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Vincenzo Pinto / AFP / Getty Images
Black smoke rises from the chimney on the roof of the Sistine Chapel on Tuesday.
VATICAN CITY — Black smoke rose above the Sistine Chapel on Tuesday, signaling that 115 Roman Catholic cardinals failed to agree on a new pope during the first day of the papal conclave.
The "princes of the church" began deliberating inside the Vatican after swearing an oath of secrecy and entering the papal conclave at about 5 p.m. local time (12 p.m. ET).
The smoke was created by the burning of ballot papers used by the cardinals in their deciding vote, with chemical cartridges being added to ensure the smoke did not appear to be white — the sign that a decision has been reached. It means the conclave will reconvene on Wednesday morning.
None of the 115 cardinals will be seen or heard, nor will they have any contact with the outside world, until they have chosen a successor to Benedict XVI, who abdicated on Feb. 28.
As the conclave got under way Tuesday, the cardinals' electronic devices were jammed to prevent any communication with the outside world. They will convene again on Wednesday. NBC's Anne Thompson reports.
"They're on their own now," said NBC News Vatican expert George Weigel, referring to the total isolation demanded by church rules.
Shortly after the conclave began, semi-naked feminist activists with the words "pope no more" written on their chests and backs staged a protest right next to St. Peter's Square, directly in front of the Vatican.
They were tackled by police and detained.
The word "conclave" comes from the Latin meaning "with key". It is a church tradition that began in 1268 when local officials became so fed up with the lack of a decision among cardinals — they had deliberated for more than two years — that they locked them away with limited food and water to encourage a result.
Earlier, thousands of pilgrims and tourists waited in line to get inside St. Peter's Basilica for a special pre-conclave Mass with the cardinals.
The "Mass Pro Eligendo Pontifice" began at 10 a.m. local time (5 a.m. ET) in front of a congregation of worshippers who were waiting outside in St. Peter's Square for tickets allocated on a first-come, first-served basis.
Alastair Jamieson / NBC News
Lois Girten, 55, from Austin, Texas, was among those waiting in line to get inside the pre-conclave Mass.
"It’s in the air! You really feel it," said Lois Girten, 55, from Austin, Texas, who secured a last-minute place on a two-week pilgrimage to Rome through a cancellation.
"It’s God’s gift that I’m in Rome just as the conclave takes place. I’m almost speechless with excitement, it’s a real treat for me."
Several thousand visitors were allowed in to take part in the service, according to Religion News Service correspondent Alessandro Speciale inside the basilica.
'Noble mission'
In his homily, cardinal Angelo Sodano, Dean of the College of Cardinals, told the congregation: "My brothers, let us pray that the Lord will grant us a pontiff who will embrace this noble mission with a generous heart."
At night, cardinals will walk or be taken by minibus the short distance to the modest rooms in Casa Santa Marta, which John Paul II had built in 1996.
On purpose and by chance, Americans join crowd in St. Peter's Square to watch for signs of a newly elected Pope.
Such is the importance of secrecy that Vatican officials have installed jamming devices to prevent the use of cellphones by cardinals or hidden microphones by anyone wanting to hear their deliberations.
No conclave has lasted more than five days in the past century, with most finishing within two or three days. Pope Benedict was elected within barely 24 hours in 2005 after just four rounds of voting.
Benedict triggered the election last month with his shock decision to abdicate because of his increasingly frail health — the first pontiff to step down in six centuries.
He leaves his successor a sea of troubles — including seemingly never-ending sex-abuse scandals, rivalry and strife inside the Vatican bureaucracy, a shortage of priests and a rise of secularism in its European strongholds.
Related:
From Rome to Africa: Meet 20 men who could be pope
Conclave smoke signals a bit of a gray area
Full coverage of the papal abdication from NBC News
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The pope delivers his final audience in St. Peter's Square as he prepares to stand down.
Leave a Comment:
Why is this CRAP news???
It beats me why any of you non-Catholics would even bother to comment on something you believe is so vile, stupid or superstitious. Yeah, our church is messed up big-time....just like every other church, religion and organization in the world. Even you non-believers are messed up too. Being human makes us all messed up. I can help but believe that some of you are old-fashioned envious because nobody pays this much attention to your religion. I am a very dissasitsfied Catholic who has visited and joined other religioius. frankly, I wasn't impressed. More of the same. The Kingdom of God is already within us already. Some hating Catholics so much. It's medieval and I doubt we hate on you so much.
Well as a non beleiver I certainly don't feel messed up and I am very sorry that you feel you are. The simple fact that you see all churches and religions as messed up should be a red flag that perhaps they are not the answer to anything, but instead you simply try another flavor. Do you see a pattern, I do!
