Pope Francis will begin the Holy Year on December 24 with the opening of the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica. Francis’s desire for the Year is to see it unfold under the sign of hope: Spes non Confundit—“Hope does not disappoint”– is the opening sentence and the title of the special instrument by [...]

There is a time and a place for everything, including speculation on the next pope. This week saw some grist for the mill, with the publication of a sort of voter’s guide for the red hats who will pick Francis’s (and Peter’s) successor.

We’ll get to that.

First, we need to consider what [...]

The Consistory of December 7 might not have ended on December 8 with the Mass of the Cardinals. There is a sense in which it will continue until December 15, when Pope Francis will make a one-day visit to Corsica. That visit is one discerning observers may choose to see as a sort of [...]

The new papal funeral rite has a striking detail: in the first phase, the one at home, the dead Pope is exposed in a simple white cassock. This is particularly unusual. Priests are composed in their vestments because a priest is a priest forever. All the more so for a bishop, who is “chief [...]