On Saturday, the world witnessed a solemn but colourful burial ceremony of the late Pope Francis. Several World leaders, led by the President of the United States of America, Donald Trump, were in Rome to pay their last respect to the humble servant of God. Whilst alive, he was loved by millions. Due to his simple nature, he gave instructions on the mode his burial should take, and his wishes were strictly adhered to. A simple and humble man, Pope Francis joined the saints last week Monday, at the age of 88.
Pope Francis was born Jorge Mario Bergoglio on 17 December, 1936, in Flores, a neighbourhood of Buenos Aires in Argentina. In his lifetime, he brought an unpretentious style to the Catholic church – rejecting elaborate outfits and the ornate papal apartments.
His burial was also simple but colourful, scaling back some of the funerary pomp and ceremony associated with past popes. Just last year, and as if he knew that his time on earth would soon be up, Pope Francis simplified several elements of the burial processions. Since the 13th century, the bodies of popes have gone on public view, their embalmed bodies placed on a raised pedestal. When John Paul 11 died in 2005, his body was first brought to the Apostolic Palace within hours for a private viewing for cardinals, bishops and other members of the church hierarchy, as well as prominent Italian officials. But Pope Francis rejected that sort of viewing. Instead, a procession brought his coffin on Wednesday directly to St. Peter’s Basilica, where a public viewing took place for three days.
Francis’ body, dressed in papal vestments, his head covered with a white bishop’s miter, was laid in state to allow tens of thousands of mourners to bid him farewell. He also instructed that his tomb be in the earth; simple, without particular decoration and with the only inscription: ‘’Franciscus”. Unlike other popes, his tomb will not bear any mention of his papacy, only the name he chose to honour St. Francis of Assisi.
From working as a bouncer at a Buenos Aires nightclub to presiding over the Vatican, the path Pope Francis forged as the leader of the Roman Catholic Church was as unlikely as it was unprecedented.
Although he was keen to flex his muscles as supreme pontiff, he angered some Catholic Church traditionalists by reaching out to gay and marginalized people, demanding justice for the poor and the dispossessed and railing against unbridled capitalism and climate change.
As the first pope from the Americas, Francis was in many ways the ultimate Vatican outsider who charted a new and more liberal course as the leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics. He loved to have children around him, and was at home with those that are physically and mentally challenged. He was against the war between Israel and Palestinians, and had condemned the brutal killing of women and children by the Israeli Army on many occasions.
The late Pope Francis announced a radical change in Vatican policy in December 2023 by formally allowing priests to bless same-sex couples. Still, he continued to oppose gay marriage, to the dismay of more liberal Catholics. The late pope also ratcheted up action against the sexual abuse of children by Catholic Church clergy by issuing the most extensive revision to its law in four decades, calling it “our shame.” He steadfastly championed the plight of migrants when many countries, including the United States, were closing their borders and right-wing politicians were demonizing them. He was against abortion, in favour of clerical celibacy, and opposed to ordaining women, although he was open to giving them a greater role in running the church.
After Pope Francis’s funeral, his coffin was transferred to the Basilica of St. Mary Major, a church lying outside the Vatican’s walls that he was particularly fond of visiting. Francis will be the first pope to be buried there since the 1600s, and the first in over 100 years to be buried outside the Vatican. A plain gravestone in a church that hasn’t held a pope’s remains in centuries – it’s a fitting final resting place for a man who will be remembered by many for his humility and his independence.
With his burial over and his legacies well documented in the minds of the faithful, attention in the next few days would shift to who becomes the next leader of the Roman Catholic Church. Electing a new pope is a big deal amongst the Catholic, and they do not joke with age-long rituals. The election process is highly secretive and nothing will be certain until white smoke pouring from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel tells the world that a new pope has been picked.
When a pope dies or resigns, 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 amongst themselves. The period between the death of a pope and the election of a new one is called the “sede vacante,” or the “seat is vacant.” During that time, the College of Cardinals keeps general oversight of the church, but it is barred from making any major decisions. When the cardinals meet for the conclave, they gather in the Sistine Chapel. All cardinal electors must swear an oath of secrecy and vote by secret ballot. As of April 21, 2025, when Pope Francis died, there were a total of 252 cardinals but only 135 of them are under 80. It is those under 80 Cardinals that have the power to elect a new pope.
