First Order of Business: Prayer: Seeking God's Will

The cardinals dedicate themselves first of all to prayer, to ask God what is His will!; for cardinals are essentially priests, and prayer is the central duty of every priest.  The mass media, as usually, gets it wrong regarding our religion.  First the cardinals have to decide, by the grace of God, whether it is God's will to have the conclave at all.  It is, to my mind, a quite difficult question which we see is also perplexing the college of cardinals before they can even dare to set a date.

Better to first consult our true and invisible Shepherd Jesus Christ; Who leads the Church more manifestly now than ever, and will indeed guide the shepherds of the Church who themselves have lost their only visible shepherd.  Thank God we still have them, our shepherds, under the Lord.  They only have the Lord to guide them.  Wonderful!  Now they have to go to Him on our behalf!  I am sure that this was part of the Pope Emeritus' intention, that the priests of the Church take on their responsibility of prayer before the Lord.