
(03:43):
with it. The beauty of the church, I think, father,
is that we bring all of that tradition into the future.
We sort of gather it up through the two millennia
and carry it, you know, to the present moment.
Speaker 5 (03:54):
Yeah, it was useful back then, it's useful now, I
mean too deep politicize.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
Let's say the whole process.
Speaker 5 (04:01):
There are no speeches being given in the Sistine Chapel,
and people's vote is a secret.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
It's not a voice.
Speaker 5 (04:08):
Vote where you could try to, you know, look at
people and persuade them to go along with you. So no,
it's a very respectful process to let people vote their conscience.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Yeah, and I like the way. I like that it
almost has a wave quality, you know, one candidate rises
and then others shift alliances because they're concerned and suddenly
somebody else comes up. There's something. Well, it's mysterious. It's mysterious.
It allows the Holy Spirit to operate a bit. Father,
this one's for you. Why the lady wrote this? I
(04:37):
didn't write this. Why are all the cardinals wearing red dresses? Father?
Is that a vera wang or an omani? Why are
they wearing red?
Speaker 5 (04:48):
Well, it actually comes from Target, you know, tell hers, Yeah,
pretty cheap. No, they don't wear dresses. The cassock is
not a dress. The cassock is that long garment meant
that the priests wear. It's black for your ordinary priests,
and then cardinals get red. They wear because that symbolizes
that they're willing to shed their blood to promote the
(05:10):
faith and be faithful to Jesus Christ. So, no, the
garment has an elegance to it. I think Raymond, we
would all say, and when you're wearing red ones where
everyone else is in black, it's very striking. They stand out.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Yeah, and the evolution of that is really something. I
mean that goes right back to Roman garb. And I
mean there's a lot of interesting Again, the church collects
up all of these bits and pieces from history and
carries it on and deserves it.
Speaker 3 (05:36):
Let me throw that in.
Speaker 5 (05:37):
I mean, yes, in Rome, important people were purple and
purple was the color of the nobility and the senators,
and so the church use that for the bishops. So
the bishops wear purple and the cardinals were red.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
Yeah, and you know, just as a side note, a
contemporary cultural side note, one of the most visited met
Gala exhibitions at the met for the costumes and and
you know, what do you call that? Finer fashion ended
up being the year that they focused on the Catholic
Church and what it did for fashion, and it was
(06:10):
mostly papal regalia, and you know, cardinal and bishop's outfits.
It's kind of cool, that's what they were looking at.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
Anyway.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Bob Maurene asks, is the new pope allowed to come
into the Vatican with his own entourage that he can trust?
Interesting question.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Well, look, the pope is a boss.
Speaker 4 (06:28):
He can come in with whoever he wants, and presumably
he is going to want to have people around him
that he can trust. We've talked about this before that
a pope can't rule a large entity like the Catholic
Church on his own. Although we In this recent papacy,
we saw a lot of the usual offices and channels
by which the pope rules were short circuited. Pope Francis
(06:50):
liked himself to make a lot of decisions, but any
wise leader of a large group, in particular a pope
needs to have a large group I think actually of
trusted advisors. So it'll be interesting, as it is when
we see like a president, you know, to put together
a cabinet, it will be interesting to see who he
brings in.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Along with him.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
And it's not a matter of being permitted. He's the
boss at that point, and he can he can even
reconfigure what the officers are going to be like with
the people who are going to help him, as Pope
Francis did.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Yeah, no, no, we're we're we are bracing for a
big shift here one way or that. It doesn't matter
who the man is, he inevitably will bring his own
sensibility and put his own stamp on this papacy.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
Father.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
What happens if a cardinal is elected and refuses the nomination?
Someone wrote in our comments does the conclavor zoom voting?
Speaker 5 (07:43):
Yeah, that's an excellent question, because yes, in order to
become pope, you have to accept the election. So it's
a very And it's similar if the pope names an archbishop,
let's say the Archbishop of Phoenix or somebody, and the
letter comes in and the man, the pre nominated archbishop
Phoenix says no, then he's not the Archbishop of Phoenix.
(08:03):
So likewise the pope can say no to the cardinals
and then in that case they would have to resume voting. Yep,
that's the way it is because it has to be
a free choice on the part of the person. And
some cardinals may say I'm not up to this job.
They may know that they have an illness that's going
to really debilitate them, or they may just say, you know, man,
(08:26):
you let's say they elect a man who's seventy nine
years old. He said, you know, I'm seventy nine. I'm
not going to have the energy needed to confront the
situation of the church. So it would be an active
humility actually for that man to say I'm sorry, I
do not accept this election.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Yeah, and then they go back to another round of balloting.
Can't make them happy, They've got to be you know,
this group wasn't too happy after the long stay in Rome.