To non-Catholic readers, Cardinals are “created” at ceremonies 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), the first non-Italian pope in 455 years. While Europe still has the largest share of cardinal electors with about 39 per cent, it is down from 52 per cent in 2013 when Francis became the first Latin American pope. The second largest group of electors is from Asia and Oceania, with about 20 per cent.
Given the nature of cardinal appointments that Francis made during his papacy, there will inevitably be some expectation that the late Argentine pontiff’s successor will be another non-European, and that like Francis, he could be another progressive, opposed to the Church’s conservative wing. But projections by outsiders have failed several times.
An inkling into what normally happens in the process of choosing a pope was revealed last year in a film written by Peter Straughan, and directed by Edward Berger. Titled ‘Conclave’, it gave a rough idea of the intrigues behind the selection of a new pope. Though based on the 2016 novel by Robert Harris, Conclave was an instant hit and its viewership has even gone up by 283 per cent since the death of Pope Francis.
Although I watched the film last year when it was released, I returned to the film again while writing this piece. The film stars Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, Jogh Lithgow, Sergio Castellitto, and Isabella Rossellini, amongst others. In the film, Cardinal Thomas Lawrence (Fiennes) organises a conclave to elect the next pope but finds himself investigating secrets and scandals about the major candidates, including Nigeria’s Cardinal Adeyemi.
With the horse-trading set to begin amongst the Cardinals, below is a list of some of the best-known candidates up for consideration:
Pietro Parolin
The current secretary of state for the Holy See, Parolin, is an experienced Italian diplomat who has helped to oversee the Vatican’s internal affairs and work on behalf of the Catholic Church around the world in countries such as Venezuela and Vietnam. He has carried out a range of tasks – supporting peace initiatives in Colombia as well as building bridges with Chinese authorities in Beijing. Perhaps more cautious than Francis, he has nonetheless largely supported the late pope’s agenda, and may thus, have earned criticism from those in the church who were opposed to that agenda. As a native of northern Italy who speaks multiple languages including French and Spanish, he could appeal to other Italian, French and Spanish cardinals voting in the conclave.
Matteo Zuppi
Zuppi has been serving since 2015 as the archbishop of Bologna, a city in north central Italy, and was made a cardinal in 2019. He has also served in a diplomatic function for the Vatican, tasked by the late pope in 2023 with leading a peace mission to Ukraine that involved travel to Moscow as well as Washington and Beijing. He belongs to a Catholic humanitarian organization called Sant’Egidio, and previously worked to mediate conflicts in several parts of the world, including Mozambique in the early 1990s and South Sudan more recently.
Pierbattista Pizzaballa
Appointed to be a cardinal relatively recently by the late Pope Francis, Pizzaballa has served as the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem since 2020, where he has devoted himself to a ministry in a region frequently mired by conflict and humanitarian crises – most recently at the center of the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
Jose Tolentino de Mendonca
He is a Portuguese cardinal who has served as the prefect of the Dicastery for Culture and Education, a relatively new administration department inside the church that focuses on promoting cultural activities, heritage, and the principles of Catholic education.
Luis Antonio Tagle
A Filipino cardinal appointed by Pope Benedict XVI in 2012, Tagle has been considered a close ally of Francis for many years and shares many of the late pope’s values, in particular when it comes to acts of charity in the most impoverished corners of the world. He previously led the church’s main charitable branch, Caritas, although it was overhauled and he subsequently stepped down as its head.
Péter Erdő
A Hungarian expert in canon law and archbishop of Esztergom-Budapest, for more than 20 years, Erdő is a leading conservative candidate for the papacy and since he was made cardinal aged just 50, he has often taken strong positions on a range of issues that seem different to that of the late pope, including on migration.
Could there be hope for a pope from Africa this time around? Three Cardinals of African origin are also being mentioned as possible candidates. These are Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson, 76; Democratic Republic of Congo’s Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, 65, the archbishop of Kinshasa; and Ivory Coast’s Cardinal Ignace Bessi Dogbo, 63.
Whoever is elected, may his papacy bring peace to a world bugged down by internal strife and economic warfare. Adièu, Pope Francis, a man of peace!
See you next week.