{"id":1990,"date":"2023-10-01T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-10-01T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vaticanfiles.org\/?p=1990"},"modified":"2023-09-24T23:39:49","modified_gmt":"2023-09-24T21:39:49","slug":"220","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vaticanfiles.org\/it\/2023\/10\/220\/","title":{"rendered":"220. \u201cThe next Pope will be John XXIV.\u201d Will he?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u201cOn the Vietnam journey, if I don’t go, John XXIV certainly will.\u201d In the\u00a0traditional inflight press conference<\/a>\u00a0on the papal plane returning to Rome from Mongolia (September 4), Pope Francis hinted at his possible successor. Being asked what his plans are for future international journeys, Francis showed awareness of his frailty, due to age and poor health conditions. This is why he cannot plan long-term. He also indicated the name of a possible successor who could replace him after he is gone. Of course, he did not refer to a specific individual, but to the papal name he wished the next Pope could take.
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The indication of the name \u201cJohn XXIV\u201d sheds light on the preferred portrait of the pope of the future. It is worth noticing the possible names he did not refer to and the one he used during the interview.
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\u201cFrancis II\u201d was not mentioned for understandable reasons. A reigning Pope wishing his successor to follow his steps is legitimate, but indicating that he should choose his name would have been an abnormal form of egocentrism. In his 10-year tenure, Francis has\u00a0shaped the next conclave<\/a>\u00a0(i.e. the assembly of cardinals who will elect the next Pope) by nominating 70% of it. Most of the new cardinals are Francis\u2019s friends and like-minded people. Obviously, he wants the successor to follow in his footsteps, but wishing him to take the name \u201cFrancis II\u201d would have been a\u00a0faux pas<\/em>.
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\u201cBenedict XVII\u201d wasn\u2019t mentioned either. Despite formally polite co-existence, Francis has always thought of himself as breaking off the ecclesiastical trajectory of Pope Ratzinger. There has been a cleavage between the two on all grounds: doctrine, practice, style, language, strategy. After the death of Benedict XVI, Francis tried\u00a0to limit his influence and close his era<\/a>. Certainly, Francis does not want Pope Ratzinger’s staunchly \u201cRoman\u201d and traditional line to be revived after the end of his reign. He believes there is no place whatsoever for a \u201cBenedict XVII\u201d in the future of the Roman Catholic Church.
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Furthermore, a \u201cJohn Paul III\u201d was not indicated as a desirable follow-up. John Paul II\u2019s legacy is surely tied to the re-launching of Rome\u2019s catholicity (i.e. the embracement of the world into Rome\u2019s sacramental and institutional structures) \u2013 something that Pope Francis is also pursuing in his own way. However, John Paul II (now a \u201csaint\u201d) was also the Pope who engaged in \u201cculture wars\u201d with the secularizing West, upholding traditional Roman Catholic moral identity-markers (e.g. opposition to abortion, euthanasia, and homosexuality). He created an \u201cus\u201d versus \u201cthem\u201d mentality in the relationship with the world, especially the secular West. This oppositional posture is very far from Pope Francis\u2019s more \u201ccatholic\u201d and inclusivist strategy. He wants to underline that we are\u00a0\u201call brothers\u201d<\/a>\u00a0and continue to be so despite professing different religions and having opposite ethical convictions. Francis does not want the Roman Church to be a polarizing agency but a place where differences exist in harmony.
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\u201cPaul VII\u201d did not appear to Francis as a desirable successor either. While Francis often positively quotes Paul VI as the one who wrote the encyclical\u00a0Evangelii Nuntiandi<\/em><\/a>\u00a0(1975) calling the Roman Church to engage in \u201cevangelization\u201d (to be understood in the Roman Catholic sense of expanding the borders of the Roman Church), he apparently dislikes the black and white picture that Paul VI painted in dealing with moral issues such as the regulation of birth in his encyclical\u00a0Humanae Vitae<\/em><\/a>\u00a0(1968). Paul VI created a chasm between the world and the Church. On the contrary, Francis wants to eliminate all separation and treats differences, even the sharpest ones, as instances of human richness to be harmonized.
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Neither \u201cFrancis II,\u201d \u201cBenedict XVII,\u201d \u201cJohn Paul III,\u201d nor \u201cPaul VII.\u201d Why \u201cJohn XXIV\u201d then? Here are some possible explanations for why Pope Francis would like his successor to imitate or look like John XXIII. John XXIII is known as the \u201cgood pope\u201d who was approachable, kind, warm, and humble. Giuseppe Roncalli (1881-1963), John XXIII, was the Pope who convened the Second Vatican Council in 1959.\u00a0The Council only began in 1962, and John XXIII died during it. Vatican II is the\u00a0watershed event<\/a>\u00a0in the present-day Roman Catholic Church whereby Rome began to downplay its centuries-long insistence on the \u201cRoman\u201d sides of its identity (e.g., hierarchy, full adherence to the catechism, submission to the ecclesiastical authority) and to stress its \u201ccatholic\u201d aspirations (e.g., inclusion, embracement, absorption). Francis thinks of himself as enacting and implementing this aspect of Vatican II.
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Moreover, in the\u00a0opening address<\/a>\u00a0to Vatican II, John XXIII remarked that the Council had no doctrinal agenda but wanted to develop \u201ca magisterium which is predominantly pastoral in character.\u201d Neither condemnations of the world nor theological definitions were to be expected. What ensued was a wholehearted affirmation of the goodness of the modern world. Francis likes to underline the pastoral nature of everything the Church says and does. The pastoral dimension (warm, welcoming, accepting of all) is often referred to as if it were in opposition to the doctrinal one. Francis thinks of his pontificate as a \u201cpastoral\u201d attempt at building bridges instead of creating walls with the whole world, leaving doctrinal issues aside. He wants this \u201cpastoral\u201d emphasis to be kept and even increased by his successor. A John XXIII-like pope is expected to promote universal fraternity in ecumenical, inter-faith, and social relationships.
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A final comment is in place. Unlike John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and Francis, John XXIII was an Italian pope. Among the candidates to succeed Francis, Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, the Italian archbishop of Bologna and president of the Italian Bishops Conference, is at the top of the list. In recent months, Francis sent Zuppi to visit Ukraine, Russia, the US, and now China as his ambassador for peace in the Ukraine war. In so doing, he wanted to raise Zuppi\u2019s international profile. In many ways, Cardinal Zuppi resembles the portrait of \u201cJohn XXIV\u201d: not known for his strong doctrinal views, but recognized as a cardinal dedicated to dialogue, peace, and fraternity. Did Pope Francis intend to indirectly campaign for him?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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