BY Martin Dunlop | March 8 | 
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Conclave to elect Pope to begin on Tuesday afternoon
Cardinals will celebrate Mass in the morning before going into the conclave; Cardinal Keith O'Brien formally excused from conclave on 'personal grounds'
The conclave to elect the next Pope will begin next Tuesday, March 12, the Vatican press office announced just a few minutes ago.
The eighth General Congregation of the College of Cardinals has decided that the conclave will begin on Tuesday.
The Vatican Press Office has released a statement saying that a ‘pro eligendo Romano Pontifice Mass will be celebrated in the morning, in the afternoon the cardinals will enter into the conclave.’
The Papal conclave, which will take place in the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel, comes after Pope Benedict XVI became the first Pope in almost 600 years to resign from his role as the Vicar of Christ when he stepped down on February 28.
The College of Cardinals voted earlier today to excuse Cardinal Keith O’Brien, whose resignation from St Andrews and Edinburgh Archdiocese was accepted by Pope Benedict XVI last Monday (February 25), from the conclave for ‘personal reasons,’ while Indonesian Cardinal Julius Riyadi Darmaatmadja, Archbishop Emeritus of Jakarta, has been excused on health grounds.
Pic: Above, the Papal voting urns
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