Read part one of Is the Pope a Catholic?
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So who is this liberal, progressive, modernising pope with no hang-ups about sex and contraception and divorce and abortion, who constantly preaches on the value and necessity of the Sacrament of Confession and the reality of the Devil, who came back from studying in Germany in the 80s with, not the latest in theological progressivism, but the 18th century devotion to Our Lady, Undoer of Knots, which he introduced to great success in Buenos Aires and which has since spread throughout Argentina and Brazil, who has obvious Marian devotion in how he welcomed the statue of Our Lady of Fatima, went on pilgrimage to the shrine of Aparecida in Brazil during the World Youth Day, and is always popping in to visit the icon of Salus Populi Romani in the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore?
As a Jesuit, he is the first pope to be a member of a religious order since 1831 (that was Gregory XVI, who was a monk in the Camaldolese order, part of the Benedictine monastic family). I think you can see the Jesuit influence in his pastoral emphasis and his liturgical style. I also think – and this is my own personal impression – that he is very definitely a post-Vatican II Catholic, in how he approaches everything from the vestments he wears to bureaucratic reform of the Vatican and the role of the laity in the Church.
Please note, this is not a criticism. I don’t think he’s one of the “Spirit of Vatican II” types, the ones who in the first flush of enthusiasm wrecked churches wholesale by pulling them asunder and tossing out everything from devotions to sodalities to altar rails to the confession boxes; who for the past fifty years have been “Any day now!” about married priests, women priests, remarriage in church for the divorced (though Pope Francis is taking a pastoral approach to that problem, too), artificial contraception, abortion, lay leadership, symbolic rather than literal understanding of the Eucharist (can you tell I’m bitter about the craze for teaching children that Communion is “like a meal, or a party with your friends!” instead of “the holy sacrifice of the altar”?) and twenty other matters from the environment to capitalism to union with other faiths and none.
Ahem. My personal prejudices are showing there, I think. But there are orthodox Catholics, faithfully attending parishes where the progressivist wing has been greatly encouraged by Pope Francis and use him as an excuse for “Oh, we don’t believe that’s a sin anymore!” teaching, where stating the official and unchanged teaching of the Church gets you looked at like you have two heads, and maybe you’re a sexist racist homophobe on top of it as well. They feel discouraged at best and betrayed at worst. I have some sympathy for them, but my view is this:
During Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict’s time, we told them “He’s the pope, suck it up!” about teaching they didn’t like to hear. Well, now it’s our turn to do the same.
He’s the pope, not God Almighty. If we truly believe the promise of Christ to preserve the Church from error, he can make a lot of mistakes and still not permanently damage Her. And considering some of his predecessors in the See of Peter, that’s a lot of leeway. In the words of the alleged exchange between Napoleon and Cardinal Consalvi, Secretary of State for the Papal States who was opposing French policy
– Napoleon: Do you not know I can destroy your Church?
– Cardinal Consalvi: Sir, not even we priests have been able to do that in 1,800 years!
On the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, January 12th of this year, the pope baptized babies as is customary during the celebration of Mass on this day in St. Peter’s. One of the babies was the child of an unmarried couple. Or maybe there were married, but not exactly according to the canons.
There was a very minor storm in a teacup about this, because it’s a question that has become pressing in recent times: when parents are not practicing the faith in any meaningful way, when baptism has become a social occasion rather than the rite of Christian Initiation, should priest simply agree to baptize any child upon request, or should they make efforts – including putting conditions on performing the ceremony or refusing to do it at all – to see that this is taken seriously as a religious ritual?
Whatever your opinion on the matter, you have no right to be surprised that he did so. This is what he has spoken about; it’s not an accident, it didn’t “just happen” – this is the kind of thing he told us he’d do, and we should have been listening, and we should have taken him seriously.
This is not to say that he’s soft on sin, but rather that he’s strong on forgiveness. He is constantly, constantly, in the homilies and fevorini he gives, talking about the mercy of God, the love of God, the necessity for confession and repentance of sins, and to return to God in the hope of gracious forgiveness and acceptance:
I would like to ask you, but do not answer aloud. When was the last time you confessed, two days ago? Two weeks ago? A couple of years ago? 20 years? 40 years? But, we should all take count, and say to ourselves: when was the last time I went to confession. And if it’s been a long time, do not waste one more day: go on, the priest will be good to you. Jesus is there, and Jesus is better than any priest, and Jesus will welcome you. He will welcome you with so much love. Be brave and go on, go to Confession.
