James O'Reilly
Shortly after 6:00pm on May 8, 2025, the face of the new successor of St. Peter was revealed to the world, along with his name: Leo XIV.
HABEMUS PAPAM
Minutes earlier, seagulls seemed to predict the white smoke from the Sistine Chapel. 133 voting cardinals, 24 hours and 23 minutes, and four ballots were what it took for a new pope.
Those 24 hours were full of anticipation—Catholics waited for a new spiritual leader and rest of the world for a new papal face on the global stage. What happened within the Sistine Chapel remains a secret, but we do know of some things.
The first round of black smoke from the Sistine came about two hours later than expected. This was simply a mistake: one cardinal had inserted two ballots, and the vote had to be repeated. But there was another unusual incident that took place:
ELISABETTA PIQUÉ
What we discovered was something completely unthinkable, something that didn’t even occur in the film Conclave. In one of the most closed, tightly controlled election processes—with every kind of control in place—a phone had slipped in; that is, someone had to go to the Sistine Chapel and knock to warn them that security had detected a SIM card.
Robert Prevost was not among the most talked-about names in the early days, but little by little his name began popping up in the forecasts. Early on, the favorites were practically all Italian. Many guessed it might be the Vatican’s number two, Pietro Parolin, but reality was far removed from those predictions, even from the start…
ELISABETTA PIQUÉ
No, no, the first vote is key because no one imagined he had such a large bloc of votes—that was crucial.
They saw him as very calm, and he remained calm even as they began to read his name over and over: Prevost, Prevost, Prevost—very calm, very composed.
There’s a saying in the Vatican that seems to prove correct every conclave: “He who enters the Sistine Chapel as pope leaves as a cardinal.”
Whatever the public opinion was, it did not match the opinion of the College of Cardinals. In the Sistine Chapel, no talking is allowed—only voting. But beforehand, the entire College of Cardinals met for several days…
ELISABETTA PIQUÉ
And so, all of this is to say that we arrived at the General Congregations, where we know there was a group of cardinals that flew under the radar—which is another key point as well. They did not go around campaigning, as we saw in other cases, and that was crucial in preventing him (Robert Prevost’s candidate) from being “burned” or disqualified.
Before the conclave started, the cardinals built a profile of who the next pope should be. And if there was one key point in common, it was unity of the Church in Christ. And among their numbers, there was one man they deemed fit for the job: Robert Prevost—now Pope Leo XIV, the 267th pope of the Catholic Church.