I can't imagine what they're going through now. You know,
it's sequestered in the in the Sistine Chapel. You know,
all you see is only outside. You see is the
boss taking you back and forth from the Santa Marta
house to the assisting travel father. Can you explain about
(09:01):
the three types of cardinals and what they mean? What
are those rules and are they interchangeable or do they
and can they adapt? Can they change those three types
of cardinalsn't sure.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (09:13):
Within the College of Cardinals, there are three ranks or
levels cardinal deacons, cardinal priests, and cardinal bishops. And this
reflects the practice going back many centuries in Rome, where
you would have deacons, who are the first order of
sacred orders that they were serving in Rome, and actually
(09:33):
in Rome they organized their church or what they're called deaconries,
and deacons were in charge of charity. So they'd have
deacons and they have priests who would serve in the
different churches. So the pope would pick some of those
deacons and priests to be sort of like important people
who would have the right then to nominate and elect
the new pope. Cardinal bishops are there from what they're
(09:58):
called the sub or carrion diocese, so the dioceses that
are immediately surrounding the Diocese of Rome. Those bishops were
called cardinal bishops, and it became the tradition that all
of them were then cardinals, and they had a right
to vote in the conclict. Now all of that is
now ceased from the point of view of they're these
(10:19):
everyone who becomes a deacon cardinal deacon is already a
priest or a bishop, and likewise cardinal priests or priests
or bishops, same with cardinal bishops. But the within the
tradition now they maintained that, for instance, the leader of
the conclave is the cardinal dean, or in his absence,
the senior cardinal bishop. So the cardinal dean and the
(10:41):
vice dean are both over eighty. So Cardinal Paraline, who
was the senior cardinal bishop, he is then charged inside
the Sistine chapel of the conclave, and then the cardinal deacon,
the senior one, will announce from the balcony the name
of the new pope. So there are these roles, and
then of course, like an organization, so ancient seniority has
(11:04):
its role.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
So the bishops and priests and deacon cardinals all enter
according to their rank.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Wow. Yeah, that's cool the way it's broken up. And
again you see all that history there again, the church
preserving this history. Even when things have fallen away, the classifications,
the rank, the tradition remains. Bob. Vatican two, one of
our viewers wrote, Vatican two had serious problems, even heresy
within that has not been addressed. What about the heresy
(11:33):
of modernism that's devastated the church in the past sixty years?
Speaker 4 (11:36):
You would say, what, Well, as I mentioned earlier, I
think that Bishop Baron has a good grasp on that.
And you know, we just have to recognize that we
all live in a culture that is deeply marked by modernism,
which is to say, a kind of a materialistic scientific.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
View of the world. I mean, there's nothing wrong with
true science.
Speaker 4 (11:56):
And the true study of the physical world, but that
has kind of encroached on our understanding of faith, of morals,
of what human beings are. Are we just animals or
are we something that go beyond that? And so I
think that this is not a cultural question that can
be solved very quickly. And some of these ambiguous statements
(12:18):
I would call them that came out of Vatican too,
were of course exploited by people who wanted to use
that modernism to advance progressive causes within the Church. Now,
in broader cultural terms, lots of people consider us to
be in postmodernism right now, which means that the old modernism,
that old materialism, scientific materialism, that's not so security longer.
(12:41):
I mean we see it in politics, we see it
in education. So there's a real opportunity for someone who
grasps deeply what's at stake, brings the graces and the
power of Christ into a culture that itself now is
searching groping around for what it's going to do. It
may take some serious restructuring of how people look back
(13:03):
at the Council and understand that as well. It's a
big task and it's one that I think the next
Pope has to undertake along with all the other things
that we've talked about with regard to sexual abuse, to
financial problems. That's a longer term problem, but we really
need to get on the case. John Paul and Benedict
started the response to it. I think we need to
(13:24):
take that forward very vigorously because in a century or so,
we could be in a very different culture unless we do.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Father. Here's an interesting question. Can a cardinal vote for
himself in a conclave?
Speaker 5 (13:37):
A cardinal can vote for himself, accept in the runoff,
and it's a technicality. So yeah, a cardinal can vote
for himself in each round leading up to I guess
it's the thirty third round. So if they haven't elected
anybody by around thirty three, what they do is the
top two vote getters enter into a runoff.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
The cardinals.
Speaker 5 (14:00):
The two cardinals who are in that category cannot vote
for themselves, so no one could say that they were
the deciding vote for themselves. And I think that's a
wise decision.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Well that was kind of a setup for this question
that one of our viewers has submitted, who would Jesus
vote for in the conclave?
Speaker 5 (14:23):
Well, you know, until the runoff number one, the Good
Lord was not a cardinals, so you know he's the
he's the God incarnate who the cardinals worship and obey.
