Tributes to Pope Francis pour in from around the world

Dust off the history books and there are papal conclaves with international intrigue, royal rigging and even riots, a checkered past that belies the air of sanctity and solemnity surrounding modern papal elections.

The word “conclave” comes from the Latin for “with key.” It is a church tradition that began in 1268 with a papal election that lasted almost three years, ending only when the townspeople of Viterbo locked up the cardinals, tore the roof off their palace, fed them nothing but bread and water and threatened them until a new pope was chosen.

While it is very unlikely the decision on Pope Francis’ successor will take quite as long or be quite as contentious, Vatican watchers agree that the winner is not a foregone conclusion.

“The great joy of the conclave is that nobody really knows and it’s such a unique electorate,” James Somerville-Meikle, the former deputy director of the Catholic Union of Great Britain, told NBC News before Francis’ death. “So many conclaves in the past have thrown up surprises.”

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In life, Pope Francis strayed from the more conservative path forged by his predecessors Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict.

But in death, Francis will be following in many of John Paul’s footsteps.

The demise of the first Argentine to lead the Roman Catholic Church set into motion a series of rituals, some of which go back more than 2,000 years and have been used to bury more than 250 popes.

They are compiled in a more than 400-page tome called the “Ordo exsequiarum Romani pontificis,” which includes the liturgy, music and prayers used for papal funerals over the centuries.

“The Ordo covers the rituals that are followed from the moment a pope dies to the moment a pope is buried,” said the Rev. David Collins, an associate professor and the director of Catholic studies at Georgetown University.

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From working as a bouncer at a Buenos Aires nightclub to presiding over the Vatican, the path Pope Francis forged as the leader of the Roman Catholic Church was as unlikely as it was unprecedented.

Francis, who died Monday at age 88, was keen to flex his muscles as supreme pontiff. He angered some Catholic Church traditionalists by reaching out to gay and marginalized people, demanding justice for the poor and the dispossessed and railing against unbridled capitalism and climate change.

As the first pope from the Americas, Francis was in many ways the ultimate Vatican outsider who charted a new and more liberal course as the leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics.

“He embarked on a real reorganization of the church and a real reorientation of the church after four decades of conservative theologians’ leading the way,” said David Gibson, director of the Fordham Center on Religion and Culture.

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