Why do we comment? Well, I can say why I comment on this. Even if I try as hard as I can to ignore this religion business...you can't. It is has wormed its dirty, conniving, controlling hands into everything. It is a large player in US elections. It is always on the fore front of the news. I constantly have people knocking on my door begging for money to fund their religion. You can't get a way from it. If I am going to be forced to live in it...you can bet anything I am going to say my piece about it. If any one should not be commenting about something it is the believers rebuking the non-believers. You can ignore my world and pretend it doesn't exist...I can't do that.
We comment because the influence of religion effects all members of society.
Evil reunion, this people need Jesus to get save.
It amazes me that so called intelligent adults believe in this medieval circus, the extravagance is unconscionable,
there are people starving all over the world, It seems to me that starving people would trump electing a new earth
bound god!
de little boyz bring us de little boyz. I bet they have a gay orgy afterwards.
They can't start voting yet, I just saw 3 cardinals on a tree limb in my yard this morning.
Oh NO !! somethings wrong ??? There should have been four they mate for life !! You know what happens when one goes astray !!!!! Watch out for the little peckers
A no brainer.................choose the oldest and most senile cardinal. By time they reach the age to become pope, what's the point. Why did the pope step down? Probably the same reason Martin Luther left the church nearly 500 years ago.............greed, corruption and sin! Some things never change.
It's baffling that Catholics think of themselves as "most holy", but yet their church is always at the center of controversy. Hypocrites!
Do you see Lutheranism as rising above the fray or do they also enjoy their twisted logic as well?
You won't find pedophiles in the Lutheran church. BTW, I'm not Lutheran...........just the wife. I am Eastern Orthodox. You won't find pedofiles in my church, either.
Let me guess, they have a rule against that so it does not exist. Who knew it could be that simple.
Actually, it is that simple.......anyone in the position of oversite should be expected to keep that rule. If they don't then they lose their resonsibility. This alone is a good reason to not look upon the RCC as God's church or the reflection of Jesus pure teaching in today's world. A willful PRACTICE of such a horrendous sin and a coverup for those PRACTICING it in a position of responsibility has to disqualify this organization as Christ's representatives on Earth.
But that doesn't mean that there is no God or there is no True representative of Christ on Earth today.
Pick me!, pick me!
OK get on your knees !!! Thats right just like that LOL
OH...and I have still have absolutely no doubt the last Pope retired of his own will. I don't think it is any small coincidence that the first pope to actually dispel a lot of the Christmas myths is also the first pope to ever step down due to heath reasons in six hundred years.
Lock up your children the pedophiles are in town for a convention!
Stupid hocus pocus bullsheet
Clap! Clap! Bring on the dancing boys!
With every story that comes out about the conclave and the election of the new pope, there is evidently a pent up need to post expressions of hatred of Catholics...for people that hate something so much, you sure seem to be fascinated and obsessed with the subject.
we aren't the media shoves it down our throats !! Because the media knows this is a sick cult !! and holds much disgust over the freaks that molest little children. They are falling apart and I am so happy to have lived to witness the freaks fail
Bob:no one held a gun to your head and made you read anything...let alone post your vile and hateful comments.
Hey it is what it is baby !!! I don't make the rules Read it and weep
no God makes the rules and one day you WILL give an account for your life
I will gladly account for my life, but you don't mean account their life...you mean they will account for what they believed and how much money they donated to their belief. I know a lot of people who attend church on a regular basis that are just...not nice people. Are they committing "deadly" sins? Not as far as I know so by the rules they are going heaven.
So then you take some one like me who doesn't buy into all the Religions, but I believe I am a "good" person. I am good enough, I am smart enough, and doggone it people like me. Will I make it into heaven? Not by the rules...and if all the people that will make it in by the rule book are going I don't think I want to.
if someone goes to church but does not make Jesus the Lord of thier lives they are not saved, Jesus cant be your savoir unless hes your lord first, Jesus said you will know them by thier fruits, ppl will know you are my disciples by your love. clearly ppl can go to church , tithe, do good works but not love, however if you do LOVE you will do all those things
So if I accept Jesus as my lord, but I walk around treating people like dirt...I will be good in the end?
If I try to be the best human I can be, but I never give a thought towards Jesus...I am damned?
Where is the line? That is what I want to know. And who decides this line? As far as I've seen it has only been the leadership of the church and the authors of the doctrine. The oldest known existing Bible doesn't even make mention of Jesus' resurrection for crying out loud. How much was made up a long the way? We have no way to know...we can only have faith that the guy by the altar knows what he is talking about.
