The Church after Francis

There are many ways of looking at the issue, but no one doubts that Francis’ pontificate is facing its final stretch. At 87 years old (he will turn 88 in December), he is already the oldest Pope in Peter’s chair since Leo ). Jorge Mario Bergoglio has not shown signs of mental fatigue, but he has physical fatigue. Knee problems already force him to almost always move around in a wheelchair (or leaning on a cane) and a certain fragility in his lungs has exposed him in the last two years to acute respiratory complications with long hospital stays. It is not in his mind to resign for now, as he himself has said in several interviews, but in the curia and in the Church’s lies the pools have long since begun. “It is something that only the Holy Spirit knows,” points out a bishop, narrowing his eyes and looking at the sky. “But just in case, some prefer to be prepared.”

Francis has structured his pontificate around a certain reforming mission with a very specific agenda. All of those plans, at least from the organic part, have been completed. Finance and the Vatican Bank (with the closure of 5,000 accounts), laws against sexual abuse, migrants at the center of the social agenda, communication (he himself has become its main spokesperson), reform of the organization of the curia with a new Apostolic Constitution and a geographically heterogeneous college of cardinals that has liquidated the traditional Italian hegemony. On the horizon is the end of the great synod on synodality (a large and long meeting of bishops to convert decision-making in the Church into something more collegial) and some scheduled trips, such as the upcoming and demanding trip to Asia and Oceania ( Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore).

The attempt to gain some diplomatic influence in possible peace processes in Gaza and Ukraine will also persist, so far unsuccessful and often counterproductive. The rest seems more like a pace of consolidation and, above all, correction of errors or more or less improvised responses to crises that are opening.

Massimo Faggioli, Church historian and professor of Theology at Villanova University (Philadelphia), believes that “there are still some elements to take into account.” “I think he wants to stay at least until the conclusion of the synod, that is, the end of 2024, the beginning of 2025. He would also like to launch the Jubilee. He has always said that he has assimilated Benedict XVI’s decision to resign, but he does not see it as a precedent that should necessarily create a school. It is contrary to generating expectations of that type,” he points out. “A conclave? The interesting thing is to know what the cardinals who will attend that meeting think of Francis’ pontificate: some have been very clear, on both sides. But there is a large gray area in the middle that we do not know, because we ignore his opinions and how Francis’ pontificate has been received in their local churches: and that is something that influences a cardinal in a conclave.

One of the most common ways to assess the establishment of a pontificate in the Catholic Church and the influence it will have on the election of the next Pope is to take a look at the college of cardinals. Its composition, that is, the number of cardinals chosen by the regent pope, would suggest that the next pontiff should be someone appointed by him or, at least, a continuator of his agenda. But the Holy Spirit is capricious and reality is not always exactly like that. On the afternoon of April 18, 2005, for example, 115 cardinals entered the Sistine Chapel to elect John Paul II’s successor. The Pole had appointed 113 of those cardinals during his 26 years of pontificate and for all of them it was the first time that they would elect a pontiff. Everything seemed more than tied for one of his creatures to take over. But conclaves are not an exact science. The next day the Holy Spirit leaned towards the most countercultural option with that numerical margin and chose Joseph Ratzinger, one of the only two that Wojtyla had not named. The other, American William Baum, was in a wheelchair.

The numbers that underpin Francis’ work in a future conclave, apart from cases like that of Benedict XVI, are increasingly larger. Of the 237 current cardinals, 131 have been appointed by Bergoglio. But the most important thing is that only those under 80 years of age could vote in a conclave, that is, 127. And of that powerful group, 92 are children of the current pontiff (72.4%). That percentage allows us to measure the power of the Pope on the day the cardinals enter the Sistine Chapel and string the paper with their vote on the rope that unites them all. “Who knows. Most of the cardinals chosen by him might think that his successor must be someone opposite. It would not be the first time. The papal election is usually like a pendulum that swings first one way and then the other. And this has been an intense pontificate, one of rupture, somewhat polarizing… and I would not be surprised if the next conclave elected a pope who could digest some questions raised by Francis. More conservative or more institutional, less moving,” says Faggioli.

There are few voices that consider that Francisco can step aside in a short period of time. Giovanni Maria Vian, expert historian of the Church and director for 11 years of the L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, is sure that “he will not resign, he will die in office.” “He has said it himself. And he seems sensible. The problem in these cases is mental deterioration, but that does not seem to be the case. And a resignation is a problem. Cohabitation with Benedicto has been calm, but it is no guarantee for the future,” says Vian, who also opens the possibility that the possible successor changes course somewhat. “Even if he chose to be called Francisco II, he will have to differentiate himself from his predecessor. An already long and disputed pontificate requires that there be a different successor. And it is true that there has been a certain polarization that could make us look for someone to calm the situation, someone with greater consensus.”

One of the key issues in the post-Francis era will be the durability of his reforms. Are they already irreversible? “They are not, but that works for any Pope,” says Vian. “Because another problem is the exercise of papal power that Francis has developed, something authoritarian, as he himself recognizes, and which will require a review of that issue. Because, among other things, that attitude goes against the definitive implementation of the reforms.” Austen Ivereigh, Francis’ biographer, one of the people who best knows his work as pontiff, has few doubts about the irreversibility of the changes. “Almost nothing is irreversible, of course. But speaking with many bishops and cardinals, the pastoral, synodal, and missionary path seems to me to be the only viable and desirable path at this time. All but a minority would agree with this. I am referring to the college of cardinals, but also to the episcopal college,” he points out.

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