In an interview today with Julia Hartley-Brewer on the "Talk" TV show, <em>Catholic Herald</em> columnist and associate editor Gavin Ashenden discusses the question of whether the next papacy will be one of cultural appeasement or resistance.
"It's very exciting," Ashenden says. "This is one of the most difficult elections to call. Actually they're all very difficult, partly because the process is to go in and say your prayers to ask God for help.
"It's a bit more than just politicking and choosing your favourite team.
"We always knew it [the conclave] was going to [take] a while. The political analysis is that if you look at it from a liberal-conservative split, the quicker it happens the more likely it is to be a liberal, the longer it takes it may well be someone more Catholic.
"So the fact you had black smoke this morning is terribly encouraging to someone like me."
Ashenden then goes on to discuss how the issue is not so much about "liberal" versus "conservative" but more about whether the Catholic Church is going to get an "appeaser" or "resister" as the next pope.
In a recent article for the <em>Catholic Herald</em>, Ashenden also discussed the mysterious role of the Holy Spirit in the process of the conclave and discerning who becomes the next head of the Catholic Church.
"The Holy Spirit will whisper His preference into the ears of the cardinals as they sleep, eat, walk and pray," Ashenden writes. "But just as the Children of Israel, having grown weary of prophets, demanded a king to imitate the nations around them, so too will God lengthen the elastic if the Church insists on imposing its own preferences over His invitation.
"Christ’s promise to Peter was that evil would not prevail against His Church. Not that it could not spoil, corrupt, confuse or disturb. But history shows that whenever the Church slips into corruption, God raises up saints and renews it afresh.
"And the prayers of 1.4 billion Catholics are a great help to the 133 cardinals wearing out their knees for us over the next four days."
<a href="https://thecatholicherald.com/does-the-holy-spirit-choose-the-pope-pope-benedicts-surprising-answer/"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color"><strong><em>RELATED: Does the Holy Spirit choose the Pope? Pope Benedict’s surprising answer</em></strong></mark></a>
<em>(Photo: screenshot from 'TalkTV' video.) </em>
