The cardinals gathered again on Saturday morning, May 3, 2025, for their ninth general congregation in preparation for the conclave. With four days to go before the doors close behind them, Cardinal Jean-Paul Vesco, Archbishop of Algiers, said they need “more time for prayer together.”
While several cardinals admitted to feeling that time is passing too quickly, one assured: "At the right moment, we will be ready, and we will give the Church the pope that God himself has wanted."
Assaulted by the press as they are every morning at the Vatican gates, most of the cardinals said they had not yet decided on a candidate, including 76-year-old Charles Maung Bo of Myanmar, who said he had “none.”
“You are doing a very nice media exercise [of selecting the candidates]; but we are not there yet,” said 79-year-old Italian Cardinal Fernando Filoni.
"It seems to me that we need more time, at least for me," agreed 75-year-old Swedish Cardinal Anders Arborelius. He explained: "We are trying to get a vision of the whole Church."
Cardinal Jean-Paul Vesco also wants "more time to pray together, much more discussion together.”
“We don't feel ready,” said the 63-year-old Franco-Algerian.
Cardinal Vesco emphasized the spiritual responsibility of the cardinal electors: “We must discover the one whom the Lord has already chosen.”
“But I am sure that at the right moment, we will be ready, and we will give the Church the pope that the Lord, that God himself, has wanted for his Church,” he also affirmed.
“We come again to pray and work to find the right person. No one is perfect, but we will find him,” said 67-year-old Cardinal William Seng Chye Goh, Archbishop of Singapore.
The conclave will begin on the afternoon of May 7. If voting begins on the afternoon of the first day, there will be only one ballot. On subsequent days, two ballots are held in the morning and two in the afternoon.