I don't mean to be so cynical, but I see it time and time again. People that are wrapped up in a religion seem to think that good can only be done via believing in their religion and that is just wrong. I've seen religion cause more hate and pain than helping and caring. I've seen entire families butchered over matters of religion. I just can't swallow any of it any more.
the oldest bible that contains all the books does mention the resurrection, what do you think all the letters of paul and acts and letters of peter referr to? " if Christ has not been raised from the dead then our faith is in vain"
The Sinai Bible is not missing any books. They are all there, but in a different order. It is missing passages that talk about the resurrection. It was digitized a while back and is online for all to read. It still has Jesus, has him being betrayed, has him die for our sins, but he just doesn't come back.
where are pauls letters? what about peters? and the acts of the apostles?
This old crap has got to stop !! Just a bunch of freaks in costumes !! Suck that smoke and not our children !! This is one of the worst cults !!! I am sooooo happy to see it all collapse each year !! More and More churches are being closed. They are trying to live in the Stone age just a bunch of freaks
Bob: do you feel much better now that you've spewed some hate?
Spew Spew spew here is more for you !! I don't hate anything or anyone I feel pitty for all that must have a cult of filth and stand by it
Did you notice that the Catholic church just had a huge recruiting drive where all the churches would be open on last Thursday to bring in the potential
donors, err I mean converts, oops I mean sheepleoh hell never mind.But I thought the only way you could become Catholic is to be born Catholic. At least that what my friend tells me all the time when she says she likes me, but I am going to hell.
Can you just get recruited?
I have known my fair share of Protestants who are hypocrites! The Lutherans are by far the worst of the lot. Hell, Hitler's handpicked henchmen were usually straight out of Lutheran seminaries. Martin Luther was a constipated and fat German who had visions of the devil tossing crap and he was the most vile of anti-semites who ever lived. John Knox and John Calvin were ranting and raving lunatics. I have lived in the south and I have seen how the Southern Baptists lead their followers around by rings in their noises and doing their utmost to keep them uneduacted and poor. Let's not even start on the other world religions. Would our fellow atheists & agnostics rise above it all and bring a new sanity to the world? I'd love to think so, but we all know the answer to that. We, the human race, have a long, long, long history of 'messing up.'
"many will come in my name and lead even the elect astray" clearly refers to the protestant reformation
ROFL!!--You have got to be kidding me!! The RCC is not the "elect." The RCC is more like an athiest/agnostic factory and has been apostated practically from day one leading tens of millions souls astray. The Reformation helped clean up SOME of the corruption in the church and bring back biblical Christianity.
wrong martin luther is one of the ELECT leading ppl astray. Jesus founded his church upon peter and said the gates of hell would not prevail against it. meaning CONTINUITY from that day till he comes again.only ONE church can qualify for that. Christ didnt wait 1500 yrs to FIX his church
Its unfortunate that, as a Christian, I see millions of dollars in the Vatican City. And a person put up so high as to worship him instead of Jesus and God. Priests, Pastors, Rabbi, etc. are no closer to God than any of us. They are all a vessel to strengthen your own personal faith
ShawninMN: you are misinformed...please do some research before you post any more comments.
So you believe they are closer to God? or that the millions in the Vatican City is justified? please explain.
ShawinMN, I'm confused, why would anyone "worship" the pope? He is simply the leader or the Catholic community. If you are an American citizen then Barack Obama is the leader of your country. Do you "worship" him?
God maintains a just enough room for people to choose based on faith, not proof. If there was proof, then ALL would repent and worship God. But thier hearts would be hard. As it is, this is another one of God's ways to seperate the wheat from the chaffe. God does not want the entire world to worship Him just because they have proof that He is real. That is why he only gives us enough proof to just barely be able to say, it isn't proof. There has to be a step of faith. He wants us to choose Him, not because of proof, but because of love.
That said, there is much error in man's methods. But hang in there. It is better for the sinful prodigal son to return to his father than to never return at all!
amen, if God gave absolute proof of his existence then he would basically be "forcing" ppl to believe. there would be no faith. im mean if there was no much proof you had to believe, then how could you not believe.
this kind of sentiment is the reason the priests got away with all their perversions, blind as a freaking bat!
the Spirit reveals itself to those who "seek him with all thier heart" those who are hard hearted are blinded so they cant understand
then whats the reason all the teachers, day care workers, boy scout leaders, nursing homes, etc get away with abuse?
Replace the word "sin" with the word "ignorance". The goal of our existence is to shed our ignorance of God's existence within us and know that GOD is not outside of us and the same energy that powers the universe is also within us...science will prove GOD's existence is within us...
Does anyone know what happens when you neglect to capitalize He, His or Him when referring to your invisible avenger?
Does He simply write it off as a grammatical error or does He get offended?
I'd be especially careful, if I were you.
