ROME — Pope Francis on Sunday said clergy and Christians must not betray the word of God with their actions or they undermine the credibility of the Catholic Church.

Francis, elected a month ago, inherited a Church struggling to restore credibility after a series of scandals, including the sexual abuse of children by priests.

The pope spoke at the Papal Basilica of St. Paul's Outside the Walls, where he celebrated Mass. He also greeted pilgrims and local Church members earlier in St. Peter's square.

"Inconsistency on the part of pastors and the faithful between what they say and what they do, between word and manner of life, is undermining the Church's credibility," the pontiff said in his homily.

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"Those who listen to us and observe us must be able to see in our actions what they hear from our lips, and so give glory to God!"

In his first major decision on Saturday, Francis set up an advisory board of cardinals to help him govern the Church and reform its troubled central administration, which was riddled by infighting and alleged corruption under Pope Benedict.

Benedict left a secret report for Francis on the problems in the administration, known as the Curia, which came to light when sensitive documents were stolen from the pope's desk and leaked by his butler in what became known as the "Vatileaks" scandal.

Since his election as the first non-European pope in nearly 1,300 years, Francis has been laying out a clear moral path for the 1.2-billion-member Church. He has favored humility and simplicity over pomp and grandeur.

Francis has preferred to live in simple quarters in the Vatican instead of moving into the regal papal apartments, and he has said he wants "a poor Church, and for the poor".

In the Sunday afternoon service at St. Paul's, Francis said that each Christian can be a saint, which he defined as "middle class holiness."

"There are the saints of every day, the 'hidden' saints, a sort of 'middle class of holiness'... to which we can all belong."

The pope celebrated Mass together with the Benedictine monks to whom the basilica and the adjoining monastery are entrusted. St. Paul's is one of Rome's four major basilicas and the second largest after St. Peter's. 

 

Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

Comes outfitted in protective bullet-proof glass. Draws a crowd wherever it goes. A driver is included; gold trim is optional.

Popemobiles also include such amenities as a handrail to let the pope easily stand and wave while in motion, a built-in stereo and arctic-cool air conditioning.

Eight popes have had their own set of holy wheels since Pope Pius XI got a stretch 460 Nurburg edition Mercedes-Benz in 1930, but the eighth, Pope Francis -- known for taking the bus to work before he was named pope -- may not want all the frills and custom built-ins that popemobiles offer. 

By retiring, Benedict XVI has passed along a white armored Mercedes SUV, which has a white leather interior with gold trim and a white leather turret that can be raised by hydraulic lift high enough for crowds to see the pope, if he wants to sit. (For longer trips around Italy, Benedict enjoyed his own helicopter.) Bullet-proof Plexiglas that's strong enough to withstand explosions surrounds the turret on three sides. There's an emergency oxygen supply built in, according to The Telegraph. 

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"The pope must feel comfortable. People must be able to see him. People have traveled very far; they want to be able to get a good look at him," said Christoph Horn, Director of Global Communications of Mercedes-Benz, from Stuttgart, Germany. "This is about creating a comfortable and safe environment for the pope to travel in and be seen in.”

The pre-mobile
Popes didn't have to wait for the invention of automobiles to be mobile. For centuries, popes traveled by throne when going out on local outings. The popes were carried by 12 bearers (representing the 12 disciples of the church) as they moved through crowds, Ronald Rychlak, a University of Mississippi law school professor who has written numerous books on religion, said.

All that changed when Pope Pius XI got his Benz. The limousine was a gift from the car company, which would provide vehicles for many popes after that.

"Usually more than one vehicle was provided, especially for the popes in the 1930s," Horn said. "They were traveling a lot, so many popemobiles were built for them."

Back then, popes traveled in limousines with open tops, he said. Over the years, more than 12 different models of cars and trucks would be provided for popes. Pope John XXIII ushered in a new era of pope cars in 1960 with a Mercedes 300D Landaulet, which had a throne that rose high in the back, The New York Times reported. His successor switched to a 1964 Lincoln model before he went back to the preferred Mercedes brand a year later.

