Conclave of 2013

Coat of arms during the vacancy of the Holy See
Dates and location
12–13 March 2013 Sistine Chapel, Apostolic Palace, Vatican City
Key officials
Dean	Angelo Sodano
Sub-Dean	Roger Etchegaray
Camerlengo	Tarcisio Bertone
Protopriest	Paulo Evaristo Arns
Protodeacon	Jean-Louis Tauran
Secretary	Lorenzo Baldisseri
Election
Candidates	See Papabile
Ballots	5
Elected Pope
Jorge Mario Bergoglio Name taken: Francis
← 2005

The Papal conclave of 2013 was convened to elect a pope to succeed Pope Benedict XVI following his resignation on 28 February 2013. After the 115 participating cardinal-electors gathered, they set 12 March 2013 as the beginning of the conclave. White smoke was seen emanating from the Sistine Chapel chimney on 13 March at 19:06 (7:06 PM) local time, following the fifth ballot, and the bells began pealing minutes after, signifying the election of a new pope. The conclave elected Jorge Mario Bergoglio, SJ, then Archbishop of Buenos Aires, as pope. He took the pontifical name of Francis.

On 11 February 2013, Benedict XVI announced his resignation of the papacy effective 28 February 2013 at 20:00 local time (19:00 UTC). He was the first pope to resign since Gregory XII in 1415, and the first to do so on his own initiative since Celestine V in 1294.

The conclave cardinals may elect any baptised Catholic male, but since 1389 they have always elected a fellow cardinal. Observers of papal elections tend to consider a few cardinals more likely choices than the others —these are the papabili, the plural for papabile, an Italian word which is practically rendered into English as "pope-able". Inasmuch as the set of papabili is a matter of informed speculation, the election of a non-papabile is common. Recent cases are John XXIII in 1958, and John Paul I and John Paul II, both in 1978.

Christoph Schönborn of Austria,Odilo Scherer of Brazil,Luis Antonio Tagle of the Philippines, Peter Turkson of Ghana, Marc Ouellet of Canada, Péter Erdő of Hungary and Angelo Scola of Italy were among the cardinals most often identified in press reports as those most likely to be elected. On 9 March, Cardinal André Vingt-Trois said there were around "half a dozen possible candidates." The next day Cardinal Philippe Barbarin said "There are three, four, maybe a dozen candidates."Jorge Bergoglio of Argentina was seen as a papabile though less likely to emerge as pope. One summary of likely candidates included him because he was the reported "second place finisher" at the last conclave, but observed that "his 'moment' seems to be over". In addition, Bergoglio was seen as an older choice as he was 76 as of the conclave and all other of the papabile were younger than him.