Despite the drift away from institutionalised religion it continues to fascinate with Robert Harris’s spellbinding Conclave about the election of a new pope now out as a movie with Ralph Fiennes starring.
Reviews are good – “A self-contained and intricate story that uses God’s representatives on Earth to show us at our most human, filled with jealousy, betrayal, forever jostling for power.”
“What Conclave suggests – is that the church is a business now and the spirituality that will draw clergy in has been usurped by the more political traps of pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust and sloth.”
Pope Francis has attempted to duck those accusations but has seemingly made few inroads into the problems that have always tainted the Vatican.
Born 17 December 1936 9pm Buenos Aires, Argentina, he has a hope-for-a-better-society Neptune opposition Saturn square his optimistic Sagittarius Sun which in turn is conjunct an upbeat Jupiter. His innovative, reforming Uranus prompting him to make a break with the past is in his 10th house.
His election chart, 13 March 2013 7.06pm Rome, has a charmingly sympathetic and hard working 6th house Sun Venus in Pisces. Though a mutinous 4th house Pluto and a disruptive, explosive Mars Uranus on the Descendant suggested the road ahead would not be smooth for internal relationships.
There are also two yods on his Election chart – one onto Jupiter inconjunct Saturn sextile Pluto which does suggest a capacity for having a positive influence out in the society; the other onto Saturn inconjunct Uranus sextile Jupiter which hints at the need for a strong backbone.
Tr Neptune Saturn moving into Aries from just before mid year in 2025 will be undermining and problematic for his time as Pope.
His views on astrology stick close to the internal rule book, despite the Vatican itself being replete with astrological artefacts from days gone by when all Popes had their own astrologer. All forms of divination are to be rejected. With that torturous double think so beloved of those of fixed beliefs he suggests consulting a horoscope will cause you to sink whereas a strong faith in Jesus will allow you to walk on water like St Peter.
“Consulting horoscopes, astrology, palm reading, interpretation of omens and lots, the phenomena of clairvoyance, and recourse to mediums all conceal a desire for power over time, history, and, in the last analysis, other human beings, as well as a wish to conciliate hidden powers.”
Tertullian reminds us, “Nothing of God costs money.” Astrologers charge fees so are inherently immoral.
One Catholic website writes: “Imagine the kind of wishy-washy deity in which astrologists and their fans believe.”
Trying to unravel the above – starting at the end – “Nothing of God costs money.” Surely a bad joke given the churches rapacious appetite for such. Ditto the Vatican’s power hungry reach. One reason the priest classes so disliked astrology was that it took power away from them.
Walking on water is a weirder supernatural belief than anything put forward by astrology.
Since on their theory God created the universe what is wrong with the notion that he is OK with David Attenborough studying nature and astrologers studying the parallels between planetary movements and events on earth?
The Roman emperors used bread and circuses to placate the peasant/plebeian classes. Religious leaders use other inducements to subdue their congregations into submission and leave the entitled priest cohort in charge.
As a footnote:
Novelist Robert Harris, 7 March 1957, is also like the Pope a Sun, Venus in Pisces; with an inventive, inspired Uranus square Neptune. His Mars (Moon) South Node in Taurus square Pluto will draw him to explore the darker side of humanity across a range of novels focused on the Second World War and then Ancient Rome.
I have read a few Robert Harris books but I think Conclave is my favourite. It not only provides the layman with some insight into to the actual process by which a Pope is elected but also shows how it is impacted by the internal politics of the Church and the way its bureaucracy is run. The central character, Lomeli, is particularly well drawn as the worn out and spiritually conflicted Dean of the College of Cardinals who gets inexorably drawn into the political manoeuvring around Papal election which he is supposed to be overseeing. You don’t often find stories where a bureaucrat struggling to do his job is the hero but this is one.
Harris has an extraordinary capacity as a writer to make a seemingly tedious or obscure subject gripping. Pompeii is another of his oeuvre which turned out to be way more fascinating than I expected.
I will read Robert Harris. Justin Welby just resigned for covering up sex abuse. There is talk of expelling Anglican bishops from Parliament. Here in Québec, court cases against the Church’s various orders are unending, like in Ireland, Belgium, France or the US. The Dalai Lama and the Pope are about the same age and will leave us almost simultaneously. Organized religion is in a very deep crisis worldwide. It is human and therefore can contain very bad people. I read about the most famous conclave, one in the 14th century, in Barbara Tuchman’s Distant Mirror. I think Steve Bannon will want to meddle in the next one.
The problem is that when the current Dalai Lama leaves us, President Xi may well try to interfere with the search for his replacement. Children in illegally occupied Tibet are already taught that Xi is not only their supreme leader, but also their spritual one.
I suspect the rejection of organized religion and the embrace of the secular, partly resulting from the extreme corruption and all the sexual predation, is one reason why the Christian Nationalists and fundamentslists in the US and worldwide are battling so hard to impose their belief systems on the non-believing populace.
Does rejection of formal religion show up in the astrology at all? If so, where? Thanks!
Marxism sprung up in the mid 19th Century when the Uranus Pluto Saturn triple conjunction in Aries was around. Then Nietzsche’s “God is dead” came as Pluto was about to move into Gemini.
According to wiki from the mid-twentieth century, there has been a gradual decline in adherence to established Christianity.
Not sure you could put a finger on the turning point.
The Vatican was endemically corrupt way back in mediaeval times with sexual improprieties rife. And 20th century offshoots are clearly no better.
The USA is different from Europe in the evangelical fundamentalist fervour which on the whole has not crossed the Atlantic.
Tertullian reminds us, “Nothing of God costs money.”
Thank you for this!! I really like it!
It’s always as if a lamp lights up when you see something spiritual costing or being really hidden behind paywalls. And sometimes a lot of them.
It makes you wonder… I don’t know what to think.
Excellent film, one of the few released recently that seems designed to appeal to thinking adults rather than the shoot’em-up teenaged set, with a delightful twist at the end. Thanks for the write-up.
Here is the Conclave movie release chart for the UK. Sepharial gives for
Asc 29Aq30…”A Sceptre Surrounded by a Crown…the new Pope. he will
be religious, strict, upright.” Neptune in 1st adds drama, while Moon in
Scorpio adds jealousy. The MC at 19Sag…”he will be called upon to
pass thru’ a fiery ordeal.”
https://ibb.co/HdmyfFw
“Novelist Robert Harris, 7 March 1957, is also like the Pope a Sun, Venus in Pisces; with an inventive, inspired Uranus square Neptune. His Mars (Moon) South Node in Taurus square Pluto will draw him to explore the darker side of humanity across a range of novels focused on the Second World War and then Ancient Rome.”
Interesting. I’ve enjoyed much of Robert Harris’s work precisely because of his portrayal of power, and resistance of “common people” in worlds dominated by shadowy figures. His work also adapts well to screen – movies and tv series based on his work may not be masterpieces, but have an appeal often missing from popular book adaptation.