Cardinals gather to elect the new pope

Cardinals from across the world were confined in the Sistine Chapel yesterday for a secretive conclave to elect the next head of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics.

- 

Some 133 cardinal electors — aged under 80—have gathered at the Vatican from five continents to pick a successor to Pope Francis, who died last month after a 12-year-long papacy.

With experts singling out liberal and conservative frontrunners from Europe, the United States, Asia and Africa, the race to lead the 2,000-year-old institution appears wide open.

In a time of geopolitical uncertainty, the new pope faces diplomatic balancing acts, as well as Church infighting, the continued fall-out from the clerical child abuse scandal, and increasingly empty pews in the West.

The “Princes of the Church” held a pre-conclave mass in St Peter’s Basilica at 10am Rome time yesterday, presided over by the dean of the College of Cardinals, Giovanni Battista Re.