As this newspaper goes to press, the red-robed cardinals are gathering beneath Michelangelo’s Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel. The conclave has begun, the doors have closed, and the world watches with anticipation. By the time you read this, white smoke may already have risen from the chimney, signaling that the Roman Catholic Church has chosen its next pope.
For journalists, it is never ideal to go to print on the cusp of history. Yet such is the nature of modern media—news breaks in real time, and the digital world ensures it reaches the public within moments. Still, even at this transitional moment, we can reflect on the weight of what is unfolding in Rome, and what it means—especially here in Ireland.
Interest in the papal election remains strong among Irish Catholics, despite significant changes in religious practice and identity in recent decades. While the term “Bouncy Castle Catholics” may seem flippant, it captures a sentiment many here understand: the tendency of some to reconnect with the church only on festive occasions or community events—often involving inflatable amusements rather than incense and Mass.
But even those who rarely cross the threshold of a chapel feel the pull of a new papacy. Why? Because the choice of a pope is about far more than religion. It is a global event, one with spiritual, political, and moral implications. The new pope, as Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re said in his homily before the conclave, must be a figure “whom the church and humanity need at this difficult and complex turning point in history.”
His words were not empty ceremony. The challenges facing the next pope are monumental, and the honeymoon period will be brief. From international crises to internal divisions, he will be tasked with leading the world’s 1.3 billion Catholics through turbulent waters.
Perhaps the most immediate concern is unity within the church itself. Over the past two decades, the Catholic world has seen two very different popes: the theologically conservative Benedict XVI and the reform-minded Francis. The result is a church that often feels ideologically stretched to its limits. Recalling John Paul II’s powerful description of the conclave as a “concern for the legacy of the keys of the Kingdom,” the cardinals must now hope they have placed those keys in the right hands.
The new pope will be expected to hold together a fractious communion without enforcing rigid uniformity. As Re said, unity must come from “communion in diversity”—a high ideal in an age when global divisions, including within faith communities, are deepening.
The papacy is also a geopolitical office. The next pope must address ongoing wars in Ukraine, the Middle East, and Sudan. He must speak to the growing refugee crisis, climate change, and rising religious persecution. In each of these areas, he will need to act not only as a spiritual shepherd but as a moral diplomat.
At home, the new pope must reckon with unfinished business. The sexual abuse crisis, which tarnished the church’s reputation and deeply wounded its people, remains a raw wound. Pope Francis made progress, but many believe he was too slow and sometimes tone-deaf to survivors’ voices. There will be no patience for similar hesitance from his successor.
Whatever his name, nationality, or style, the new pope will face a Catholic community in flux—especially here in Ireland. The faithful may no longer fill pews weekly, but they are watching. And perhaps, once the smoke has cleared and the applause fades, more will begin to ask not only who the pope is, but what the church can mean in their lives today.