Francis takes a very pastoral view of how doctrine should be applied in the everyday life of the faithful; not as a set of ossified rules, either to be imposed or tossed out wholesale, but to serve the life of the People of God to grow in faith and love:
Since the early times of the Church the temptation has existed to understand the doctrine in an ideological sense or to reduce it to an ensemble of abstract and crystalized theories (cf. Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii gaudium, 39-42). In reality, doctrine has the sole purpose of serving the life of the People of God and it seeks to assure our faith of a sure foundation. Great, in fact, is the temptation to appropriate to ourselves the gifts of salvation that come from God, to domesticate them – perhaps even with a good intention – to the views and the spirit of the world. And this is a temptation that is constantly repeated.
He doesn’t want the adulation of the popular image about him, which he thinks is mistaken.
And perhaps public opinion will turn against him after these shocking revelations of his secret life of crime and graverobbing!
Pope Francis has confessed to stealing the rosary cross of his late confessor and wearing it under his cassock to this day.
The Pope admitted to taking the cross from his late confessor’s casket during an informal chat with Roman priests on Thursday, Associated Press report from the Vatican.
What Francis is doing that is really shaking things up, and what is not splashed all over the headlines, is that he is tackling the bureaucratic layers and entrenched little fiefdoms in the Vatican, a bold effort when he has to tackle a thousand years of inertia.
Ambition and climbing the career ladder are not unknown even within clerical circles, and there are many who have their eyes set on a bishop’s ring, a cardinal’s hat, or at least being titled “monsignor” and getting a plum post in the local chancery or even in a Vatican dicastery.
Francis has moved to cut that route of advancement off, by enforcing the rules on who is eligible:
Pope Francis has instituted a change in the title of “monsignor”, ordering that within dioceses it only be granted to priests who are at least 65 years of age, the Vatican announced today. In a statement issued by the Secretariat of State, the Vatican said it had informed bishops’ conferences, through a circular sent to their corresponding nunciatures, that “in the world’s dioceses, the only ecclesiastical title henceforth to be conferred shall be “chaplain of His Holiness”, to which the appellation, “monsignor”, shall correspond. The title shall be conferred only upon priests who have reached the age of 65.”
Until now, diocesan priests under the age of 65 were eligible for the title, depending on the wishes of their bishops.
The circular further clarifies that the use of the title “monsignor” in connection with certain major offices and where this is a cultural practice – such as for a bishop or the vicar general of the diocese – “remains unchanged.”
He also reminded the highest ranks that they’re there to be his advisors and priests first, empire builders second, in his homily for Ash Wednesday:
While a Vatican translation of Francis’ prepared homily is below, an impromptu aside of the preach – per his custom, one of several (especially when sensitive topics are involved) – registered as a clear swipe at the cardinals gathered around him clad in their scarlet choir robes, upon each of whom the Pope subsequently imposed ashes.
“In our little everyday environment, when I watch these power struggles for positions,” he said, “I think to myself, ‘These people are trying to play God the Creator!’
“They still do not realize that they are not God!”
He is also making changes in the financial structures, the new heads of the various dicasteries (the various departments of the Roman Curia, which is the administrative body of the Holy See and covers everything from archaeology and church architecture to bishops, priests, laity and the doctrines of the faith) and who he is bringing in to be a ‘council of advisors’.
So to sum up what I think:
Is the Pope a Catholic? Of course!
He’s not in the mould of his predecessor, who was the pope for me because he fitted so comfortably with how I felt and thought. That’s a good thing, because I find Francis makes me uncomfortable at times, and I need to be prodded hard out of my tendency to Phariseeism (binding the burdens of the law on the shoulders of others, rather than the easy yoke of Christ).
He has the Jesuit “preferential option for the poor”. This phrase originated in a 1968 letter to South American Jesuits from the Superior General of the Order, Fr. Pedro Arrupe. It has become strongly associated with Liberation Theology as it has been most developed and worked out in that context, but in its originating spirit, it’s a Jesuit concept, and tellingly, a Latin American concept.
He has the Vatican II reforming spirit for a simplified liturgy, which is not the same thing as lacking orthodox doctrine.
I think his experience coming from South America, and Argentina in particular, very much colors his style of governance and how he sees the role of the clergy and the laity. On the one hand, the Church in Argentina was tied-in with the State, including being seen (whether rightly or wrongly) as on the side of the entitled, the privileged, those in power versus the poor in the slums. On the other hand, he has seen how ‘liberation theology’ can be perverted into quasi-Marxism (and you end up with something like the Shining Path in Peru who killed all around them in the name of “the people”).