So no, and you know, in the free Will, in
the rather excuse me, in the gift of free will
to mankind, God left in the church decisions to be
(14:48):
made by us, not by God directly. So we believe
in providence, in God's help, but we do not believe that.
You know, God is voting in the Each cardinal votes,
and hopefully they vote in a godly way. But got
to remember there are a lot of good men in
that college, so voting for one and not another doesn't
mean you're doing something that defends God.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Yeah. Well, when I read that question, I thought, if
Jesus walks into the Sistine Chapel, I could promise you
they'll all vacate. There'll be no need to have a
vicar of Christ if you have Christ, right. Yeah, well,
well wait till he goes back to heaven and then
you have another conclave. I guess here's an interesting question, Bob.
This lady, she says, I am confused as to what
(15:31):
the cardinal How do the cardinals vote on the fourth day?
It says they have to take a pause on the
fourth day according to the constitution of conclave that John
Pauled a second drafted or wrote promulgated. Bob, do they
take a pause for the full day for prayer and
meditation or only for part of the day.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Yeah, we talked about this the other day, and I
think they have some latitude in what they're going to do.
They could take the whole day off, they could take
the half day off. And I think there's a certain
prudence that if people are exhausted or they feel that
they kind of have reached an impasse about where the
vote is going, maybe it's a good thing to take
a whole day. And if it's Sunday and they back
(16:12):
off and they have a chance to pray, go to
Mass and have a little bit of recreation and come
back afterwards. But I don't believe there's any requirement that
this be a full day or a half day. Will
no doubt find if it gets to that stage, will
no doubt find out how much the people who are
running the actual conclave feel that they need a break.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
Father.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
Why do the cardinals have to change their handwriting when
writing their ballot? This viewer said, I heard that they
have to disguise their handwriting. Is that true?
Speaker 5 (16:48):
It is because the voting is anonymous. When you submit
your ballots, you don't put your name on it, and
when the ballots are deposited in the urn, those who
are counters are supposed to mix them up. So that's
like if you could see the last cardinal and he's
on the top of the stack and take his name
out first.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
Everybody know he voted for that person. So now the
goal here is to not allow the.
Speaker 5 (17:15):
Individual names or votes to be known, so that it
can't be a form of moral persuasion or even you know,
kind of like a certain amount of coercion that you
have to vote with cardinals x set. Now, disguising handwriting
presumes that the counters will recognize the handwriting of the others.
(17:35):
In the modern world, very few people send letters by snail.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
Mail, you know, they don't write out letters and email.
Speaker 5 (17:42):
You know, there's no signature unless you use that automatic
signature thing which is always made up. So no one really,
I think, will know the handwriting. But some of them
may know the handwriting of each other. So yeah, disguising
it as best you can, that's just another means to
try to preserve the anonymity and privacy of what's happening.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
And I've known older cardinals who've gone in and they
have an inframani, who's a person, you know, basically a
nurse somebody to help them, and they can if the
cardinal can't write, if they have the sheiks or a tool.
They'll write the name for them and actually do that,
which I didn't realize. But those functions those people do.
Nurses if you will, they are allowed in, but they
(18:20):
too are under the oath of secrecy. Bob, What could
a group of Catholic cardinals do in the case and
I'm reading this and at the moment of the election
of a cardinal who is clearly heterodox or suspected of heterodoxy,
between the very brief moment of the proclamation of the
result of the vote and the moment when the elected
cardinal accepts the office, is there an option that would
(18:42):
allow Catholic cardinals to oppose an election on the grounds
that the elected man is not Catholic, is not truly Poppibaly.
Speaker 4 (18:51):
I think the answer, unfortunately, is there's nothing that they
can do that. It's kind of like the popular vote
in a presidential election or whatever other type of election.
If the process has been followed, one hopes that both
because of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and the
prudence of the men in the room, that that would
(19:13):
not result in somebody who was obviously and openly heretical.
That would have been worked out before that I can't
imagine how they would know that at that given moment.
But it's a good thing to raise these issues because,
you know, funny things happen in the course of elections
and whatnot, and we know, you know people we started
out talking about how the conclave has not always been
(19:36):
carried out in this formula. We've had periods when there's
more than one pope and decisions have to be made
about who was actually the legitimate pope, and there have
been long periods of no pope at Also, we tend
to see these things the way we see other events
on television and through social media. In fact, someone has
said this is the first social media conclave where there's
(19:58):
almost instantaneous respect to what's happening.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
And so if.
Speaker 4 (20:02):
People were watching this see a figure who's elected who
they suspect of heterodoxy, they're gonna, you know, they're going
to react and they're hope that that someone can be saved.
