Conclave

by Robert Harris

You do appreciate that the person who stands to gain the most from this is Tedesco? The whole basis of his candidacy is that the Holy Father led the Church to disaster by his ill-thought-out attempts at reform. For him and his supporters, the revelation that the Holy Father was reading their bank accounts and commissioning reports accusing the Curia of institutional corruption would simply prove their point.” “I thought we were here to serve God, not the Curia.” “Oh don’t be naïve, Jacopo—you of all people! I have been fighting these battles for longer than you have, and the truth of the matter is that we can only serve God through the Church of His Son, Jesus Christ, and the Curia is the heart and brain of the Church, however imperfect it may be.” Lomeli was suddenly conscious of a fearsome headache beginning to form, positioned precisely behind his right eye—it was always brought on by exhaustion and nervous strain. On past form, if he was not careful, he would have to take to his bed for a day or two. Perhaps he should? There was a provision in the Apostolic Constitution for sick cardinals to cast their votes from their rooms in the Casa Santa Marta. Their ballot papers were to be collected by three nominated cardinals known as infirmarii, who were required to transfer their votes in a locked box to the Sistine Chapel. He was sorely tempted by the idea of lying in bed with the covers over his head and leaving it to others to sort out the mess. But immediately he asked G...

this ties back to the speech about the church being a body