Crowd Cheers, Sings, Prays

As white smoke streamed Tuesday from the slender chimney on the roof of the Sistine Chapel where the cardinals met to elect a new pope, the crowd of tens of thousands filling St. Peter’s Square surged forward.

They shouted with excitement: “Habemus papam!” (We have a pope!)

Some cheered, some sang. Many whipped out cellphones and typed in the words “white smoke.”

But when Chilean Cardinal Jorge Arturo Medina Estevez announced that the new leader of the world’s 1 billion Roman Catholics was Joseph Ratzinger, electricity seemed to give way to matter-of-factness.

“We don’t know much about him, except that he’s quite closely linked with John Paul II,” said Ursula Kelly of County Derry, Ireland, who was in Rome with her husband for their 15th wedding anniversary. “But we’re just so glad to see it.”

Some groups applauded, some cheered, but the overwhelming sentiment was that a larger figure loomed over the scene -- Pope John Paul II, who died this month.

“It’s a hard act to follow. He is the only pope I’ve known,” said Paul Anderson, 25, a resident advisor for Chicago’s Loyola University semester abroad program in Rome who had come to the square every day since John Paul fell gravely ill.

Ratzinger seemed to sense John Paul’s shadow as well. When he emerged onto the marble balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica overlooking the square, the first sentence he uttered as Benedict XVI was an acknowledgment of his predecessor’s power.

“After the great Pope John Paul II, the cardinals have elected me -- a simple, humble worker in the vineyard of the Lord,” he said in Italian.

He raised his arms in greeting, turning from side to side, clasped his hands together and blew a kiss to the crowd, which filled the vast square and spilled into adjoining streets. The new pope appeared a bit stiff, perhaps not yet used to performing before a vast public.

Cardinal Justin Rigali of Philadelphia, who was looking down on the same crowd from an adjacent balcony, later described a scene of majesty as he gazed over St. Peter’s Square. “I was on the balcony to the right and what a view it was! All these tens of thousands of people and the wonderful welcome they gave the new pope. You heard them chant ‘Benedetto, Benedetto,’ ” the new pope’s name in Italian. “So it started off well,” he said.

Silvana Dal Mas, an elderly nun of the Daughters of the Heart of Jesus who had come to Rome for the conclave, elbowed her way to the very front of the crowd. She said she would have preferred a Latin American pope, but when Ratzinger was named she quickly adjusted her sights.

“I am happy,” she said, looking up at the balconies filled with cardinals. “People think the Germans are hard, but I come from near the border with Austria and when the Germans love, it’s sincere. This pope will ... “ she paused. “He will work very well.”

Mario Marazziti, the spokesman and a founding member of the Community of Sant’Egidio, a Catholic activist group that works with the poor and refugees, raced to St. Peter’s Square when he heard about the white smoke. He found himself surprised by the new pope’s demeanor.

To Marazziti, the usually stern Ratzinger seemed awestruck, even timid, as he stood on the balcony of the basilica, looking out at the crowd that had assembled to greet him.

“I think he was uncertain; he was intimidated tonight,” Marazziti said. “He used minimalist words. And all of us today are the children of John Paul II who regard this strong and timid man.... I was moved, I found it tender.”

Most excited about his election were groups of young people who had been devoted to John Paul II and were eager to transfer their affections to a new spiritual leader.

Bree Dail, 23, who attends Christendom College in Front Royal, Va., snagged a seat in the front row on Monday and Tuesday along with a handful of her fellow students so that she could watch the new pope close up. She had spent much of the day saying the rosary with her friends, hoping the cardinals would come to a decision.

When she heard Ratzinger’s name, she leapt up, shouting and cheering. She, like so many others, could not help but associate him with the previous pope. “They gave us the best, [Ratzinger] has the heart of the Holy Father,” she said, referring to John Paul. “We are happy, we are ecstatic, it’s like we have a father.”

The day was overcast and chilly. Dark clouds scudded across the sky, making it hard to tell if the initial curl of smoke rising at dusk from the Sistine Chapel was gray tending to black, or gray tending to white.

The piazza that saw scattered groups of people earlier in the day appeared suddenly to have filled to bursting. A group of Spanish nuns leapt onto chairs and began to chant, “We have a pope!”

An older nun reproved them. “You don’t know for certain yet,” she said.

As the crowd, seeing the white smoke, called out “bianco, bianco,” a priest with his cellphone glued to one ear came out on one of the terraces that sits atop the majestic colonnade surrounding St. Peter’s Square and gestured frantically at the bell tower.

John Paul had decreed that in addition to sending up white smoke, the Vatican should ring the bells to announce a papal selection.

When the chimes finally were heard, the ringing was overwhelmed by the roar of the crowd, relieved and excited that the election of a new pope was real. Some waved papal flags, others flags from their home countries -- Germany and Honduras, Mexico and the United States. As people waited, there were lulls in the cheers and some began to sing Italian hymns or chant prayers in Latin.

Vatican staff members -- priests, nuns and lay workers -- came out onto the roofs of the buildings surrounding St. Peter’s to watch the ceremony. News photographers and TV camera operators positioned themselves amid the statues that crown the colonnade.

As the cardinals prepared to introduce the new pope, assistants unfurled a velvet banner with the seal of John Paul and hung it in front of the papal balcony. Then, the grand glass doors were opened and, in a dramatic entrance, a long, deep red curtain was pushed aside to make way for the new pope.

The 115 elector cardinals gathered on adjoining balconies, their scarlet cassocks and skullcaps contrasting sharply with the white marble. It created a vivid tableau but also a moment of sober ceremony as they watched one of their own move into the most elite post in Christendom.

After a greeting and a few words, Ratzinger spoke in Italian. “I entrust myself to your prayers.” And the crowd chanted his new papal name.

With the dusk deepening and a damp wind rising, he ducked back inside the basilica.

With the new pope’s departure, the crowd began to drift off. A group known as Papa Boys, an informal youth group that sprang up during John Paul’s jubilee year, rallied a large circle of young Catholics to sing. They were hoping the new pope would make another appearance.

Many, however, who stood on the periphery of the swaying teenagers and 20-somethings had more questions than answers. “We’ll see if he has enough charisma to face this crisis of faith that we have in the church with people drifting away,” said Elena Fonte, 35, a lawyer. “I still think of John Paul II as pope; not of Ratzinger as pope.”

Times staff writers Sebastian Rotella and Geraldine Baum contributed to this report.