Conclave

by Robert Harris

“The Pope had doubts about God?” “Not about God! Never about God!” And then Bellini said something Lomeli would never forget. “What he had lost faith in was the Church.”

And although Lomeli greeted them just as warmly as he did the others—they were his neighbours, after all—he couldn’t help noticing that they lacked the precious gift of awe he had detected in those who had travelled from across the world. Good men though they were, they were somehow knowing; they were blasé.

He had quoted Matthew: “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”

Lomeli looked up from his plate. “I take it then you don’t believe our friend is sincere when he says he doesn’t want to be Pope.” “Oh, he’s perfectly sincere—that’s one of the reasons I support him. The men who are dangerous—the men who must be stopped—are the ones who actively desire it.”

“My brothers and sisters, in the course of a long life in the service of our Mother the Church, let me tell you that the one sin I have come to fear more than any other is certainty. Certainty is the great enemy of unity. Certainty is the deadly enemy of tolerance.

Our faith is a living thing precisely because it walks hand in hand with doubt. If there was only certainty, and if there was no doubt, there would be no mystery, and therefore no need for faith.

“But that is absurd! What did I call for? Three things: unity; tolerance; humility. Are colleagues now suggesting we need a Pope who is schismatic, intolerant and arrogant?”

Was it really possible that he had spent the past thirty years worshipping the Church rather than God?

But now I see that the Conclave, in its wisdom, was correct, and I was wrong. You lack the courage required to be Pope. I’ll leave you alone.”

I believe my heart is pure. But how can any of us say for sure why we act as we do? In my experience, the basest sins are often committed for the highest motives.”