White smoke pours out of the Sistine Chapel chimney, signaling the election of a new pope

VATICAN CITY AP White smoke poured from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel and the great bells of St Peter s Basilica tolled Thursday after cardinals elected the th pope to lead the Catholic Church on the second day of their conclave The crowd in St Peter s Square erupted in cheers priests made the sign of the cross and nuns wept as the crowd shouted Viva il papa after the white smoke wafted into the late afternoon sky at p m Waving flags from around the world tens of thousands of people waited to learn who had won The smoke signal means the winner secured at least votes of the cardinals participating in the conclave to elect a successor to Pope Francis The name will be revealed later when a top cardinal utters the words Habemus Papam Latin for We have a pope from the loggia of the basilica The cardinal then reads the winner s birth name in Latin and reveals the name he has chosen to be called The new pope is then expected to make his first community appearance and impart a blessing from the same loggia In the crowd at St Peter s Square Pedro Deget a finance pupil from Argentina revealed he and his family visited Rome during the Argentine pope s pontificate and were hoping for a new pope in Francis image Francis did well in opening the church to the outside world but on other fronts maybe he didn t do enough We ll see if the next one will be able to do more Deget commented from the piazza The Rev Jan Dominik Bogataj a Slovene Franciscan friar was more critical of Francis He stated if he were in the Sistine Chapel he d be voting for Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem who is on a large number of papal contender lists He has clear ideas not much ideology He s a direct intelligent and respectful man Bogataj reported from the square Preponderance of all he s agile A long wait on the first ballot On Wednesday night the black smoke of the first ballot poured out of the chapel chimney just after p m about hours after the cardinals filed into the Sistine Chapel to take their oaths at the start of the conclave The late hour prompted speculation about what took so long Did they have to redo the vote Did someone get sick or need translation help Did the papal preacher take a long time to deliver his meditation before the voting began They apparently need more time reported Costanza Ranaldi a -year-old who traveled from Pescara in Italy s Abruzzo region to the Vatican Chosen of the cardinals had mentioned they expected a short conclave But if fresh history is any guide it will likely take a meager rounds of voting to settle on the th pope For much of the past century the conclave has needed between three and ballots to find a pope John Paul I the pope who reigned for days in was elected on the fourth ballot His successor John Paul II needed eight Francis was elected on the fifth in Conjecture on contenders The cardinals opened the secretive centuries-old ritual Wednesday afternoon participating in a rite more theatrical than even Hollywood could create Bright red cassocks Swiss Guards standing at attention ancient Latin chants and oaths preceded the slamming shut of the Sistine Chapel doors to seal the cardinals off from the outside world Cardinal Pietro Parolin the -year-old secretary of state under Francis and a leading contender to succeed him as pope assumed leadership of the proceedings as the the greater part senior cardinal under age eligible to participate Parolin seemed to have received the blessings from none other than Re the respected elder among the cardinals During the traditional exchange of peace during the pre-conclave Mass on Wednesday Re was caught on a hot mic telling Parolin auguri doppio or double best wishes Italians debated whether it was just a customary gesture acknowledging Parolin s role running conclave or if it might have been an informal endorsement or even a premature congratulations The voting process The voting follows a strict choreography dictated by church law Each cardinal writes his choice on a piece of paper inscribed with the words Eligo in summen pontificem I elect as supreme pontiff They approach the altar one by one and say I call as my witness Christ the Lord who will be my judge that my vote is given to the one who before God I think should be elected The folded ballot is placed on a round plate and tipped into a silver and gold urn Once cast the ballots are opened one by one by three different scrutineers cardinals selected at random who write down the names and read them aloud The scrutineers whose work is checked by other cardinals called revisers then add up the results of each round of balloting and write them on a separate sheet of paper which is preserved in the papal archives As the scrutineer reads out each name he pierces each ballot with a needle through the word Eligo All the ballots are then bound together with thread and the bundle is put aside and burned in the chapel stove along with a chemical to produce the smoke