March 5, 2013: For the coming conclave, the Sistine Chapel will be closed to the public
until further notice from 13.00 pm on 5 March. During the same period, Vatican Museums,
the Borgia Apartment and Collection of Modern Religious Art will also be closed for
visitors.
For the 25th time, the Sistine Chapel will go back to
being the silent witness of the election of the new Pope. The 115 cardinal electors
come under the immortal Michelangelo's frescoes to choose the successor of St. Peter.
The Sistine Chapel - which in 1996 became the official seat of the Conclave
with the Apostolic Constitution "Universi Dominici Gregis" of John Paul II - will
be equipped with 115 cherry chairs, marked with the name of each Cardinal elector,
and twelve wooden tables covered with a beige and burgundy satin cloth, six on the
right side and six on the left, arranged in two rows of different levels. In front
of the altar, under the Last Judgment, a table for the urn of raw wood, and a lectern
with the Gospel on which Cardinals will be sworn in.
The velvet bag to pick
up the cards and place cards with the names of Cardinals, which will be equipped with
pen, folder and a red card for scrutiny, will also soon be ready.
As is the
tradition since 1939, the Conclave that elected Pope Pius XII, beyond the marble railing,
will have the famous stove (two similar structures attached) that will be used to
burn the cards and where the chimney will exit the "smoke". Voting results will in
fact be made visible by the color of smoke that come out of the chimney installed
on the roof of the Sistine Chapel: black smoke in the cases not reached majority,
white smoke for the election of the new Pope.
The rites of the conclave to
elect a successor to Pope Benedict XVI will be opened in St. Peter's Basilica with
the Mass "Pro eligendo Pope", after which all the cardinals Voters will go to the
Sistine Chapel at the beginning of the real Conclave. To elect the Pope will require
a qualified majority of two-thirds of the cardinals electors.