Papal election rule ensures broad support
Pope Benedict XVI has changed the rules for electing popes, making it potentially harder to name a successor but ensuring that when the white smoke rises from the Sistine Chapel, the new pontiff will have broad support among cardinals.
Benedict issued a one-page document in Latin requiring that two-thirds of the cardinals in a conclave agree on the new pontiff. The move was a return to Vatican tradition and reversed Pope John Paul II’s 1996 decision to let an absolute majority decide if cardinals remained deadlocked after 33 rounds of voting.
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