From what I've read, He tends to get really violent when He gets pissed!
I don't capitolize He Him or His for God's benefit. He doesn't need me. I do it for my benefit. I need Him. It's just another symbol of respect. A symbol of my desire to remain under God.
Although others continue to make statements and show symbols of thier rejection of God, many times I don't think they realize what it means.
God clearly has a sense of humor too, i think its ok
newbook wrote:-->"Replace the word "sin" with the word "ignorance". The goal of our existence is to shed our ignorance of God's existence within us and know that GOD is not outside of us and the same energy that powers the universe is also within us...science will prove GOD's existence is within us..."
This is an old lie that apparently doesn't go away. Shirley McClain once yelled it into the sea "I am god!"
Satan used this lie in the beginning with Eve - you shall be wise as God. Now, we find that it is still being used. While it is true we are made in the image of God (Gen. 1:26) - it is still true that we are His creation and not 'gods'. Probably the most publicized statement of this error was by Shirley MacLaine's movie with her standing on the beach and declaring 'I am god. I am god'. In her book, Dancing in the Light, she states: "I know that I exist, therefore I AM. I know the God-source exists. Therefore IT IS. Since I am part of that force, then I AM that I AM." This was the title that God used of Himself in Ex. 3: . It is also the claim that Jesus made in John. The Jews on that occasion declared such was blasphemy against God and worthy of death under the Old Testament. They were right - if Jesus claim was not true.
So, once again, we are left with a choice of faith. Either Jesus is the Christ, the only son of God, one in being with the Father, or WE are all god, using the new age, Shirley McClain method. Since the bible outs this lie in the very beginning, it is clear to me which road to follow.
You may seem you are very clever in your "revelation" that you are god, but it is not novel. It is the oldest lie. It also brings the oldest warning. And you seem to have fallen for it. And I know why, it is because it is easy. You don't have to obey God, if you are god. You simply do whatever you do. Sounds great for now, but when you are judged, God will ratify your choice.
Time for a black pope?
Looks like a pedophile convention.
I have a feeling a huge surprise is going to come out.
Obama is going to be the next Pope.
I see parents are being cautious, left their kids at home...... just in case, good idea.
Come clean at last, scour your genitals with a pope on a rope. Buy Plenary Indulgences, indulge yourselves in a plot in heaven or win a ride in your own purgatory proof wiener mobile. Fondle a fruity Swiss Guard ! Incarcerate your self in the Vatican : "It's in the air," whiff the black smoke and the pungent odor of the commodes de cardinals. After the mass hysteria of the last black mass, the cardinal sinners will convene in the holy communion of conclave. Prayers, chants and ejaculations, don't get any on ya !
amen.
No matter what those of us that are not Catholic you have to see that the Church still holds more members than any other Christian sect on earth. This is shown by the number of folks that have traveled to Rome to see the new Pope get elected. You can call it what you want but the Catholic Church had St. Peter as it's first Pope and everything else sprang from it. To call it not a Christian religion is like saying that the earth is flat.
sooooooo what you're saying is that all the molestations started with st. peter, did I interpret that correctly?
Does go to show that forced subjucation of aboriginals was an effective technique and has shown lasting consequence.
Please tell me John Bull, how you derived your thought pattern from my statement? I do not support the church but was making a point on how many members it has and who is thought to be the first pope.
Absolutely incredible that, while men and women of science and reason celebrate the exploration of the outermost reaches of the universe and the innermost particles of the atom, there are so many people still suckling at the breast of superstition and religious ritual!
And who do you think created the outermost reaches of the universe and the innermost particles of the atom?
Infinite mass packed into an infinitaly small space. The big bang, right? OK. And how exactly did that infinite mass get there? And where was it located, if "space" didn't exist yet?
Scienists have done many, and great things! But they havn't provided anything to prove that there isn't a creator God. They only discover a few of his methods.
Likewise, they can never prove God's existence, because God has given us free will to use to choose Him. And for those that seek, they shall find. Not proof, but truth.
COme on.. This is nuts everyday its something else in the news about this silly reliegion that condons child molestation and is tollerant of same...
Get the hell off my TV Screen... Bunch of hypocrits...
God will GET you!!
Breaks my Heart that so so so MANY are deceived and do not even think to know that "Satan" is steppin in (as per God's Prophecy) and the end draws more nearer second by second:-( WAKE UP!!! Rev. 18:4,5 Jesus speaking!!!! it is Imperative you Hear His Call!!!
Wow.... pure delusion on display here. Satan just like your god is a myth. Please grow up.
Wow....pure denial on display here. Reject God and when the day comes, God will ratify your choice.
Can we just make this the last time we ever see them, period?