Over the last few months various people have asked me this question: “Who do you think will be the next pope?”

Of course, the question comes only sporadically. That is because the media periodically pronounces the pope to be a “dead man walking,” or a pontiff on the verge of retirement. However, this tough old Polish gentleman seems to fool them every time.

My response is always this: “How should I know? I am only a parish priest. I have never walked in that rarified atmosphere where the hierarchy dwells. I am in labor, not management.”

How could I possibly handicap a field of papal candidates when I don’t even know them? As Will Rogers was fond of saying, “All I know is what I read in the papers.” And most of what I read is often an ounce of reality and a pound of fantasy.

Yet, there are certain things we know.

First, the papal election is a political process. Of that there is no doubt. There are candidates—willing or unwilling. There are ballots that are cast. There is a Church waiting to be governed and a world situation in which the Church must be engaged. The truth is that not all cardinals are equipped to be a pope—even though certain ones might feel that they are worthy and ready. Also, each specific age requires its own certain type of personality to lead this huge institution with all of its internal problems.

I find it interesting that, at the very first ecumenical council held in Jerusalem, the apostles came out with a decree that read as follows: “It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us” (Acts 15:28).

These men had argued and discussed certain problems. Finally, they came to a decision. Obviously when they had finally come to agreement, they presumed that their decision was from the “Holy Spirit.”

It has been that way ever since. The Church has had a thousand debates and chosen 260 popes (the first one was a personal choice; Jesus chose Peter). And every time (except for a few confused and disputed elections) the presumption has been that when all is said and done, a particular man has been chosen by his peers but under the Divine Providence—this man was God’s man for this Church at this time.

For almost 2,000 years the Church has sailed along. Yes, the bark of Peter has had some strange, even weird, people at the helm. The old boat has pitched and rolled and at times has been driven off course. But through all the storms and all of the apparently unfit pilots, there is an invisible, powerful guiding hand at the helm.

She always rights herself and moves on. Somehow even the “wrong” man can be the “right” man when God is guiding not only the ship but the world.

Next time, God willing, let me put before you some of the popes of the 20th century. We should be able to see, in hindsight, why they were chosen. After that, let me place before you the situation of today’s Church.

Then you can perhaps calculate what type of man the Holy Spirit and the cardinals might be looking for in the next Roman pontiff. It might be interesting to guess on whose head the Holy Spirit might land. But don’t bet the ranch on a papal lottery. Mysterious, in fact Byzantine, are the ways of the Holy Roman Church of God.

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