Holy Spirit Influence Within the Conclave

[HagiaSophia]

I have been puzzled by many a post here as to how others perceive the Holy Spirit working within the conclave and its election process. For the life of me I could not figure out what they thought happens in conclave with regard to the Spirit. Some of them made me feel as if they expected the Third Person of the Trinity to hand out a written note giving instructions.

Tonight I was most pleased to hear Fr. John Neuhaus describe it exactly as it was taught to me many years ago:

We are promised two things: that the pope elected cannot destroy the Catholic Church and that he cannot corrupt the deposit of faith as handed down to us from our Apostolic Fathers.

Several years ago, Cardinal Ratzinger once commented -- "He makes certain that things turn out all right in the end".