What’s the process for picking a new pope?

A historian has answers for you about the pope’s passing and the path to a new pontiff.

Although he was not an official Vatican employee, in the late 1990s John Frymire, now on faculty at the University of Missouri, was part of a small academic team granted access to the previously secret archives of the Holy Office—the Roman Inquisition and the Index of Prohibited Books, now called the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

At the time, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, received permission from Pope John Paul II to open this once secret archive at Vatican City, the headquarters of the Catholic Church, to scholars. The goal was to examine and modernize the organization of these archives for historical research.

While earning a doctorate from the University of Arizona, Frymire spent seven years studying in Austria, Germany, and Italy. He is the first North American scholar given full access to the secret archives of the Holy Office.

Because the archive was not officially open at the time, and there was no formal way to get inside, Frymire gained entry daily through Ratzinger’s office, thereby becoming familiar with Vatican staff and Ratzinger himself—who would later become Pope Benedict XVI. Frymire says their relationship developed through a shared German background—and by his habit of bringing traditional German breads and sausages.

Now, as an associate history professor at Mizzou, Frymire reflects on the current events at the Vatican following the death of Pope Francis:

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