SUCCESSOR . . . TO WHOM?

 

Successor . . . to Whom?

by George Weigel

In the first days of discussion in the General Congregations preparing for the conclave that will begin on May 7, several cardinals have said that the conclave’s task is to find the “successor of Pope Francis.” 

That is right, chronologically. It is not right theologically. 

Conclave 2025’s task is not to find the successor of Francis but the successor of Peter. 

Conclave 2013 was not charged with finding the “successor of Benedict XVI” (Benedict 2.0). Conclave 2005 did not have the responsibility to find the “successor of John Paul II” (John Paul 2.0). Each conclave’s duty is to fill the Petrine Office, not to find the man who will best duplicate the pontificate that has just ended.

In my small book The Next Pope: The Office of Peter and a Church in Mission (Ignatius Press), I described what seem to me some key some aspects of the Office of Peter: 

Like everything else in the Church, the Office of Peter—the unique ministry exercised by the Bishop of Rome—is at the service of the Gospel and its proclamation. At the Mass publicly inaugurating his Petrine ministry in 1978, Pope John Paul II offered a memorable lesson in this ancient truth. Its echoes continue to reverberate throughout the living parts of world Catholicism.

On October 22, 1978, the Church was still in shock over the unexpected death of Pope John Paul I after a thirty-three day papacy. The world was skeptical, at best, about the possibility of papal leadership. The Roman Curia was stunned by the election of the first non-Italian pope in 455 years. Yet by the end of the papal Mass that day, the world, the Church, and the Curia knew that something had changed, and changed dramatically. French journalist André Frossard captured the character of the moment when he wrote back to his Paris-based newspaper, “This is not a pope from Poland; this is a pope from Galilee.” 

What did John Paul II do over the course of three hours?

He displayed the power of the Gospel in his own life, affirming without hesitation that Jesus Christ is the Lord who uniquely knows and satisfies the deepest longings of the human heart. Thus the first words of his homily, delivered outdoors before a vast throng in St. Peter’s Square and before millions on television, were a bold repetition of Simon Peter’s confession of faith at Caesarea Philippi: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!” (Matt. 16:16) That, he said, was the divinely-inspired profession of faith from which the Office of Peter was born.

He proclaimed the power of the Gospel to reveal both the face of God the merciful Father and the greatness of our humanity. For Christ, he said, had brought humanity close “to the mystery of the living God” even as Christ had shown us “the ultimate and definitive truth” about ourselves. And that, he taught, is what the Church must propose to the world: “Please, listen once again,” he asked.

He explained the power of the Gospel by reminding the Church and the world that the Gospel is the only power the Church possesses, and that “the mystery of the cross and resurrection” is the only power the Church should want: “the absolute and yet sweet and gentle power of the Lord,” a power that “responds to the whole depths of the human person. . . .” 

He embodied the power of the Gospel by reminding the Church that Catholic leadership is a leadership of service by the will of Christ. That was what Christ had taught the apostles by washing their feet at the Last Supper, and that was what Christ was teaching the bishops and the pope today. And so he prayed, before the world and the Church, “Christ, make me become and remain the servant of your unique power, the servant of your sweet power, the servant of your power that knows no eventide. Make me a servant. Indeed, the servant of your servants.”

He challenged the world to experience the power of the Gospel, and in doing so to rid itself of the fears that closed hearts and minds to God: “Be not afraid! Be not afraid to welcome Christ and accept his power. Help [me] and all those who wish to serve Christ and with Christ’s power to serve the human person and the whole of mankind. Be not afraid! Open wide the doors for Christ. To his saving power open the boundaries of states, economic, and political systems, the vast fields of culture, civilization, and development. Be not afraid.” 

Two decades later, in closing the Great Jubilee of 2000, that same “pope from Galilee” would urge the Church to “put out into the deep” of the New Evangelization. That valedictory command from Peter’s 263rd successor was implicit in John Paul II’s first public papal homily. By retrieving a Galilean experience, it set the pattern for the Church’s mission in the twenty-first century and the third millennium. . . . 

While Canon 1404 in the Church’s legal code states that “the First See is judged by no one,” the pope, the Bishop of Rome who leads the First See as Successor of Peter, is not above the Gospel or the Church. Nor can Peter’s Office in the Church be understood by analogy to an absolutist czar or dictator. 

As the Second Vatican Council was concluding its work on the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Pope Paul VI proposed that Lumen Gentium include a sentence asserting that the pope “is accountable to the Lord alone.” The Council’s Theological Commission, which included some very old-fashioned theologians, rejected that formula. The Commission noted that “the Roman Pontiff is also bound to revelation itself, to the fundamental structure of the Church, to the sacraments, to the definitions of earlier Councils, and other obligations too numerous to mention.” Thus it is a serious mistake to imagine the papacy as an authoritarian office from which the pope issues arbitrary decisions that reflect his will alone. Rather, the Petrine Office is an authoritative office, whose holder is the custodian of an authoritative tradition. He is the servant of that tradition, that body of doctrine and practice, not its master. 

Recognizing both the vast authority of his office and the boundaries within which that authority must be exercised is a challenge for any pope. . . . One way to meet that challenge is for the next pope to welcome and respond to serious, respectful questions and critique from those who share concern for and responsibility for the Church—and especially from the pope’s brother bishops who, when necessary, must summon the courage to do for Peter what Paul did for him, as Paul testified in Galatians 2:11: offer him fraternal correction. . . .

