What kind of pope will they pick next?
By THOMAS C. FOX Pope Paul VI had been dead less than a week. Cardinals were arriving from distant lands. Vatican City was buzzing. An interregnum — that time between popes — is part solemn and part carnival. Never is it more clear how childlike Catholics are than when Father is absent. With each papal death they frolic briefly in new-felt freedom, planning their futures, politicking to take greater control of their lives. After the white smoke rises above the Sistine Chapel, they again cede the reins to a new Holy Father and brace themselves to accept what follows. Twenty years ago, the man who emerged on the balcony above St. Peter s Square was named Albino Luciani. He had not been high on any list. The smiling unknown Italian emerged as a surprise choice, serving a month before his equally surprising death. When the shocked cardinals returned to Rome for the second time that autumn, they asked themselves how they could have overlooked something as basic as health. They were determ