This is a different kind of process. This is is
a slower, older type of process, and that can be frustrating,
but at the same time it may provide some safeguards.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Next question, what do the cardinals do in between votes?
Father do they talk amongst themselves. Do they get up
and speak, do they read? Do they pray? What's the
protocol for dinner's lunches and the in between periods in
the Sistine Chapel. I'll let you both talk about that.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Sure.
Speaker 5 (20:40):
No, well, all of the above. You know, they're once
they leave the Sistine Chapel, then they're going to be
able to speak to each other. They get on the
bus which takes them that short distance from the Sistine
Chapel around the back of Saint Peter's over to the
Saint Martha House.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
Inside they can take.
Speaker 5 (20:57):
A walk, you know, around that area where there's a
sort of like parking lot air in front of Saint Martha's.
The better said, and then the Vatican gardens are up
the hill a little bit.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (21:08):
They can certainly go in and discuss at dinner. They
can also relax with a book. But they can't do
is call anybody, send emails, listen to the radio, watch television,
watch the Royal Grande podcast. They can't do any of that.
So and I guess our shot. I know, but no,
(21:29):
it's you know they are. It's it's similar to being
on a retreat because there are times of prayer and silence,
and certainly that's what's happening in the Sistine Chapel. But no,
in fact, those are the times when they can look
at compare notes and say, well, we think Cardinal X
is the right one, but he couldn't get enough votes,
and now I'm going to go for Cardinal Y.
Speaker 3 (21:46):
What do you think?
Speaker 1 (21:47):
Hmm. Yeah, that's when the that's when the heavy the
heavy pressure and the politicking sort of begins.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
Bob.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
But I was told that they whisper and talk to
the people aside them in the in the Sistine Chapel
as well.
Speaker 4 (21:59):
Yeah, yeah, look, they're they're they're free because they are
actually behind kind of a paywall, if we want to
put it that way, right, you know, I sometimes worry
how how much behind uh anonymity they actually are. I mean,
they take all these steps, they bring in, you know,
security experts to sweep for bugs. But we've seen in
(22:20):
the past that in such events somehow always managed to
leak it to a certain extent, if not immediately then
then after the fact. And they're not supposed to even
leak after the fact. That right, Look, this is all
to the good. The more that they talk with one another.
The more the possibilities are working out some things, understanding
who's who. We keep saying over and over again, they
don't know each other very well. And maybe in that circumstance,
(22:44):
which is a bit of a pressure pressure cooker, I mean,
I think, you know, there's the outlet of prayer and
relaxation and whatnot, But in that pressure cooker, you may
begin to see things about people's characters. It will help you,
how that, to see how they will operate when they're
in the pressure cooker.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Being the pope, yeah, father, speak to that for a moment.
The I mean, when Pope Francis was elected, suddenly you know,
there was a journalist, Austin Ivory who came out with
a book. He had letter in verse of not only
the agreements made before the conclave, but conversations had in
the vote com I mean today he was sending out
(23:20):
the vote com Oh. At this point, Francis was already
up ten points. I thought this was supposed to be
secret under penalty of excommunication.
Speaker 5 (23:29):
Now that's actually the canon law. It's supposed to remain.
So you're not supposed to speak about anything concerning the election.
Now that doesn't mean you can't say I walked in
and my seat was uncomfortable because it was a plastic
you know, wooden bench.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Rather, that was not a nice seat. That's trivia.
Speaker 5 (23:48):
But you cannot come in and say, you know, I
saw a cardinal Lets get up and then everybody was smiling.
And no, you're supposed to keep it all secret, but
people do leak. This is one of the had realities
of the modern world that people do not take odes seriously.
And this we see it in courts of law, and
now we see it.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
You're right.
Speaker 5 (24:09):
There have been many books written about how the voting
went in the last papal conclave and it's stunning. Now
I'll say I'll be completely honest here. Poe Francis himself
talked about yes, he did the voting subsequently, and people
noted that, wait a minute, you're not supposed to do that.
(24:29):
Now you could say, since he's the lawgiver, he could
dispense himself from observing that law post facto.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
But you know the.
Speaker 5 (24:37):
Casualness nowadays with which people assume, well, we say that
for public consumption, but in reality we call our journalist friends.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
That's something I think that needs to be stamped out.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
Yeah, Bob, I saw it today. I'm walking I'm walking
home from the from the Vatican. There are people on
the phone after the first vote, and they're relating tallies
and I hear this one's moving up, and that one's
in the li and this one lost some votes. I'm like,
what app are these people on?
Speaker 4 (25:06):
Yeah, I've been looking at the Italian press, which is
not always reliable. In fact, it's quite unreliable, but they
are very reliable in that they convey every rumor that
there is floating around in it and around the room
at the same time.
