INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
With the death of Pope Francis, announced by the Vatican on Monday, Roman Catholics around the globe will start speculating on who among the
red-robed cardinals will succeed him.Given the nature of cardinal appointments Francis made during his papacy, there will inevitably be some
nothing will be certain until white smoke pouring from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel tells the world that a new pope has been
When a pope dies or resigns, those cardinals aged under 80 are eligible to enter a secret conclave to choose the new head of the nearly 1.4
billion-member Roman Catholic Church from among themselves.The complex vote will reveal if the current cardinals, most of them put there by
Francis, believe his embrace of liberal social values and his progressive reform agenda have gone too far and whether a period of
retrenchment is needed.The cardinals will set the date for the start of the conclave after they start arriving in Rome in the coming
days.Only a pope can appoint cardinals and the type of men he chooses can leave his stamp on the Church long after his reign - because of
their status as senior clerics and because one of them may end up as pontiff.As of April 21 there were a total of 252 cardinals, 135 of them
cardinal electors under 80
called consistories, where they are given their ring, a red biretta - a square cap - and pledge loyalty to the pope, even if it means
shedding blood or sacrificing their lives, as signified by the colour red.Pope Francis held 10 consistories and with each of them, he
increased the chances that his successor will be another non-European, having beefed up the Church in places where it is either a tiny
minority or where it is growing faster than in the mostly stagnant West.For many centuries, most cardinals were Italian, except for a period
when the papacy was based in Avignon between 1309-1377, when many were French.The internationalisation of the College of Cardinals began in
earnest under Paul VI (1963-1978)
It was greatly accelerated by John Paul II (1978-2005), a Pole who was the first non-Italian pope in 455 years.While Europe still has the
largest share of cardinal electors, with about 39%, it is down from 52% in 2013 when Francis became the first Latin American pope
The second largest group of electors is from Asia and Oceania, with about 20%.A Less Euro-Centric GroupFrancis appointed more than 20
cardinals from countries that had never previously had a cardinal, nearly all of them from developing countries such as Rwanda, Cape Verde,
Tonga, Myanmar, Mongolia and South Sudan, or countries with very few Catholics such as Sweden.In some cases he repeatedly overlooked
vacancies in big European cities that traditionally had cardinals, to stress that the Church could not be so Euro-centric.In other places,
such as the United States, he bypassed dioceses such as Los Angeles and San Francisco, apparently because they had conservative
that a pope names during his reign also increases the possibility that his successor will be someone who holds similar views on Church and
social issues.However, this is not always the case, as the cardinals may choose a person theologically dissimilar to his predecessor but
considered the best candidate for internal Church reasons or for the historical times in which the election takes place.Pope Benedict was
chosen to succeed Pope John Paul II in part because Benedict had worked with John Paul for two decades and the cardinals wanted
scandal exposed a dysfunctional central administration, much of it overseen by Italian prelates.At the same time, many cardinals clearly
non-European pope in nearly 13 centuries.Although cardinals who have turned 80 cannot enter the conclave, they still can affect its outcome
They are allowed to attend meetings known as General Congregations that take place in the days before a conclave starts and where a profile
