Cardinal Puljic to Vote for New Pope in Chapel

Amid reports that Cardinal Vinko Puljic would vote for Pope from a Vatican guesthouse rather than in the conclave that begins Tuesday, the retired archbishop of Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, announced Monday that he would participate in the closed Sistine Chapel proceedings after all.

"I need help to get in, but I think there will be no problem," Puljic, 79, said in a filmed interview with an Italian-based nongovernmental organization. "With help I can get into the Sistine Chapel."

An earlier report in the Italian publication Corriere della Sera last week revealed that Puljic, who has had health problems recently, would stay in the Vatican-owned Santa Marta guesthouse and vote remotely while his brethren were sequestered in the Sistine Chapel and electing a new Pope by secret ballot.

Several Vatican-watchers worried that a cardinal voting from outside the chapel would slow the election down. Other Catholic leaders, unaware that a cardinal could vote for Pope without being in the chapel, voiced dismay with this little-known procedure.

"I don't like the sound of it," a Roman Catholic pastor in Washington told Newsmax on Sunday. "I never heard of this before. Someone who was in the room with [Puljic] could talk to him and possibly influence his vote."

Best known for his leadership during the war in Bosnia in the 1990s, Puljic rose through the ranks of the Catholic Church hierarchy as an ally of Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI. He has also been publicly critical of some of Pope Francis' progressive decisions and is widely expected to support a more conservative and traditional successor to Francis.

With 133 cardinals now expected to vote in the election, which begins Wednesday, two have announced they will not attend the conclave because of health concerns: Cardinals John Njue of Kenya and Antonio de Canizares Llovera of Spain, both considered conservative. Another cardinal, Angelo Becciu, was convicted of embezzlement and had his right to vote in a conclave abrogated by Francis.

John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.