But don't call it 'popemobile'
When popes travel abroad for state visits, it's not always possible for the vehicles they use at home to make the journey with them. Instead, customized cars are prepared ahead of the visit, submitted for Vatican approval from the country he will visit.

"The primary level of security is assigned to the host nation," Rychlak said. "If they want to have something like a popemobile for a major parade, let's say they're doing Mass at Yankee stadium or something like that, they would have to make arrangements to ship something over, or that's the kind of situation where there may be a gift made to the pope" by a major car company.

That was how the car that officially became known for the first time as the "popemobile" came into existence: Pope John Paul II had visited Ireland in 1979, and a boxy yellow Ford Transit van awaited him as his chariot. Last November, The Telegraph reported an Irish businessman had acquired the van from the Dublin Wax Museum, where it had been since the papal visit, and was transforming it into a party bus.

Many other popemobiles have stayed in the countries they were used in. In 2008, Newsweek got a peek at the popemobile Benedict used for his U.S. tour, describing it as "by far the fanciest and sleekest papal car ever built ... The papal handlers can shift their passenger from zero to 60 in less than eight seconds, but the drivers probably won't exceed 10 mph along the parade routes."

In 2002, John Paul II asked the media to stop using the term "popemobile," insisting it sounded "undignified."

A clear need for better security
John Paul II survived an assassination attempt in 1981 while in St. Peter's Square. A Turkish man was later convicted of firing the shots, which punctured the pope's car and struck him four times. John Paul II survived, but it was clear his wide-open truck wouldn't suffice to protect him. From then on, bulletproof glass has encased popemobiles, although popes have occasionally ridden around without covering for brief periods.

Since adding bulletproof glass, popemobiles have added other necessary features, including ultra-powerful air conditioning to cool down the glass dome that popes sit in, reports The Telegraph.

Other protection measures include heavy-metal reinforcement on the bottom of the vehicle as well as the other sides, and the driver is always a trusted longtime Vatican employee. There's no partition between the pope and his driver; a microphone enables him to broadcast messages to crowds through speakers outside the popemobile.

The current weighs five tons and was just presented to Benedict last December by Mercedes-Benz.

"We work with the members of the Vatican and with the people in charge of the garages of the Vatican," Horn said. "These are all individual vehicles that are built to specifications."

The new pope's desire to get up close and personal with his faithful has presented challenges for his security detail.

"The pope's going to want to be up close hugging and touching and meeting people and that's going to be a tremendous concern for his security people," Rychlak said. "His security forces have taken him aside, or probably already have, and are going to say, 'Holy Father, you're putting us in a horrible situation if you don't go along with these things.'"

They're used to having to say that, though: Benedict didn't always like the feeling of a "shield between him and the people," Rychlak said. Most popemobiles are designed so the glass can be lowered, though.

This story was originally published on Sun Mar 31, 2013 4:36 AM EDT

News analysis

Two major churches installed new leaders this week. But while it took the Roman Catholic Church just a month to get a new pope, more than a year passed before the Anglicans inaugurated the new Archbishop of Canterbury.

Catholics saw the new Pope Francis inaugurated at the Vatican on Tuesday — after Pope Benedict’s shock resignation on Feb. 11 — and two days later Justin Welby was installed as leader of some 85 million members of the Anglican Communion.

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The Roman Catholic Church got together all 115 cardinal electors, set the date for the conclave and, after a couple of days of deliberation, a leader for the church’s 1.2 billion members emerged. He is appointed for life and can invoke papal infallibility.

"It’s a very secretive process, a lot of people are involved, but it doesn’t usually take … long," papal historian Michael Walsh said, noting conclaves in the 20^th century took no longer than three or four days.

Since the resignation of the last Anglican leader, it took nine months to find a new one and over a year to reach the day of Welby’s inauguration.

