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Cardinals locked in Sistine Chapel to pick pope
By The Associated Press
This article was originally published March 12, 2013 at 7:04 a.m. Updated March 12, 2013 at 12:39 p.m.
PHOTO BY ALESSANDRA TARANTINO / AP
A view of the Sistine Chapel, at the Vatican, Saturday, March 9, 2013. Firefighters have installed the top of the Sistine Chapel chimney that will signal to the world that a new pope has been elected, while construction workers were preparing the chapel interior for the start of the papal conclave Tuesday. For such an important decision, the chimney is an awfully simple affair: a century-old cast iron stove where ballot papers are burned, with a copper pipe out the top that snakes up the Sistine's frescoed walls, out the window and onto the chapel roof.
VATICAN CITY — Cardinals from around the globe locked themselves inside the Sistine Chapel on Tuesday to choose a new leader for the world's 1.2 billion Catholics and their church, surrounded by Michelangelo's imposing frescos imagining the beginning and the end of the world.
The 115 scarlet-robed men entered their conclave with a final appeal for unity to heal the divisions that have been exposed by Pope Benedict XVI's shocking resignation and revelations of corruption in the Vatican bureaucracy.
Led by prelates holding a crucifix and candles, the cardinals chanted the Litany of Saints, the hypnotic Gregorian chant imploring the intercession of the saints, as they filed into the chapel and took their oath of secrecy.
With a dramatic closing of the thick double doors and the exhortation "Extra omnes" or "all out," the ritual-filled conclave began beneath Michelangelo's frescoed "Creation" and before his "Last Judgment" — potent images for the task at hand.
Benedict XVI's resignation has thrown the church into turmoil and exposed deep divisions among cardinals grappling with the apparently conflicting needs for a manager to clean up the Vatican's dysfunctional bureaucracy and a pastor who can inspire Catholics at a time of waning faith and growing secularism.
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