Speaker 3 (25:19):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 4 (25:20):
I mean there's a story that was told. This is
an interesting story by Messagero that before they closed the
doors today, the Cardinal Ray, who gave the homily at
the final Mass before they possessed into the conclave, said
to Cardinal Paroline, he used an expression that I've never
heard before, alguti dopey. He says double good fortune. And
(25:47):
since he's a leading candidate the way that the Italians
are interpreting this and Cardinal rays a little hard of hearing,
so he said it really loudly, so that everybody heard
it as he.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
Was going in.
Speaker 4 (25:57):
What they heard that this as meaning is I hope
you win number one, but also I hope you do
well in managing, because he's also the manager of.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
What's going on inside the room there.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
So this is kind of thing that the Italians look
at and they think that maybe it's going to tell
things one way or another. I'm a little skeptical, but
it's interesting the way that they read every tiny detail.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
Every utterance. Yeah, it's kind of cool. Are you looking
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Capital values driven investing to support your faith, family, and
finances there at Taylorfogne dot com. Bob, what should the
Pope elect do to help resolve and correct the China
deal that remains secretive?
Speaker 4 (26:59):
One of our viewers, right, Oh man, this is a
hard question.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
I know.
Speaker 4 (27:07):
Yeah, if it's Cardinal Paroline, it's I mean, it's his baby,
so he's going to have to go back on some
of the things that he did there. Still, you know,
we don't know what's in there. But we do know
that the Chinese they're just running ahead with naming bishops
and reforming dioceses and and actually changing the way that
that masses are said inside the church with President G's
(27:30):
image there, and they're trying to cynicize all religions, and
especially the Catholic Church because of the Catholic Church as
a what they regard as a foreign leader. I don't
know what they can do. I think the first thing
to do is to publish the accord. They aren't supposed
to be private accords like this in the modern world.
They should publish that. People should be able to know
(27:53):
what the details are so they can at least criticize
the Chinese if they're doing something they're not supposed to
be doing. But I think this is the to take
a much more severe approach, and it may it's going
to require them to be willing to confront China. They
haven't been willing to confront Cuba and Nicaragua and Venezuela lately,
which had been putting a lot of pressure in Catholic priests.
(28:15):
But it's not only the matter of a diplomatic arrangement.
This is also the life and death of ordinary lay people,
priests and bishops in China, and we can't abandon them.
We need some vigorous action to rescue them.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
You know, Bob, it's interesting to say that I ran
into a few African and South American cardinals and they
were mentioning John Paul. We need a John Pole the
second like pope because of what you just raised. He
did confront Nicaragua, he did confront the Russian regime. He
(28:50):
did confront these fascists and demanded religious freedom in them
and brought the moral suasion of the church. I know
it's a balancing act, but a fellow like Perline, I
don't think he'll ever roll that back. But I think
the next pope pastor not only expose it, but roll
it back. It's it's it's outrageous. Father, which continent besides
(29:10):
Europe one of our viewers' rites is most likely to
produce the next Pope?
Speaker 3 (29:17):
Well, my estimation is would be Africa.
Speaker 5 (29:22):
You know, if we get a European this time, who
knows how long he'll reign over the church as pope.
But you know, the African Church is growing all the time,
and the African cardinals, you know, assume, you know, great
relevance in the life of the churches. They represent an
area where Christianity is not dying. It's sad to say
in Europe statistically, Christianity is losing numbers and influence in
(29:48):
an unimaginable way. You know, if you think at the
end of the Second World War, when Christianity was viewed
as the renewal force to try and bring back a
continent which have been destroyed by two worlds wars, and
look at it today where Christianity is on the run
in almost every single European nation. Eastern Europe is apart
(30:10):
where there is a revival. But so I think Africa
would be that they answer that question would be where the.
Speaker 3 (30:16):
Next a pope? Now, where the future will come from?
Speaker 1 (30:20):
Which wouldn't be the first time. In the early centuries
of the Church we had a string of Africans, mostly
from Tunisia, right.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
Yeah, North Africa.
Speaker 5 (30:29):
Yeah, they were you know the Roman North Africa is
the Roman province, so the Christianity spread there.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Yeah. Bob william asks why are the older cardinals over
eighty not allowed in the conclave, and especially why not
allow them to be involved given that their knowledge is unparalleled.
Speaker 4 (30:47):
Yeah, I think that's a bit of a sore point.
But look, look, you have to have rules about when
when people can be active in an organization, when when
they cannot. I mean, it's simply the case in the
Catholic Cheurche that bishops at age seventy five are supposed
to send a letter to the Holy Father presenting their resignation.