The procedure in choosing an Anglican leader — who presides over royal births, marriages, deaths and coronations and will most likely christen Prince William and Kate's baby this summer — is complicated, even though his powers over Anglicans are more limited than those of the pope over Catholics and he must retire by the age of 70.

Their equivalent of the papal conclave is the Crown Nominations Commission consisting of 16 people, who narrow down the list of candidates to two people.

Those names are then submitted to the British prime minister who chooses one and submits it to the monarch for the final approval.

While the decision to elect a pope rests solely with members of the Catholic Church, the selection of an Archbishop of Canterbury is a combined decision of the clergy and the British state.

The balance between to the two weighs heavily on the side of the state, since it chooses the chairperson of the nomination commission.

"I don’t think it is a lengthy procedure — after all, he is being elected for three roles: the spiritual head of the Anglican Communion, leader of the Church of England and Bishop of Canterbury," Jan Butter, director of communications for the Anglican Communion, said.

He explained that the commission's task was complicated by having to choose from candidates who are not present in the discussions, unlike the conclave where every cardinal involved is a potential candidate.

"When a huge corporation hunts for a CEO, they take the right amount of time to make sure the right choice has been made," Butter emphasized "and that is what the CNC has done this time and always."

The duration does not seem to bother some Anglicans.

"There is less rush and more excitement," Tarsila Burity, a member of the church from Brazil currently attending college in the UK said, "knowing that the decision could affect so many people it’s worth the wait."

So much effort to award a significant ecclesiastical position, even though authority does not carry infallibility and the post is not for life.

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CANTERBURY, England — The new spiritual leader of the world's Anglicans was enthroned by a female cleric on Thursday, taking the helm at a time when the troubled church risks tearing itself apart over gay marriage and women bishops.

In a colorful ceremony featuring African dancers, Punjabi music and Anglican hymns, Justin Welby, 57, officially became the 105th archbishop of Canterbury under the gothic arches of Britain's 900-year-old Canterbury Cathedral.

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The ceremony took place in front of a congregation that included heir-to-the-throne Prince Charles, Prime Minister David Cameron and other establishment figures.

For the first time in the church's history, the priest who placed him on the diocesan throne in Canterbury — the mother church of the Church of England and of the Anglican Communion — was a woman, Archdeacon of Canterbury Sheila Watson.

Another priest then installed Welby in the chair of St. Augustine, marking his inauguration as Primate of All England and spiritual leader of the worldwide Anglican Communion.

Welby now faces a tough balancing act to keep the 80 million-strong Anglican Communion together.

He is against gay marriage, but favors the ordination of women as bishops.

Softer stance on gay marriage
The archbishop finds himself in the crossfire between liberal clerics in the United States and Britain who are at odds with conservatives in Africa and elsewhere over those issues, and his handling of the dispute is set to dominate his tenure.

Just hours before the ceremony, Welby spoke out publicly about gay marriage, offering a softer stance on the issue.

"You see gay relationships that are just stunning in the quality of the relationship," he told the BBC, while stressing he had no doubts over the church's policy on same-sex relationships.

"The Church of England holds very firmly, and continues to hold to the view, that marriage is a lifelong union of one man to one woman."

Senior African Anglican leaders have lined up to denounce a decision to allow celibate gay bishops, saying it would only widen the rift in the church.

"It's true that not all the African bishops, but quite a number of African bishops are strongly opposed to the way you understand sexuality in the West," Solomon Tilewa Johnson, archbishop and primate of the West Africa section of the Anglican Communion, told Reuters on the eve of the ceremony.

Pope Francis, who was formally installed as head of the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics about a week ago, sent Welby a message from the Vatican to congratulate him.

"Please be assured of my prayers as you take up your new responsibilities, and I ask you to pray for me as I respond to the new call that the Lord has addressed to me," he said. "I look forward to meeting you in the near future, and to continuing the warm fraternal relations that our predecessors enjoyed."