In the twenty-first chapter of John’s Gospel, the Risen Lord three times challenges Peter: “Do you love me more than the rest? . . . Do you love me? . . . Do you love me?” (John 21:15–17). It is tempting to see here a riposte to Peter’s three denials after Jesus was arrested: having denied his Lord three times, Peter must now profess his faith three times. A deeper reading of that encounter suggests something else—Peter is being asked whether he can empty himself of himself “more than the rest” in order to tend the Lord’s flock as its chief shepherd. All those ordained as priests and bishops in the Catholic Church are asked to empty themselves of themselves in order to be Christ for the Church and the world. That Johannine Gospel vignette suggests that it is in the nature of the Petrine Office that the pope must empty himself more fully “than the rest.” In order to exercise his ministry as the universal “servant of the servants of God” (a papal title that began with Pope St. Gregory the Great), Peter’s Successor must open himself to the working of divine grace in his life so that he can empty himself of himself as much as is humanly possible. . . . 

That the pope is the Church’s first witness to Christ and the Gospel is, according to Catholic teaching, of the will of Christ. It was also Christ’s will that all of his disciples be witnesses and that all be evangelists. That means that, while the pope is the Church’s first witness, he is not its only witness. And his responsibilities include doing everything he can to encourage others to fulfill their responsibilities as witnesses to the Gospel and its power. 

Today, the pope and the papacy are at the center of the Catholic imagination. That was not always the case. Prior to Pope Pius IX, who served as Bishop of Rome from 1846 until 1878, most Catholics had little idea who “the pope” was, much less what the pope said or did. Thanks to the development of the popular press, to the travails he suffered while the Papal States were being stripped away by the new Kingdom of Italy, to the number of jubilees he celebrated during his lengthy pontificate (which brought throngs of pilgrims to Rome), and to the drama of the First Vatican Council, Pius IX became a real personality to many of the world’s Catholics—the first pope whose picture Catholics displayed in their homes. . . . And from Pius IX on, the pope and the papacy grew ever larger in both the Catholic imagination and the world’s thinking about the Church.

This “papal protagonism,” as some have described it, has helped the Church unleash the power of the Gospel on more than one occasion. It was one reason why Pope Pius X could swiftly reconfigure the spiritual landscape of Catholicism by admitting seven-year-old children to Holy Communion; that Pope Pius XI could extend and deepen Pope Leo XIII’s social doctrine while challenging three totalitarian systems; and that Pope Pius XII could set the intellectual stage for the Second Vatican Council with the encyclicals Mystici Corporis Christi (The Mystical Body of Christ), Divino Afflante Spiritu (Inspired by the Holy Spirit), and Mediator Dei (The Mediator Between God and Man). “Papal protagonism” has had its effects in world history, too, most notably in John Paul II’s pivotal role in igniting the revolution of conscience that helped make possible the nonviolent political Revolution of 1989 and the collapse of European communism. 

“Papal protagonism”—the Office of Peter at the very center of the Catholic imagination—has also had less happy effects in the Church. 

If bishops think of the pope as the center of all initiative in the Church, they may be less eager to take the responsibility they have for unleashing the power of the Gospel in their people.

If bishops and superiors of religious communities interpret “papal protagonism” to mean that they need not take necessary disciplinary action for the good of their dioceses or communities because “Rome will fix it,” those local Churches and communities suffer—and so does the entire Church.

“Papal protagonism” can also have the unhappy effect of suggesting—not least through the media and social media—that what the pope does and says sums up the meaning, work, and condition of the Catholic Church at any given moment in time. This is simply not true. And it can distract attention from the growing parts of the world Church where the power of the Gospel is being unleashed. How many Catholics, and how much of the world media, have missed the phenomenal growth of Catholicism in sub-Saharan Africa in the post-Vatican II years—and have missed that extraordinary flowering of the Gospel because of a too-tight focus on the papacy and the controversies surrounding it? How many Catholics today are sadly unaware of the many good things happening in their own local Church and throughout the world Church because they are spellbound by the papacy and fixated on what the pope says and does? . . .

The pope must and will remain the Church’s supreme authority. That authority, however, must be exercised in such a way that it facilitates the leadership of others, especially the Church’s bishops. And the supreme authority must demand, when necessary, that local authorities discharge their responsibilities so that the power of the Gospel may be visible in all the people of the Church.  

This will be less a matter of “shrinking” the papacy than of the papacy empowering the missionary discipleship of others. Given the unique structure of authority in the Catholic Church, a measure of “papal protagonism” is not only inevitable but desirable. If the pope understands that strengthening the brethren is one essential responsibility of his office, however, he will exercise his office in a way that points beyond himself to Christ. And he will lead in ways that remind his flock that they are all missionary disciples, called to witness to the power of the Gospel and to make Christ known to the world. 

The cardinals of Conclave 2005 have a formidable task ahead of them. That task will be addressed in a more Gospel-centered way if the cardinal-electors remind themselves that every pope brings unique spiritual and human gifts to the Office of Peter, and that their charge is not to find Francis 2.0, but to find the Successor of Peter, to whom the Lord gave the responsibility to “strengthen your brethren” (Luke 22:32).

George Weigel is a Distinguished Senior Fellow of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center and the author of thirty books, including To Sanctify the World: The Vital Legacy of Vatican II (Basic Books). 

https://firstthings.com/letters-from-rome-2025-the-papal-interregnum-no-4/