In Calcutta on Wednesday, Cardinal Telesphore Pacidicus Toppo, the first tribal Asian to be included in the College of Cardinals that elects the Pope has reported that having an Asian Pope cannot be ruled out.

Cardinal Toppo, the Archbishop of Ranchi said, “The way things are moving, the Church has reached a stage where it may not be impossible to have a non-European or even an Asian Pope.”

As a Cardinal, Toppo is in fact eligible to be a candidate to be the next Pope, however, he declined to state whether or not an Asian will take over from Pope John Paul II to lead the Roman Catholic Church. Toppo said, “There is no use speculating. The papal election is guided by the Holy Spirit.”

The Roman Catholic Church has strict rituals set up to elect a Pope. Cardinals are gathered from all over the world at the Vatican for an entire week. They concentrate on prayer and meditation to focus their minds and then after they create a panel of candidates.

The history of the Roman Catholic Church has seen Popes mainly being European over the past few centuries and especially a majority have been Italian, with particular favour seeming to lie with bishops from Milan, Naples and Genoa.

However, times have been moving on and just 25 years ago, Karol Wojtyla, Bishop of Krakow, Poland was elected as Pope John Paul II.