This means that things which are of huge importance to Western Europe/USA are not even on his radar. It also means, much to my amusement, that those who would have a tendency to say “Wisdom! Attend!” when he is condemning abortion immediately said “Well, now, that’s only his opinion and not binding teaching” when he brought out an encyclical which was critical of, among other things, the modern capitalist global economy.
He very strongly believes that the role of the Pope, as any priest, is to be a pastor and shepherd of souls; what he has said about priests should be “shepherds living with the smell of the sheep.”
I mentioned in passing the latest headlines about “Pope approves (or changes his mind, or redefines Catholic teaching – take your pick) of same-sex marriage”. Okay, what did he really say, if he said anything?
On 5th March, he gave an interview to an Italian daily newspaper, Corriere della Sera. I am only going by the translated synopsis of his remarks, which are along the lines of “Pope Francis suggested the Catholic Church could tolerate some types of nonmarital civil unions as a practical measure to guarantee property rights and health care.”
Seemingly this has been conflated into (a) Pope accepts civil unions and (b) Pope accepts same-sex civil unions.
Now, I don’t know what his opinion on those is, but I imagine he’s forming one if enough people keep yabbering on about it.
Again, my own personal view (and I wonder if he would come to something similar) is that, as a matter of natural justice, it may be permissible for states to legislate same-sex civil unions (i) given that it is within the role of the state to legislate about what forms of civil contracts it recognizes or are protected by law, and that this would be a purely secular matter (ii) given that civil unions are not regarded as sacramental marriage, and that Catholics who only marry by a civil union are obligated to regularize their marriage – see the fuss about the ‘unmarried’ couple having their baby baptized as mentioned above and (iii) given the mess straight couples have made of marriage already with co-habitation, ‘open’ marriages, serial monogamy, multiple divorce and remarriage, ‘no fault’ divorce which can be abused for trivial reasons, childbearing outside of marriage, refusal to have children within marriage and the likes, it’s not fair to say “But if Jack and Joe or Jill and Sally are permitted to have a registry office ceremony, it will destroy marriage”, when Jack and Jill have been doing the same for their last three partners.
However, that does not affect sacramental marriage, or indeed the true nature of what marriage is and should be. If the state in the morning made it legal for three people, a cow and a pine tree to be registered in a civil marriage, that’s the affair of the state. I’m not going to fight culture wars here; I do object to people who do not accept same-sex civil unions/marriages as the exact same as heterosexual marriage being decried as “homophobes” (as though the only reason for objections could only be bigotry and prejudice) and though I myself think that you can provide wedding cakes, photographic services or the rent of a hall to same-sex couples, where people have genuine conscience convictions that this makes them witness to, or complicit in, what is sinful activity then we should accommodate the tender consciences of the weaker brethren and not entrap them with set-ups for lawsuits.
If I have to pick an overriding theme of his papacy to date (and it’s only been a year!) it’s that of mercy: mercy, mercy, mercy.
The priest is called to learn this, to have a heart that is moved. The priests who are – I permit myself the word – “aseptics” those “of the laboratory,” all clean, all good, do not help the Church. Today we can think of the Church as a “field hospital.” This, excuse me, I repeat, because I see it like this, I feel it so: a “field hospital.” There is need to cure the wounds, so many wounds! So many wounds! There are so many wounded people, by material problems, by scandals, also in the Church … Wounded people by the illusions of the world … We, priests, must be there, close to these people. Mercy means first of all to cure the wounds. When one is wounded, one needs this immediately, not analyses, such as the significance of cholesterol, of glycaemia … But the wound is there, cure the wound, and then we will look at the analyses. Then the specialist cures will be made, but first the open wounds must be cured. For me this, at this moment, is the most important. And there are also hidden wounds, because there are people who move away, so that their wounds are not seen … There comes to mind the custom, due to the Mosaic law, of lepers at the time of Jesus, who were always far away, so as not to infect …. There are people who move away because of shame, because of the embarrassment of having their wounds seen … And they move away perhaps with a mistaken face against the Church, but deep down, within there is the wound … They want a pat! And you, dear fellow brothers — I ask you — do you know the wounds of your parishioners? Do you intuit them? It is the only question …
Finally, speaking of the type of thing that makes headlines in the media, I have to conclude with this one:
Pope Francis has dined with homeless people, made the cover of Time and Rolling Stone and now has blessed a parrot belonging to a male stripper.
The parrot, named Amore, was initially passed up by Pope Francis as he rode around in the popemobile during his general audience in St. Peter’s Square Wednesday. Eventually, Francis went back to bless the bird and hold it on his finger.
The bird’s owner was identified as Francesco Lombardi, and according to ANSA, he’s a former male stripper turned erotic film actor.