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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   9111 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 21, 2025

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Brief overview of the upcoming conclave Rules: https://collegeofcardinalsreport.com/conclaves/electing-a-pope/

There's 135 voting cardinals. 45 is enough to block any candidate in particular; cardinal Parolin probably already has that many in opposition. 90 is enough to elect a pope; no candidate is likely to have that number in the first round. The 'conservatives' voting as a block of around fifty is likely in the first few rounds.

Some Cardinals worth keeping an eye on in the interventions:

Oullet, Bagnasco, and Piacenza are dinosaurs, but a conclave skittish from pope Francis' behavior might like that. They're centrist center-right wingers who'll have broad ideological appeal and they have a proven track record in church leadership. They're also from developed Latin countries seen as a natural home for the church. The cardinals specifically looking for a short papacy which doesn't make major changes and emphasizes orthodoxy and conventional HR moves are likely to find their candidate out of these three; in the past Schonborn would also have been on the list, but his liberalism makes him unpredictable. Cardinal Oullet was the runner-up at the last conclave and it is very plausible that a 'compromise' candidate to give Pizzaballa another shot in 5-10 years would be him.

Erdo is probably not going to get elected, but is at the head of the conservative voting block, giving him lots of influence. Watch for cardinals who give speeches hitting similar themes.

Pizzaballa is young, not just for a pope but for a head of state in general. He is, however, incredibly popular among the rank and file, both clerical and lay, and has been since he offered to trade his life for those of Hamas's hostages.

Zuppi is rumoured to be pope Francis' handpicked successor. Aveline is rumoured to be the favorite among the cardinals in that corner. Either one of them is a semiplausible result from the conclave.

Parolin likely has a veto block to oppose him already lined up, but he really wants to be pope and he has a lot of influence.

Tagle is fairly young, but is too progressive to get elected in a future conclave. I suspect he's too progressive to get elected in this one, too, but if he tacks sharply to the right in the interventions it's possible.

are they likely to make any significant changes to the Vatican II settlement?

https://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2025/04/the-end-of-vatican-ii-era-and-future.html#more

There are roughly four factions with influence within the Church, figures like Vigano and Gracida being outliers. Besides the rupturists[ed note- far left] there is a faction that believes (or claims to believe in) some form of ‘hermeneutic of continuity’ and can even reference Pope Benedict XVI in that regard, but ultimately they believe in developing beyond that and the hermeneutic of continuity has past teachings continuously reinterpreted through the lens of the present instead of the reverse.

The third school can simply be called Ratzingerian. They adhere to an organic and holistic continuity where the Second Vatican Council is neither marginalized, nor idolized. Cardinals such as Koch, Filoni, Woelki, Nycz and most American bishops clearly fall in this category.

The fourth category is best described as semi-traditional and has Cardinal Burke and Cardinal Sarah as its most well-known supporters. The Second Vatican Council isn’t rejected, as it is by Vigano, but its dogmatic status may be downplayed or denied and various aspects of it are subjected to criticism.

The Ratzingerians likely hold a majority in the Church by ~2030 at the latest, and are likely to side with the semitraditionalists over the... I call them 'meds' because those are their leaders, but the faction that believes in developing the hermeneutic of continuity through reinterpreting past teachings. Functionally all of them are from the broader Latin world(either in Europe or in Latin America) and if one is elected in the upcoming conclave(which isn't totally implausible; Zuppi and Aveline are strong contenders if not the strongest) you can expect the Vatican II settlement to stay about the same but with a stronger trad movement. A more conservative pope would shift to the right somewhat faster but still not fast. The chances of the Vatican II settlement moving to the left are negligible.

Pizzaballa is young, not just for a pope but for a head of state in general.

Well, that is relative. He was born in 1965, so he is about 60. By comparison, Obama was elected president at about 48, Angela Merkel became Chancellor at ~51 and Jacinda Ardern became Prime Minister at about 37. Being the head of a state at 60 is only young if you take the last two US presidents as a baseline.

Also, the Pope is a head of state in the same way that he is the supreme commander of an armed force -- which is to say, that while he is both, he as a very non-central example of either. Presumably, even being just the bishop of a regular European city is coming closer to describing his day job. Being a head of state technically comes with the job, but it is a minor consideration -- no contender will run on a platform of "the Vatican should increase the minimum wage or reform health care".

Just for context, Zuppi is the president of the CEI and a radical immigrationist. He is probably the most pro-open border institutional person in Italy, and a radical leftist to booth.

Yes, Zuppi’s ties to the political left are a mark against him. His religious liberalism is however quite moderate; I would expect Aveline to be more likely as a liberal pope than him, but ‘president of the Italian bishop’s conference’ is a heck of a head start.

It's a shame that Papal candidates are renamed when entering office. I'd pay money for a Pope Pizzaballa just for the meme value alone.

He could be renamed Pope Basil, to keep the theme. St. Basil was an influential theologian and bishop.

Most major and minor characters in the Dragonball saga are named for food (or rarely, clothing or musical instruments). Pizzaballa vs. Zuppi is therefore weak metafictional evidence we’re living in a Dragonball fanfiction.

Time to start chi-building exercises.

Spaceballs sequel in which Pizza the Hutt has become Pizza the Pope.

Well, we already had Palpatine as the pope 15 years ago.

I wonder if even a compromise new Pope represents a major concern for traditionalists, especially in the west.

As I understand it, the "traditionalist" catholic movement was largely underground after Vatican II all the way until the 1990s. The two largest groups dedicated to the Traditional Latin Mass, the FSSP and the ICKSP, weren't even founded until 1988 and 1990, respectively. Even up through the Benedict XVI pontificate, traditionalists were very small and fringe (again, if my understanding is accurate)

This changed when Francis got The Big Chair. His break with a lot of seemingly bedrock doctrine (see Amoris Laetitia from 2016) contributed to the strengthening of the traditionalist movement. The Traditionis Custodes (2021) has been seem by some as a direct attempt to smash the TLM (although this is contradicted in part by how Francis dealt with the aforementioned FSSP, ICSKP, and even the SSPX).

All of this is to say, nothing rallies a group like The Big Bad Enemy, and traditionalists had that with Francis to their hearts content - especially the sedevacantists and other RadTrads, including the Very Online versions.

If a New Pope is elected who, on day one, states "Yeah TLM is fine for whoever wants to celebrate it. Bishops don't need to ask for approval anymore. Go for it." does this take a lot of the Righteously Indignant (TM) wind out of the sails of the traditionalists? I don't know, but much hay was made for a reason during the Francis Pontificate.

Electing Pizzaballa would be, I think, a epoch defining moment for the church for the better. If there's a Cardinal out there (besides Zen) who has "future Saint" written all over him, it's probably Pizzaballa.

The FSSP did not exist before 1988 but that was because they were part of the SSPX before the Econe consecrations and saw steady growth immediately after under JPII and Benedict- nothing like the massive influxes during PF or post-covid, but still growing. The SSPX has seen some setbacks but mostly same story, steady growth(although much more complicated in their case because they got started by absorbing groups of independent trads) and has been operating out in the open since the seventies.

Now sedevacantists do sometimes become normal trads based on who's the pope. That's certainly possible. But there's so many different sedevacantist groups and so many of them are actual cults or run by completely insane people that shedding the relative normies was an inevitability anyways.

Any outside chance for Arborelius?

He’s definitely electable. Not on my shortlist but it’s possible.

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