A Journalistic 'Discovery'

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXI, Issue 29, 16 July 1903, Page 1

A Journalistic 'Discovery '

Mental ripeness is commonly humble ; mental rawness is inflated with pride. We are all familiar with the aggressive controversialists of diluted intellect who, after having read a cheap — and usually nasty— tract or two, deem themselves qualified to teach Catholic theology to the Pope and the whole College of Cardinals. The performance is, as a rule, sufficient to make a tombstone smile. The serious illness of the Pop© furnished a

golden opportunity for blundering which omniscient jourw nalistic wights have eagerly taken adyantage of. The result has been the appearance, in our secular papers, of a charming variety of tit-bits of misinformation about conclaves, ' candidates ' for the Papacy, and the laws of succession to the See of Rome. One imaginative journalist, in his search for a mare's nest, made a ' discovery ' that must have caused no small amusement to Cardinal Moran. It was nothing less than this : that his Eminence has the ' right ' to have the conclave for the election of Leo's successor postponed until his (the Cardinal's) arrival in the Eternal City. And the portentous news was sent tingling along the submarine wires to the ends of the earth !

Of course no such right exists. Gregory X.'s constitution of 1274 provides that, on the death of a Pope, the Cardinals present in curia (that is, in residence within the Papal Court) were to await for ten days, the arrival of their absent colleagues. At the expiration of that time they were to meet together in conclave and elect his successor. If any Cardinal did not go into conclave, or was forced for any reason to leave, the election was to proceed without him. But provision was made that those who came late and wished to enter might do bo. These and other provisions regarding the conclave were confirmed by Boniface VIII. in 1294. In 1562 Pope Pius IV. issued a constitution which also provided for a delay of ten days only, and ordered that the Cardinals present should have the right of electing at once ' without waiting for other arrivals.' The ' novemdiali 'or ten days' delay has since then been dispensed with on only two occasions of special danger, and for these occasions only. It was abrogated in 1797, when the First Napoleon's victorious troops seized the Eternal City, proclaimed the Roman Republic, and when the aged Pontiff, Pius VI., had retired from its desecrated walls to the great Carthusian monastery near Florence. He published a Bull authorising the Cardinals to meet immediately after his death to decide whether it was desirable to observe the usual ceremonies, etc., which did not affect the essence of the electoral act, and to proceed to the appointment of hia successor. Similar provisions were made by Pius IX. In the anxious years that followed the invasion of the Papal States and the capture of Rome by the Piedmontese troops in 1870. The fo,urth provision of the Bull of Pius IX. ran as follows : — ' If the Pope dies in Rome the Cardinals present in curia at the moment of his decease are at once to decide, by a majority of votes, if the election is to take place out of Rome, and out of Italy. As soon as the number of Cardinals present represents the half, plus one (that is, a bare majority) of the total number of the Sacred College, they may. If they consider it advisable, proceed immediately to the election, without waiting for the expiration of any other delays.' These abrogations of the ' novemdiali ' were,

however, temporary expedients to meet anticipated attempts by usurping Powers to interfere with the freedom of papal elections. In no case, however, is the beginning of the conclave delayed beyond ten days ; and no Cardinal, no group of Cardinals, and not even the Sacred College of Cardinals collectively, can, unless by virtue of Papal instructions, either anticipate or defer the date of the appointment of a successor to a Pope that has passed away. A cableman in Sydney ' corrected ' a few days ago the previous blunder about Cardinal Moran's right to postpone the conclave. With the serene good faith of one who believes that he has exclusive and accurate information and is anxious to impart it for the enlightenment of others, this new authority on conclaves informed the people of New Zealand that the now Pope must bo actually elected within the ten days ! This and a few other tit-bits of information about conclaves that have lately appeared in the secular press of New Zealand would form interesting additions to David Macrae's ' Book of Blunders.'