The conclave to elect a new Pope will convene at the Vatican on May 7.
Reuters reports this, citing sources.
The cardinals agreed on the date during a closed meeting at the Vatican, the first since Pope Francisʼ funeral on Saturday. It will be officially announced soon.
UPD at 14:53. The Vatican has confirmed that the conclave will be held on May 7. The conclave will be held in the Vaticanʼs Sistine Chapel. It will be closed to visitors until the cardinals elect a new Pope.
A conclave is a closed meeting of cardinals in the Vatican where they elect a new Pope. A candidate must receive at least two-thirds of the votes of all participating cardinals to become pope. The entire process is secret and closed to the outside world.
About 135 cardinals from around the world under the age of 80 can participate in the conclave and elect a new leader for the Churchʼs 1.4 billion faithful. The previous two conclaves, held in 2005 and 2013, lasted just two days.
- On April 21, the Vatican announced the death of Pope Francis. He died of a stroke and subsequent irreversible heart failure after a long illness — he was in the hospital from February 14 to March 23. The pontiff had developed bilateral pneumonia. His condition was serious.
- The pontiff was buried on April 26 — the first time in 100 years that a pope was buried outside the Vatican walls, in the church of Santa Maria Maggiore. Among the leaders who arrived for the funeral in Rome were, in particular, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and the US President Donald Trump.
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