I Have A Prediction

My prediction is this: The next pope will not be named Benedict.

Why? Because the current pope is.

See: I got to thinking about the circumstances under which a pope take the prior pope’s name.

It seems to me that the default option would be to pick a different name because to pick your predecessor’s name would invite comparisons to him. If people liked him then they would always be looking at you to see if you measure up to their fond memories of him. On the other hand, if they hated his guts then they’d likely hate your guts, too, since you obviously admired him so much that you took his name. Either way, it’d be better to strike out on your own, be your own pope, and pick a name that hasn’t been used in a while.

But there are circumstances which can override this.

Obviously, John Paul II picked the name he did because of the crisis caused by the abrupt and unexpected death of John Paul I. It was a way of signalling continuity and reassurring the world that we could get past the crisis.

But when was the last time before that that a pope picked his predecessor’s name?

I thought about it and realized that it was when Eugenio Pacelli picked the name "Pius XII." Was there a crisis then? You bet! World War II was about to break out, Pius XI had really been ticking off Adolph Hitler with all his human rights and pro-peace talk and Pacelli (former nuncio to Germany and professional Hitler-despiser) was elected as an in-your-face gesture to hold a hard line against Hitler. (In other words, to put a Bronx cheer "right in der Fuehrer’s face" as Spike Jones would say). Pius XII thus picked the name of his predecessor to signal that the Church was staying the course against Nazism.

When was the last time before that when it happened?

I didn’t know.

Couldn’t remember another occurrence as far back as my memory of papal names went, so I looked up a

LIST OF POPES.

Y’know when it turns out the last time it happened was?

1800.

That’s right: Over a century beforehand (and goin’ on a century an a half).

In 1800 Pope Pius VII took the name of his predecessor, Pius VI. Was there a crisis then? Yep. Proto-Hitler Napoleon was raising a ruckus.

And the time before that?

Actually, it was right quick before that. Pius VI’s predecessor had taken the name Clement XIV after his predecessor, Clement XIII. And was it a time of crisis?

Hoo-boy! Warn’t it! Here’s part of the opening of Clement XIV’s page in the Catholic Encyclopedia:

At the death of Clement XIII the Church was in dire distress. Gallicanism and Jansenism, Febronianism and Rationalism were up in rebellion against the authority of the Roman pontiff; the rulers of France, Spain, Naples, Portugal, Parma were on the side of the sectarians who flattered their dynastic prejudices and, at least in appearance, worked for the strengthening of the temporal power against the spiritual. The new pope would have to face a coalition of moral and political forces which Clement XIII had indeed manfully resisted, but failed to put down, or even materially to check [SOURCE].

The time before that was in 1670, when Clement X succeeded Clement IX. That time I don’t know if you’d say that there was a crisis, though the conclave was really long (almost five months!) and divided and the new pope was a very elderly man who had only been named a cardinal on the eve of Clement IX’s death. It thus seems that the took the name out of gratitude, though it might also have been to reassure the Church after an abnormally long conclave. (He also may not have minded comparisons since he didn’t expect to have a long reign in which to invite them.)

However that may be, popes don’t pick their predecessors’ names that often. Only about once a century on average, as you can see above, and it tends to be under very unusual circumstances, like a crisis when it is imperative to send a strong continuity signal.

I’d hope (though one never knows) that this won’t pertain at the time of the next conclave.

Hence my prediction.