All eyes on the Sistine Chapel

The whole world will be focusing on the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican tomorrow as the Conclave of the College of Cardinals is held to elect a new Pope. Whoever is elected will have a very hard act to follow: John Paul II was a spiritual and political giant, a charismatic statesman, an international icon and will probably be declared a saint by his successor. The outpouring of grief in Rome and all over the world as he was buried last week showed just how much this man was loved and admired.

The presence of so many heads of state and government at John Paul II's funeral was testimony to the late Pontiff's global influence and respect.

The election of the new Pope will be closely watched throughout the world. There are 1.1 billion Catholics worldwide, representing 17 per cent of humanity, and the Pope has a huge influence among Catholics and non-Catholics alike. To be elected, a candidate needs two-thirds of the cardinals' vote plus one of all votes. If nobody is elected after 12 to 13 days, then a simple majority is needed.

So much has been written about which cardinals have a decent chance of being elected Pope, the so-called papabili. The truth is that the new Pontiff is likely to be a compromise candidate, one who both liberals and conservatives feel comfortable with, somebody who can best deal with the many challenges facing the Catholic Church and who is acceptable to cardinals from rich and developing nations. He will have to be someone who can unite the Church, who can reach out to other religions and hopefully somebody who, like John Paul II, is charismatic and multi-lingual.

There is a good chance that the new Pope will be a complete "outsider", just like Karol Wojtyla was in 1978, and nobody can deny that he was an excellent choice. There is a lot of media speculation that the new Pope will come from Latin America, Asia or Africa, where more Catholics now live than in North America and Europe. Furthermore, such a choice would make the Church focus even more on the plight of people in the developing world. Cardinal Bernard Panafieu, Archbishop of Marseilles, said recently in an interview that "everything is possible" when asked about the future Pope.

The European cardinals will no doubt have a major say in the selection of the new Pontiff. Europe has 58 out of the 117 cardinals, and 20 of these are Italian. Latin America has 21, the US and Canada 14, Africa 11, Asia 11 and Oceania two.

The election of a non-European Pope would be popular with clergy and laity who want the Church to continue speaking in favour of social justice and against poverty and to consolidate its expansion outside Europe. Such an election would, of course, be just as surprising and historic as the election of a Polish Pope in 1978, the first non-Italian in 455 years, and a Pope from a Communist country.

I think we can be allowed to state that the next Pope will not be an American, because America's superpower status makes this virtually impossible, but that still leaves a lot of cardinals to choose from. I don't think the Church is ready for an African or Asian Pope - although nothing can be ruled out and I could easily be wrong - but I would say that the likelihood is that the next Pope will be European or Latin American. Latin America has 500 million members of the Church - almost half the world's Catholics, which is why many people think that the time has come for a Pontiff from this continent.

The election of the new Pope is a very complex procedure that involves the forging of alliances to deal with the social, political and ethical issues facing the Church. Technically speaking, if the European, US, Canadian and Oceania cardinals wanted a European Pope they could form a voting bloc and would be just four votes short of the two thirds majority needed to elect their candidate. However the question facing cardinals is which person would be best suited to lead the Church at this point in time and to deal with its many challenges. It is wrong to divide the cardinals on a regional basis. In both the developed and developing world there are conservative and liberal cardinals,

The new Pope will have to deal with the fact that there is a gulf between the Church's social doctrine and the lives of many ordinary Catholics, especially in the developed world. I am referring to issues such as contraception, divorce, premarital sex as well opinions on euthanasia, women priests and whether priests should be allowed to marry.

There is also the very important issue of how to engage in a constructive dialogue with other world religions, especially Islam, how to bring about unity with other Christian Churches, such as the Orthodox and Protestant faiths, and how best to deal with the Communist regime in China, where Catholics loyal to the Vatican have to practise their religion underground.

If the Church is ready to review some of its social policies then it could elect a 'young' more liberal Pope. If it is not ready for change so soon after John Paul's death, then it could elect a compromise elderly Cardinal who would be more of a transitional figure. We will have to wait and see.

It is a pity that Mrs Jacqueline Calleja (Letters, The Sunday Times, April 10) chose to focus on just one aspect of my article "John Paul the Great" (April 3) - namely the Pope's doctrine on contraception - which was misquoted and out of context.

Mrs Calleja said: "Mr Anthony Manduca asserts that the Pope's doctrine on contraception has contributed to the spread of AIDS in the Third World." I did not say that. I said: "One of the criticisms of the Pope's doctrine on contraception was that it contributed to the spread of AIDS in the Third World, and such criticism is certainly valid."

Surely even the most fervent admirer of Pope John Paul II - such as myself - is entitled to be objective in stating that criticism of the Church's doctrine on contraception vis-à-vis the spread of AIDS in the Third World cannot be easily dismissed and presents a huge challenge for any future Pope?

The whole point of my article was to emphasise the greatness of Pope John Paul II while highlighting some of the challenges facing his successor.