#popes

"In the fourth vote, the ballots overwhelmingly shifted" to Cardinal Prevost, Cardinal You of South Korea said.

Cardinal Müller sat behind the American front-runner in the Sistine Chapel and noticed that he seemed calm. Cardinal Tagle, who sat next to Cardinal Prevost, noticed him taking deep breaths as votes amassed in his favor.

"I asked him, 'Do you want a candy?' and he said, 'Yes'," Cardinal Tagle said.

During one of the votes, Cardinal Tobin, as he held his ballot high and put it in the urn, turned and saw Cardinal Prevost, whom he had known for about 30 years.

"I took a look at Bob," Cardinal Tobin said, "and he had his head in his hands."

-- A fascinating inside-the-Sistine-Chapel look at the Conclave that elected Cardinal Robert Prevost as Pope Leo XIV, via the New York Times.

— Catholic journalist Catherine Pepinster writing at The Guardian.

Going back 250 years, of the (now) 18 popes since the start of the American Revolution, the three most what we would now call "progressive" would be...

John XXIII (1958-1963)

Francis (2013-2025)

Leo XIII (1878-1903)

Leo XIII issued an encyclical called Rerum Novarum which in modern terms called for collective bargaining and fair working conditions for workers – with emphasis on the working poor. Though the encyclical also rejected violence and forced confiscation of property as advocated by militant socialists of that era, Rerum Novarum was regarded as radical by powerful conservative elements inside the church hierarchy. So when Leo XIII died, the cardinals elected Pius X who was a blatant reactionary.

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papal prophecies

illustrations from a manuscript copy of "vaticinia de summis pontificibus" (a series of prophecies related to specific popes), northern italy, c. 1410-15