Welby is seen as a pragmatic trouble-shooter, hardened by years of work as a crisis negotiator in Africa among separatists in the swamps of the Niger Delta and Islamists in northern Nigeria.

Born in London in 1956, he was educated at the private Eton College, and went on to study history and law at Cambridge University. His father's family were German-Jewish immigrants who fled persecution to England in the 19th century.

His life changed dramatically in 1983 when his daughter was killed in a car accident, an event he described as a "dark time" that brought him and his wife closer to God. 

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Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis celebrated his first mass as pontiff Thursday, urging the Catholic church to emphasize its core faith and the Gospels or risk becoming like "a compassionate NGO," referring to non-governmental organizations that provide community services.

He warned that following anything other than spiritual values was like children building sand-castles on a beach, Reuters reported. "Then everything comes crashing down," he said, according to the report.

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His homily, in front of a congregation at St Peter's Basilica, was short and delivered without notes. It was also given in Italian, in place of the Latin preferred by his predecessor, the pope emeritus.

 

The first full day of his pontificate saw more details emerge about his character and background.

Officials said Pope Francis had declined the official papal car and joked with cardinals not long after being elected as head of the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics on Wednesday night.

One Vatican insider admitted he was as "surprised" by the choice of Francis as the rain-soaked crowd at St. Peter's Square — where an audible gasp followed the pontiff's unveiling. 

"I didn’t expect it," press spokesman Father Federico Lombardi told reporters, referring to the moment when Argentine Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio appeared on the balcony overlooking the square.

The Latin American pope’s election shattered Europe's centuries-old grip on the papacy, and his choice of name — in honor of the 12th century saint from Assisi — is widely seen as a nod to a new era of simplicity.

Lombardi said Pope Francis declined the official papal car for his first journey from the Sistine Chapel, choosing instead to board a bus with cardinals who had just elected him.

Later, at dinner, the new pope prompted laughter by responding to their toast with the remark: "May god forgive you for what you have done."

Those observations were echoed by New York's Cardinal Tim Dolan, who told TODAY's Matt Lauer that Francis had shunned protocol that called for him to sit on elevated platform, preferring instead to stand alongside fellow cardinals. "So he greeted each of us as brothers, literally on the same level as we were.”

Francis returned Thursday to the church-run hostel where he had stayed ahead of the conclave and insisted on paying the bill.

"He was concerned about giving a good example of what priests and bishops should do," a Vatican spokesman said. He did not disclose how much the bill totaled.

A theological conservative who has also been hailed for his compassion toward the poor, the 76-year-old Francis is the first Jesuit pontiff. 

He is also expected to become the first pope in more than 600 years to meet his predecessor. Francis will travel to the hillside papal summer residence at Castel Gandolfo to greet the emeritus pope, who is living there temporarily after abdicating as Benedict XVI on Feb. 28.

Lombardi on Thursday confirmed the historic meeting would take place but said the timing had yet to be decided.

Francis will be formally installed as the church's new leader on Tuesday.

Earlier Thursday, he made a quick and discrete visit to Rome’s Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore.

"He spoke to us cordially like a father," Father Ludovico Melo told Reuters after the meeting. "We were given 10 minutes' advance notice that the pope was coming".

The new pope, who is also now Bishop of Rome, prayed before a famous icon of the Madonna called the Salus Populi Romani, or Protectress of the Roman People.

NBC News' Vatican expert George Weigel predicted Francis would "certainly" prove to be a reformer when it comes to the Roman curia — the Vatican bureaucracy at the heart of the Catholic church.

The election of Francis appeared to surprise even those at the very heart of the church leadership, particularly among its sizable Italian contingent.

The Conference of Italian Bishops was so confident of victory for Milan’s Cardinal Angelo Scola that an emailed press statement congratulating the new pope was sent with a covering email that referred to Scola, not the victorious Bergoglio, as the chosen successor to Benedict.

Italian newspaper La Repubblica reported that the conclave had "rebelled against the curia."