(31:09):
The Pope can accept it right at that moment, or
we can say, well, you know, I want you to
stay on. Very often people will stay on. Cardinal Dolan
from New York, for example, his past seventy five, but
he hasn't been removed from his position as Cardinal Archbishop
of New York. Look, we've all known people over eighty
years old. Some of them are very wise. I think
(31:32):
of Cardinal zen who was just he's a dynamo, he's
still got all his marbles, he's got energy, he's got courage.
But how many and he's over ninety, how many people
over eighty would be would you want to trust to
have that degree of lucidity? And if you make an
exception for one, why not another? And then you get
(31:53):
into a whole quarrel over that.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
So it's a rule. In some cases it's.
Speaker 4 (31:58):
Probably unjust, but it would be unjust no matter how
you kind of cut it. So you make a decision
and that's how it goes for.
Speaker 6 (32:06):
Yeah, I think it was Paul the six rule, right, father, Yeah, Yeah,
Can I throw in on this one, yeah, because yeah,
Paul the Six put that rule in place, and it
was understood at the time to be an effort to
diminish the influence of older, presumably more conservative.
Speaker 3 (32:19):
Cardinals in the next papal election.
Speaker 5 (32:22):
The irony is, of course that you cannot vote for
a pope if you're over eighty, but you can be
a pope if you're overeatey.
Speaker 3 (32:31):
So you know.
Speaker 5 (32:33):
Which is more important. Being a pope is more important
than voting for one. So if you can do the greater,
you can do the lesser. That's the usual principle of law.
So I think I also say the retirement of bishops
of seventy five is not of that was only introduced.
Also after the Second Vatican Council we got into the
managerial mindset of efficiency, I think, you know, which is
(32:54):
remember the managerial revolution after the Second World War.
Speaker 3 (32:57):
You know, we're going to fix the world's problems by
better man. The jury is in on that.
Speaker 5 (33:04):
Yeah, Yeah, I don't think I don't think we should
have these rules because I would much rather have cardinals
Zen voting than simply being an advisor to the others.
Speaker 3 (33:13):
Because he's a man of extreme lucidity and experience.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
Yeah, and then people look to the elders, particularly if
they're venerable like Zen and have been through the fires
of you know, facing down a regime like China and
still you know, waving the flag. Here's father. This is
one for you. Why can't there be an American pope?
Speaker 3 (33:32):
There can be.
Speaker 5 (33:33):
It's just, you know, the church exists in history, so
historical factors have to be examined, you know. I mean
my colleague here, Bob Royal, has written the whole history
of theology in the twentieth century. You have to look
at the way things develop, you know, theologians react to
secular trends and then challenges and then biblical studies and
all the rest. So on a political scene, I would say,
(33:56):
what position does America operate in the world? Back in
the eighteen fifth these we were a mission territory since
the Second World War, with a unique dominant power opposing
for the Communists and now other forces China and the rest.
So I think the idea would be the dominant secular
power should not also have one of its members be
the head of the chur church honor.
Speaker 3 (34:18):
But I'd been through what Bob had to say.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
Yeah, Bob, that's the concern, right, you don't want the
superpower having the other superpower.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
I think you're running, Bob. That's why you were talking
all those cardinals this week. You were trying to slip
them the bill.
Speaker 4 (34:39):
I mean, look, if they were the proper candidate. And
some people think that the Cardinal Prevost, who has been
the head of the bishops the committee that selects the bishops,
and spend time in Latin America is a front runner.
He's a possibility, even though he kind of just appeals
to some of the Latin America because he spent time
(35:01):
in Latin America, and of course he's been in Rome
a lot. I just don't know what kind of pope
he would be. I think an American who spent more
time in America would have a better grasp on a
lot of what's.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
Going on in the world.
Speaker 4 (35:17):
It's not necessary that a pope grasp you know geopolitical things.
Certainly Pope Francis did not.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
John Paul did.
Speaker 4 (35:25):
Jean Paul happened to be a man who came from
a country where he was in the midst of everything
that was going on in the world at that moment.
But why not, you know, there could be an American
at some point. I think at this moment there's a
fair degree of anti Americanism, and I think the Trump
factor would maybe play into that as well, unfortunately, But
anybody can become a pope, any person from any country
(35:48):
around the world, and we may be surprised even this
time around.
Speaker 1 (35:51):
Do you feel as I look out as I talked
to so many of these men and we all did
this week, it seems that this is why I kind
of when I heard Prevost and so started looking at
him and reading and watching interviews. It seems the pope now,
the pope that everyone collectively is yearning for, whether they
give you a name or not, is a sturdy man.
(36:12):
John Paul was that sort of sturdy man of faith
who had kind of been through the fires and was
ready to complete the mission and declare the Gospel in
a compelling way that came from a lived experience. Father,
Am I totally off base? Is that? Do you feel
that that's sort of where we are now.
