In the days leading to the secret balloting at the Sistine Chapel, Vatican insiders said the Cardinals would vote according to their conscience. Nobody ruled out the power play, vested interests and Machiavellian maneuvers to get the two-thirds vote to elect the new pope.
According to press reports, the conclave was divided between those who worked in the Vatican and the reformers, who wanted the next Pope to address the corruption, inefficiency and reluctance of those in the Vatican to share power and information with bishops from around the world.
Analysts said they would not be surprised if members of a powerful faction, the so-called Benedict faction, who owe their red hats to the resigned pope, would pull a surprise because they made up more than half of the voters. Nobody knows, as yet, whether some of these predictions came to pass.
Tagle has gained a reputation in the Vatican as “a man of the people,†a good theologian who was close to Benedict. Novaliches Bishop Emeritus Teodoro Bacani said the country would explode with joy if Tagle emerged on the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica when the cardinals declare “Habemus Papam (We have a pope) and white smoke billowed out of the chimney on top the Sistine Chapel.
But it was not Tagle’s time to wear the white robe and red shoes.
Nonetheless, Filipinos savored the mere possibility. These moments will go down in Philippine history as the year when a Filipino cardinal almost became a pope.
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