However, Cardinal Dolan denied the conclave had been divided. "I didn't sense that tug of war at all," he said. "I sensed a rather remarkable consensus. We needed a man who had a good track record of sound, effective pastoral governance, and we got what we wanted."

Italy's La Stampa newspaper cited an interview Bergoglio gave last year in which he condemned "vanity" and said being cardinal was "not an award to be bragged about."

Outside the Vatican, torrential overnight rain had cleansed St Peter's Square of any sign of the 100,000-strong crowd that had cheered, applauded and cried when Francis emerged on the balcony above.

Newspaper vendors were kept busy by tourists lining to see inside the basilica.

"I think he will be a pope who thinks about more than just the Vatican," said Maryland native Marjorie Steiner, 61, who visited St. Peter’s Square on Thursday as part of a vacation in Rome.

Dory Gordon, 51, from Houston, Texas, who was also on vacation, said: "As a Catholic I'm really excited that they have made this break with tradition. It sends out a good message that the church is here for all the world's people."

NBC's John Newland, Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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This story was originally published on Thu Mar 14, 2013 5:25 AM EDT

 

MANILA, Philippines — On the face of it Philippine Cardinal Luis Antonio "Chito" Tagle has a lot going for him as a contender for pope. He's young: At 55, the second youngest of the cardinals. He sings and preaches on television, and has 120,000 followers on Facebook.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) has named him among the three "least worst" papal candidates because of the way he has spoken out on sex abuse by members of the clergy.

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He speaks fluent Italian, English and Tagalog, and his French and Latin are said to pretty good too. The National Catholic Reporter recently called him "an effective missionary and communicator," and described him as the face of a "dynamic and relatively angst-free form of Catholicism."

 

He became something of a protégé of Pope Benedict, and if elected would be Asia's first pope.

Before getting carried away, though, it is worth looking at what he has been doing with those communication skills and the state of Catholic Church here in the Philippines.

It is locked in a fierce battle with the government over social reform, in what has become a struggle for hearts and minds in a country where for centuries the church wielded enormous and almost unchallenged power.

Four-fifths of the Philippines' 104 million people are Catholic, and the country has one of the highest birth rates in Asia.

The most recent dispute was over a law to help the country's poorest women gain access to birth control and introduce sex education in public schools and family-planning training for community health officers. It was finally passed by parliament late last year after being stalled for a decade by opposition from the church.

The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippine declared that "contraception is corruption!" and that the moral fiber of the nation was at risk.

Critics say the Church's doctrinaire attitude has for decades been the biggest single drag on social and economic development in the Philippines, where the U.N. estimates that half the country's 3.4 million annual pregnancies are unintended, and improved maternal health care would save hundreds of pregnancy-related deaths every year.

A large banner opposing the law still hangs on Manila Cathedral, and the Catholic groups are mobilizing for forthcoming senate elections, where they intend to target senators who supported the legislation.

The passing of what's called the Reproductive Health Act was a severe blow to an institution that had commanded almost unwavering support.

Suddenly it is no longer taboo to defy the church, and President Benigno Aquino III has vowed to press on with changes, with reformers urging him to liberalize abortion and divorce laws.

Surprisingly, the coverage of the conclave by the Philippine media has been very low key, though that could change if it drags on and Tagle is seen as having a serious chance.

There is nothing Filipinos like more than seeing one of their own making a big impact on the global stage. One young woman even described the battle for the papacy as rather like watching Filipino boxing sensation Manny Pacquiao in one of his international prize fights, and feeling the same sense of pride.

On the face of it, there's a big difference between the boxing ring and the Sistine Chapel, yet both require some pretty deft footwork.

And Tagle, with his easy smile and disarming charm, will be a key player, even if he is regarded as an outside bet for the crown.

But his is not the easy charm of a social reformer. Far from it. And reformers here in Manila fear that in the knockabout world of Philippine politics, a strong performance by Tagle in Rome could strengthen the hand of conservatives at home fighting what many regard as much-needed reforms.

