Throwing Their Red Hats into the Ring

It will be a sad occasion, but it will come. Dressed in their ceremonial red robes, as many as 135 Roman Catholic Cardinals from around the globe, representing 1 billion followers, will gather deep within the Vatican to elect a successor to Pope John Paul II, one of the longest-serving Pontiffs in history but a mortal being nonetheless. The vote will take place in secret and will be guided, according to church doctrine, by the promptings of the Holy Spirit. Which man the College of Cardinals will smile on no one knows, but there is reason to believe this much: the process of choosing the future Holy Father has already begun.

Not that anyone is campaigning for the job--at least not openly. Running for Pope is a peculiar affair, mostly because one is not supposed to do it. In 1996, two years after he broke his leg and set in motion what some observers see as a quiet struggle to succeed him, John Paul II, like Paul VI before him, explicitly forbade the Cardinals to so much as chat about the matter of the next Pontiff. Still, in the media, candidates cropped up, and lately the speculation has grown intense, fueled by John Paul's declining health--at almost 81, he shows the symptoms of Parkinson's disease--and by a flurry of Vatican activity. Last month 44 Cardinals were installed, and in May the princes of the church will again travel to Rome for a wide-ranging discussion on Catholicism in the new millennium.

So who will it be? If the question were only that simple. Positioning oneself for Popehood is a catch-22 on a cosmic scale. To be a front runner in the race is, according to church tradition, a formula for losing it. "He who goes into the conclave as Pope comes out a Cardinal," goes the Roman maxim. Take the case of the Colombian Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos, 71, one of several so-called papabili (Italian for "Popables"). Castrillon Hoyos speaks several languages and possesses an attractive combination of real-world pastoral experience and inside-the-Vatican bureaucratic savvy. In 1999, his compatriot Gabriel Garcia Marquez sang his praises in print, recalling how the Cardinal had dressed as a civilian to meet with drug lord Pablo Escobar, and explicitly calling Castrillon Hoyos a contender. The article, in the eyes of some, raised Castrillon Hoyos' profile a bit too high.

If one hopes to be Pope, it's important not to say so, but hiding one's light entirely is not wise either. Like junior professors on track for tenure, some papabili are prolific authors. Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini's commentary on the Gospel of Mark is currently making the rounds and Cardinal Dionigi Tettemanzi published the 650-page New Christian Bioethics last year. A little strategic globe hopping may help too. Ray Flynn, the former U.S. ambassador to the Holy See, believes that to rank the papabili it's important to "get their frequent-flyer reports." A lifelong Catholic, Flynn is both idealistic and realistic about the undeclared campaign for Pope. "It's the Holy Spirit, but you have to have your bumper stickers ready," he says.