Facebook? FaceTime? Emails? What cardinals give up during conclave
Cardinals attend a Mass presided over by Cardinal Pietro Parolin in St. Peter’s Square, at the Vatican, on the second of nine days of mourning for Pope Francis on Sunday, April 27, 2025. FILE PHOTO/Associated Press
MANILA, Philippines — It’s a question that surfaces every time the world watches a papal election unfold. As the crimson-robed princes of the Church vanish behind the Renaissance walls of the Sistine Chapel, many wonder: In this age of constant connection, what exactly do these men give up?
The answer is simple: everything.
When the conclave begins, cardinal electors surrender not only their smartphones but every link to the outside world. No tweets. No texts. No calls home. Not even a whisper from the evening news. They retreat into a realm where privacy is absolute and secrecy is enforced by oaths that carry the weight of automatic excommunication.
For those cloistered days, they do more than choose a pope—they step back in time, into a sanctuary untouched by the modern world’s relentless noise. Here, the Church seeks divine guidance without distraction, and every measure is taken to ensure the solemnity and integrity of the election.
READ: Sistine Chapel readied for next pope’s election
This seclusion is no accident. It is enshrined in Universi Dominici Gregis, the apostolic constitution issued by Pope John Paul II in 1996, and reinforced by Pope Benedict XVI’s 2013 Normas Nonnullas. Together, these documents create one of the world’s most secretive and ritual-bound election processes.
A cloister of silence
The conclave begins 15 to 20 days after a pope’s death or resignation. First, the cardinals celebrate the Missa pro Eligendo Papa in St. Peter’s Basilica. Then they proceed to the Sistine Chapel, chanting Veni Creator Spiritus, invoking the Holy Spirit.
At that pivotal moment, the command rings out: Extra omnes—”Everyone out.”
Non-electors, assistants, even Vatican staff are dismissed. The doors are sealed. The cardinals are now cut off until white smoke signals their choice.
As Universi Dominici Gregis decrees, cardinal electors are “strictly forbidden” from any communication with the outside world—by phone, letter, radio, TV, or internet. The blackout is total.
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Even those allowed inside Vatican City during the conclave—medical staff, technicians, secretaries—must swear an oath of secrecy. The stakes are high: any breach results in latae sententiae excommunication—automatic expulsion from the sacraments and the Church community.
No phones, no recordings, no exceptions
Security is exhaustive. Vatican technicians sweep the Sistine Chapel with anti-bugging equipment to detect hidden devices. Two officials are assigned to ensure no recording or transmission gear sneaks in.
If any such device is found—audio recorder, camera, phone—it is immediately removed. If anyone tries to record, transmit, or leak information, the penalty is swift and severe: excommunication.
Every cardinal, upon entering conclave, takes this solemn oath:
“I will observe absolute and perpetual secrecy… fully aware that an infraction thereof will incur automatic excommunication.”
Vatican as fortress
But it is not only the Sistine Chapel that is sealed. Vatican City itself becomes a fortress during a conclave.
According to Normas Nonnullas, even liturgical masters, secretaries, and technicians must reside within Vatican walls, cut off from their families and the outside world.
The Domus Sanctae Marthae, where the electors sleep, is locked down. Only essential staff—cooks, cleaners, medics—may enter, and all must have sworn their own oaths.
Weight of excommunication
Violating conclave secrecy is no mere technicality. It is among the gravest offenses in Catholic canon law.
Anyone—cardinal, assistant, staff—who leaks or reveals conclave details is excommunicated latae sententiae. This rare penalty requires no trial or formal pronouncement. The act itself brings about the punishment. Only the pope can lift it.
Even after the white smoke rises and a new pope appears on the balcony, the seal of secrecy endures. Universi Dominici Gregis warns that cardinals must never disclose details of the voting, the debates, or the decisions—not in life, not in memoirs, not even on their deathbeds.
Their silence is meant to be eternal.
Lito B. Zulueta, professor of journalism at the UST Faculty of Arts & Letters, covered the conclave of 2005 that elected Pope Benedict XVI and that of 2013 that elected Pope Francis.