ROME — In this country, where they love to talk, there are many views on how long the cardinals will take to choose the next pope. 

The leaders of the Catholic Church don't have to act fast. When your history stretches back 2,000 years and beyond, time is relative. In 1268, the church leadership was so divided it took three years to choose a new pope. Three weeks, even three months, would not be long by comparison.

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Three days is a good bet. Even Pope John Paul II, considered an outsider, was selected on the third day. But if the conclave is bitterly divided, cardinals could keep going… and going.

In Roman times the Senate of the Republic would begin at dawn. Senators were adept at delaying a vote, drawing out proceedings.

Fast forward from Roman times and Italy had inherited a culture with a slow pace and a love of long lunches and weekends away from work.

Yet this is also the country that invented the espresso, where coffee is often drunk standing up. Italians created one of the world's greatest fast foods: pizza. And then there's Ferrari, Lamborghini, Maserati — Italian cars go at one speed: fast. 

Perhaps Italy’s need for speed is partly a reaction to the slow lane that Italy so often appears to occupy. Traffic lights seem to take forever to change; it is little wonder many Italian drivers have one hand permanently on their vehicle's horn.

Italy’s culture has shaped not only the conclave process but the entire machinery of the Vatican — a fact that some say explains many of the church’s current predicaments.

“The way in which the dysfunction of 21st century Italy has re-established itself within the curia in recent years is one of the most important issues for the church,” NBC News Vatican expert George Weigel said.

Twenty-eight of the 115 cardinals taking part in the conclave are from Italy — more than two-and-a-half times the number from the next-largest represented nation, the United States.

For almost 200 years, no papal selection has lasted longer than five days, and it is possible that all the talking prior to the conclave has helped narrow down the field. The voting itself is a slow process — the ballots are counted three times — but the results are announced as they come in, so it will quickly be clear to the cardinals if there is an emerging consensus.

Then the new pope will walk out on to the balcony St. Peter's Basilica. And the conversation will move on to whether the pace of change in the Roman Catholic Church will speed up or slow down.

NBC News' Alastair Jamieson contributed to this report.

Follow NBC News' Keir Simmons on Twitter.

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ROME — Jamming devices to halt communication were installed at the Vatican on Monday, as part of a security lockdown ahead of the papal conclave.

The behind-the-scenes ballot process is supposed to remain a secret, but modern technology left Roman Catholic Church officials taking no chances.

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Staff working alongside the cardinals voting inside the Sistine Chapel must swear an oath of secrecy.

"I expect they’ll be on a total lockdown," NBC News' Vatican analyst George Weigel said. "Security is tight. It’s got to be."

Jamming devices will be used at the Sistine Chapel inside the Vatican and the nearby guest residences at Santa Marta where cardinals will sleep during the conclave, officials told reporters on Friday.

The move will ensure cardinals cannot communicate with the outside world or use social media. It will also prevent hidden microphones from picking up the discussions.

Any cardinals or Vatican workers –- such as those serving food in Santa Marta – breaching the code face excommunication from the church.

"Even who said, 'pass the salt' is a secret," wrote Sister Mary Ann Walsh, media relations director for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in a blog post. "In this electronic age, I worry some cardinals may go into iPad and Twitter withdrawal."

To prevent any contact with the outside world, cardinals will also be taken the 750 yards from Santa Marta to the Sistine Chapel by bus.

"The Vatican highly prizes the traditional Conclave secrecy — even more so after the leaks scandal that have plagued it in the past months," said Alessandro Speciale, Vatican correspondent for Religion News Service. "Most of the jamming measures were already in use in 2005, but of course, back then there were no smartphones and iPads. While cardinals will probably take their commitment to secrecy seriously, some of them are avid [Tweeters] and bloggers, and they might risk going into internet withdrawal if the conclave drags on too long."

Weigel added: "It would be difficult for anyone to use a cellphone, even out of sight. With 115 cardinals in the Sistine Chapel, space is tight and it would be obvious if anyone was checking their phone."

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