WATCH LIVE: Conclave begins to elect new pope, smoke to billow from Sistine Chapel chimney after first vote

VATICAN CITY – With each the pomp, play and solemnity that the Catholic Church tin muster, 133 cardinals began the centuries-old ritual to elite a successor to Pope Francis, celebrating a greeting Mass connected Wednesday earlier opening the astir geographically divers conclave successful the faith’s 2,000-year history.

Hailing from 70 countries, the cardinals are being sequestered from the extracurricular world, their cellphones surrendered and airwaves astir the Vatican jammed to forestall each communications until they find a caller person for the 1.4 billion-member church.

At 4:30 p.m. (1430 GMT; 10:30 a.m. EDT) the cardinals locomotion solemnly into the frescoed Sistine Chapel, chanting the meditative “Litany of the Saints” and the Latin hymn “Veni Creator,” imploring the saints and the Holy Spirit to assistance them prime a pope.

Once there, they pledge to support secrecy astir what is astir to transpire and to not let “any interference, absorption oregon immoderate different signifier of intervention” from outsiders to power their voting.

Standing earlier Michelangelo’s imaginativeness of eden and hellhole successful “The Last Judgment,” each cardinal places his manus connected the Gospel and swears to transportation retired that duty.

The awesomeness of the chapel’s frescoes, and Michelangelo’s successful particular, is meant to punctual the cardinals of the weighty work they bear. In his regulations for the conclave, St. John Paul II wrote that successful the Sistine Chapel, “everything is conducive to an consciousness of the beingness of God, successful whose show each idiosyncratic volition 1 time beryllium judged.”

After the cardinals instrumentality their oaths, a elder cardinal delivers a meditation. The maestro of papal liturgical ceremonies, Archbishop Diego Ravelli, calls retired “Extra omnes,” Latin for “all out.” Anyone not eligible to ballot past leaves and the chapel doors close, allowing the enactment to begin.

The cardinals don’t person to instrumentality a archetypal ballot connected Wednesday, but they usually do. Assuming nary victor is found, the Vatican said achromatic fume could beryllium expected retired of the Sistine Chapel chimney astatine astir 7 p.m.

The cardinals discontinue for the nighttime and instrumentality Thursday morning. They tin clasp up to 2 ballots successful the greeting and 2 successful the day until a victor is found.

While cardinals this week said they expected a abbreviated conclave, it volition apt instrumentality astatine slightest a fewer rounds of voting. For the past century, it has taken betwixt 3 and 8 ballots to find a pope. John Paul I — the pope who reigned for 33 days successful 1978 — was elected connected the 3rd ballot. His successor, John Paul II, needed eight. Francis was elected connected the 5th successful 2013.

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