Speaker 5 (36:34):
I think there's a desire for, you know, a strong
father figure and you know, and you know, this is
where you know, somebody said once, you know, gentleness is
a sign of true strength, and I think that's what
we all expect from our dads. You know, they lay
down the law, but then you know they restrained the
punishment to a degree in order to teach us good lessons.
(36:56):
So you know, that's one reason why African cardinals are
so attractive. You know, I've dealt with African parishioners in
New York. One of my parents was majority African parishioners.
They were French speaking. I have two African priests with me. Now,
you know, Africa is a place where Christianity really was
light to get people out of the fear of paganism
(37:19):
and to bring to them, you know, the true fatherhood
of God and brothership in Christ. So I think, you know,
that is a very important factor. Now Africans aren't the
only ones can do that, you know, again, going back
to cardinals, en, we're talked about if there was ever
a father figure it's him. You know, his flock is
being persecuted by communists and he opens his mouth and
(37:41):
says stop. Jimmy lay Sarah would also fit the bill.
Speaker 1 (37:45):
I mean he faced down a fascist regime down there
Obongo the same. I mean, these people suffer for their faith.
Of some of the Sudanese bishops, they've got, you know,
marauding groups of Islamisists burning down villages and killing people.
So they know what it means to suffer for the
faith in the way that we in the West. You know,
I'm going to play golf today. I'm going to skip
(38:06):
the masks. Our African brothers and sisters don't understand that approach.
Speaker 5 (38:10):
I'll just throw in Nigerian bishops, you know, the cardinals
in Nigeria are as Bob has recently said in a
public presentation, no country in the world has suffered as
many executions of Christians, i e. Martyrdoms than Nigeria.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
Okay, I'm going to there are a couple of other
questions here. I'm going to try to get this quickly
in what was the actual state of liturgical practice in
the church before that it can too and they're asking
I'd love to hear your views on the role of
Latin in the Church. It seems discussion center on one
pole of the other tridentine or no Latin at all.
Perhaps we could intstoll more Latin in the and keep
(38:47):
the homilies in the vernacular. Bob, I'll start with you.
I mean, that's sort of what Benedict the sixteenth was
trying to accomplish.
Speaker 4 (38:56):
Yeah, you know, some people who write for us at
the cat thing and who are advocates of Latin, as
I myself am, have pointed to the fact that during
Vatican Two a lot of the speeches were in Latin,
which not all the cardinals, bishops, et cetera at that
time understood very well. So some of the problems that
(39:16):
we see in the end, may I've had something to
do with that. We've seen in this past week that
there's a lot of Latin that is being used, as
in this run up to the conclive and even in
the entry into the Conclive. And this really puts a
question in front of us because if it's not going
to be Latin, which is you know, you know, you
(39:36):
say whatever you want about Latin, it is the historic
official language of the Western Church, going back to the
last The first few centuries of the Church actually started
kind of in Greek but moved into into a Latin format.
But what language is going to be the official language
of the Vatican Otherwise, I mean that there has to
be some some medium in which everybody can can discuss.
(40:00):
And not everybody speaks Italian, by the way, So you
know some people who proposed that English should now become
the official language or at least the working language in
the Vatican, because it's much more likely that people can
handle that than to have studied it. They probably have
to have studied in Rome to know Italian.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
But this question is not going to go away.
Speaker 4 (40:20):
There needs to be a universal language, and either it's
going to be the universal language of the Old Empire
or it's going to be the language or the New Empire. Probably,
And that also touches on turgical matters which I'm not
going to touch, but I'll leave to the cannadist to explain.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
Okay, resident candidates, you're up, so I'll start by me.
Don't speak in Latin though.
Speaker 5 (40:41):
No, no, well, bell leaeve the lingual Latin side. No,
I want to endorse a Bob just said English should
be the language of the curia, and the reason being
it's the language that most the largest number of Catholics
in the world either speak and English as the first
language or learned it. So therefore it's useful. It's not
because of anglosphere domination, just the reality. I mean, we're
(41:04):
just following Hollywood and the economic world. The diplomat French
is no longer the diplomatic language of choice. So and
it would be very useful, I would say, because yet
we're never going to recover spoken Latin in the church.
And part of the reason is when you when the
liturgy became vernacular, there was no need for priests to
(41:24):
learn Latin anymore. So now priests who do learn Latin
have a particular interest in it, but there are very
few Latin teachers who can go all over the world
and spread this knowledge. So it's I regret that and
maybe that can be revived and you know, now back,
let's go to liturgy. Yeah, the liturgical practice before the
council is a great treasure and value and hopefully, you know,
(41:49):
we can go back to the John poll second Benedict approach,
which is let both forms of the liturgy it coexists
and influence each other.
