This is the irony of the Mary/Voiello/Caltanissetta/Spencer conspiracy: Pius knows full well that neither his global congregation nor his closest associates are with him anymore. He also tells the Pope point- blank that he'll no longer spill the secrets of the confessional to a pontiff who doesn't believe in God. While Sister Mary schemes to oust him using his most closely guarded hopes and fears, his in- over- his- head spymaster Don Tommaso is now snitching to his rivals. Unfortunately, so does everyone else around him, including his allies. Voiello may play hardball – or should that be ?īut even he has his limits. But it's his conscience that makes the Cardinal call it off, whether or not the man in charge smells a rat. By now, Pius has uncovered the ruse he literally sniffs out the impostors' deception by smelling his.
While he does get the Pope to absent- mindedly authorize documents that reverse some of his diktats regarding the priesthood, he doesn't pull the trigger on the magic bullet and have the man unwittingly sign his own resignation. He offers to fill the vacant papacy with Spencer should he succeed, straight- up kneeling to kiss the power- hungry American's ring as a sign of loyalty.īut in the end, he can't go through with the plan. But when Sister Mary tips him off that Pius is distracted – by the fake parents she herself manufactured – the Secretary of State at last has an opening. However, he'd kept a copy of the files all along, and is only dissuaded from using them after all when elderly Cardinal Caltanissetta convinces him that the scandal would taint the entire Church. Yes, Voiello appeared to surrender to the Pope's superior skill in the Vatican's game of thrones, going so far as to abandon his plan to blackmail him with misleading photographs of him and his adoring fan Ester. His estranged mentor Cardinal Michael Spencer sums it all up nicely, as you might expect from the guy who taught him everything he knows. The reclusive Pope's pitiless fundamentalism is driving the faithful from the flock and his stringent guidelines for ordaining new priests has cut off their supply of shepherds. We're now deep into the Pius XIII era, and his tyrannical tactics have backfired spectacularly. O she of little faith! As we learn throughout the hour, Lenny was already well on his way to arriving at that decision all on his own. Her hope was that the fulfillment of his lifelong dream of reuniting with his parents would leave him so shaken that he could be bamboozled by his cardinals into resigning his office. Using a piece of the tobacco pipe that the elder deadbeat Belardo left with his son Lenny on the day the boy was deserted at her orphanage, the nun hired actors to impersonate the Holy Father's mom and pop. But her desperate attempt to end his disastrous reign was no less intimate. No, Sister Mary didn't lock lips with her former ward – even for a show this Oedipally fixated, that would be a bridge too far. After tonight's episode of The Young Pope, we've got a feeling Pope Pius XIII knows how the Good Lord felt.