Welcome to Breakpoint, a daily look at an ever-changing culture through the lens of unchanging truth.

For the Colson Center, I'm John Stone Street.

Well, today the College of Cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church will begin the conclave to elect the new Pope.

While the results certainly matter a great deal to Roman Catholics, they also matter for Protestants and for the Orthodox Church.

Despite our significant and irreconcilable

doctrinal differences on matters such as the role of Mary, the sacraments, scripture, salvation,

the fundamental nature of the church, all Christians should be praying that God intervenes and leads

and who replaces Francis as the next pope. The brilliant theologian J.I. Packer once observed that we're justified by faith,

but not by believing in justification by faith.

We have substantial differences,

and still, Christians across faith lines can embrace what Chuck Colson called an ecumenism of the trenches,

which takes the forms of working together to defend life,

promote robust dialogue, and wherever possible, protect essential cultural goods, like life,

marriage, and religious liberty. Another reason why who becomes the Pope affects both Catholics

and non-Catholics, is that while non-Christians are certainly aware of the divisions within the

Christian world, they rarely understand them. So as a result, like it or not, the Pope is viewed by many

as the leader of the Christian world. He is the head of the largest Christian body in the world,

that numbers about a billion members, and no other religious leader has a comparative stature.

For example, only one religious

leader on the planet can both request and gain a state audience in nearly any nation on the

planet. So to outsiders, the Pope is the face of the Christian world, whatever other branches

of the church might think. Though some Christians will certainly claim that it doesn't matter what

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