“Not only do they not have the numbers to get any guy in like Cardinal Sarah or [Hungarian Cardinal Peter] Erdo, they don’t even have the numbers to be a blocking minority against the liberals,” said Benjamin Harnwell, an Italy-based correspondent for Steve Bannon’s War Room. “It’s a non-Catholic conclave.”
A well known Italian adage goes “fat pope, thin pope” meaning that conclaves tend to counterbalance the preceding one with an ideological shift.
Intimidation tactics
One thing that has changed since the last conclave in 2013 is that lobbying has gone digital.
With a proliferation of conservative blogs and influencers on social media the campaign this time is “like nothing I’ve seen before,” said Stephen Schneck, former director of the Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies at the Catholic University of America. “A gushing flood of analyses, opinions, and actual campaigning by outside groups and influencers is under way, he said, suggesting its immediacy and reach could make a difference.
Frontrunners are fretting about what may emerge. A video of Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, among the most likely to succeed Francis, singing a karaoke rendition of John Lennon’s Imagine, was published by the right-wing website LifeSiteNews, with critics claiming lyrics such as “Imagine there’s no heaven” are a “surrender to atheism”.
“They know they don’t have the numbers so the aim is to intimidate the reformists,” said veteran Vatican watcher and journalist Marco Politi. “The message is: ‘Look you cannot choose a Francis II. It’s a psychological game.’”
But once cardinals are in the Sistine Chapel, they are removed from outside interference.
“It’s difficult to say what will happen in that boiler room” the Vatican ambassador said. “The best-laid plans don’t always survive contact with reality. This group of cardinals has never had the opportunity to get to know each other. They are still stretching their muscles, to see what kind of people they are.”