Speaker 3 (41:59):
Because for those who do take the trouble to.
Speaker 5 (42:00):
Learn Latin and pray in it, you know, peace and
joy come from that beautiful association with the historic worship.
Speaker 3 (42:07):
Of the Church. For people who go to the New Mass,
which is in the vernacular, they've come to learn to
appreciate that, and that should be allowed to continue. Also, yeah, yeah,
that's a great point.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
And he did try to reconcile the Latin and the
tradition of the Church with the vernacular, and they do
fit together. They can fit and enrich one another. To
pity that with stup. Okay, here's a question that came in.
I've been giving a lot of these questions, so it's
a good way to answer it. Are you going to
be live during the conclave? Are you all going to
be on site at Saint Peter's. Well, I'll take first
(42:42):
crack at this. We're all going to be live, but
we're going to be at different networks. I'll be on
Fox News, Fathers on Newsmax. Bob has been bouncing around
several different networks. We're doing the world over on Thursday,
but e WTM decided not to have us anchor their
live coverage, And to be very clear, because I've heard
a lot of erroneous things over the last few of
the days, this was not our decision. In fact, we
(43:05):
paid our own way to come here to make ourselves
available to e WT, and you know, for whatever reason,
they decided to go in a different direction. So unless
anybody else wants to chime in on that, I'll leave
that one there. Question from down under, what do we
laity do if we get a bad pope?
Speaker 4 (43:23):
We all head to the back country in Australia and
pray like grace.
Speaker 2 (43:28):
Look, you know.
Speaker 4 (43:32):
This may be sound like a flip answer, but every
human being is bad to a certain extent.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
We're all sinners.
Speaker 4 (43:37):
Every pope is going to have, you know, limitations. John
Paul wasn't a particularly really good administrator. Benedictine wasn't either,
but they were great men, great great men in various ways.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
What you do with you, you do what a Catholic does.
Speaker 4 (43:52):
You go to Mass, you go to confession, you bring
your children upright, you practice charity, you keep your faith
and don't allow extraneous especially in this media environment where
every day everything has to be a you know, histrionic
and dramatic and it's the end of the world. I mean,
(44:13):
our faith is in the name of the Lord who
made heaven in earth. This affair goes right. So if
he made heaven on earth, he can probably keep us
on the right track, you know, even if there is
a bad But we're more, even more than one bad
pope in a row, so be a Catholic.
Speaker 2 (44:28):
Yeah, that'll work.
Speaker 1 (44:29):
Father, you're what should the lady do if we get a.
Speaker 5 (44:32):
Bit, Well, they had to have faith in God and
continue to pray, remain faithful to the doctrine of the faith.
You know, I'm reflecting back. You know, we had immoral
popes in the in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance period,
and I can't remember which pope was, but he made
the statement he had illegitimate children. That's the lead into it.
He said, in all the world calls me father, except
(44:53):
my children call me uncle, you know, because that's that's
how they were explaining to the children why they're close
he's your uncle, whereas he loved with their father. So
we can laugh about that. Of course, on chastity is
not his immortal sin, and it's a horrible thing.
Speaker 3 (45:09):
But yeah, we faithful.
Speaker 5 (45:14):
I mean, we've had so many problems. The Reformation was
a time of great upheaval. Now, the popes, you know,
defended the Catholic Church against the Protestant Reformers, but many
clergy didn't and they fell in with it. And then
of course secular rules persecuted. I mean here in Rome
we have the Venerable English College, which sent countless priests
back to England to be martyred. So, you know, if
(45:37):
they could be faithful in the midst of turbulence, we
can too.
Speaker 1 (45:41):
And when you look at the really bad popes and
the venal ones, some of whom you mentioned, Father, they
did leave this amazing art and architecture. You know, they
there was something that they were used for to contribute
to the ages, even though they were pretty despicable characters themselves.
But God is away of taking care of those people,
(46:01):
and he has the final judgment.
Speaker 3 (46:03):
Thank God.
Speaker 1 (46:04):
The Arroyo Grande Conclave crew, we'll close it out there.
This Vatican addition will continue. Don't miss our next episode.
Subscribe to a Royal Grande Show on YouTube or a
Royal Grande podcast wherever you get yours. And this episode
is brought to you by our friends at Taylor for
gone Capital Management, Faith, family and finances. Visit them at
Taylorforgan dot com. On behalf of Robert Royal father Gerald Murray.
(46:28):
We will convene again, gentlemen. I'm Raim at Royo from
Rome Joo Arroyo. Grande is produced in partnership with iHeart
Podcasts and is available on the iHeartRadio app or wherever
you get your podcasts
Host
Raymond Arroyo
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