Cardinals were prohibited from voting for themselves in 1179 by the Third Lateran Council, who also increased the required simple majority vote to two thirds for an election. However, this ruling was dispensed with in 1945 by Pius XII, who compensated by increasing the two thirds majority, to two thirds plus one for an election.
In 1996, Pope John Paul II restored the two thirds majority, but not the prohibition on cardinals voting for themselves.
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One of the highlights of this trio of poems is Pope John Paul II's reflection on his own successor and the upcoming conclave in Rome in the second poem. In the first and last poems, he focuses on God ...
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Article comments
1 - DrPat
Vatican Idol - I love it!
2 - Victor Plenty
Be cool if someone smuggled in a camera. Then we'd all get to see Ratzinger do some of those uberthrashing heavy metal guitar riffs.
3 - Annie
And the Vatican Idol is....
Dang,I was hoping they`d take a couple more days at least! I had a great gag lined up for today...had to do with a chiminey fire :) Oh, well. C`est la vie!
4 - DrPat
Hey, Victor, der Panzerkardinal is a lot more likely to need a Kraftwerkian electronic keyboard - and they wouldn't let him have one in the electronically-secure Sistine Chapel.
No music. But he's more than a pretty face, so he gets the vote!
5 - Eric Olsen
great one Annie! You could still do a chimney fire comic, they had trouble distinguishing between the white and the black, as it came out gray
6 - Victor Plenty
Maybe they can build him a good old pipe organ so he can continue to ROCK ON!!
7 - DrPat
He is reputed to be (really) an accomplished pianist with a preference for Beethoven - that's why I suggested eKeyboards for him...
8 - Victor Plenty
Organs and pianos can be built with no electronics. The lack of circuitry may make it more difficult to rock out, but not impossible.
"Goodness gracious, great balls of fire!"
Beethoven has been made to rock, too.