“(OUR NEW AND WONDERFUL PAPA) HAS POWERFUL ENEMIES”

3/31/13, Easter Sunday




The Jesuit Pope Francis assumed the chair of St. Peter to the delight and enthusiasm of multitudes (See my 3/13/13 piece POPE FRANCIS: THIS IS STARTING TO LOOK LIKE A MIRACLE!) of Catholics and non-Catholics alike, and the new pontiff continues to enthrall and surprise most…and unsettle, even frighten, many.



The Pope has tossed aside customs and set precedents on almost a daily basis:



--He has refused to live in the very comfortable, if not posh, Vatican apartments, choosing instead to live in two room quarters in the guest house he occupied during the conclave. When he was Archbishop of Buenos Aires, he refused to live in the archbishop’s palace, favoring a simple apartment, so this perhaps should not have come as a surprise.



--Francis refuses the gold cross, the ornate head gear, and the fancy designer shoes traditionally worn by the pope, the last of which were a special favorite of the Pope Emeritus.



--He included in the traditional Holy Thursday washing of the feet women and Muslims, making Francis the first pope to wash the feet of either Muslim or a woman. That he celebrated in a juvenile detention facility, rather than the Vatican, the Holy Thursday Mass at which this precedent was set itself broke precedent.



--Francis has called for priests to get out of the rectories and to get out among the people, to be true shepherds among the sheep.



--He has called for a “poorer Church.”

Even without making any changes in doctrine, and few think he will, the Pope has already sent shivers, with both connotations, down people’s spines. While most of us are delighted in what the Pope has done so far, many aren’t. As the Wall Street Journal reports this Easter weekend (March 30-31, page A8), a Father Joseph Kramer, a traditionalist in Rome who says Mass in Latin, says,



“We’re stretching tradition. Things are mutating.”



One suspects that Father Kramer is not overflowing with joy when making that statement; note the choice of the verb in the second sentence.



To go a step further, the a “traditionalist” Catholic website Rorate Caeli  Caeli (“drop down the dew, you heavens,” from Isaiah 45, 8, and used in the Divine Office during Advent) published its version of the Holy Thursday foot washing story with the headline “The Official End of the Reform of the Reform-by example.” The Reform of the Reform is the backlash against much of Vatican II by those who seem to wish it never happened.



Why the consternation in some quarters over Pope Francis? As we have been made painfully aware over the last thirty years or so, the Church is not composed entirely of good people, and ordination, or the desire for ordination, does not necessarily make one holy…or even good and decent. There are plenty of people, some powerful, some less so, in the Church who are in it primarily for its gaudier and showier aspects that the Pope eschews. These people like to dress up like priests and bishops, to lord it over people, to wear the expensive finery and the gold. They like the pomp and circumstance and crave the respect, the awe, that they feel their offices bequeath them. They have little desire to get out among the people; rather, they prefer to be placed above the people. They have even less desire for a “poorer Church;” the very notion offends their skewed sense of piety and reverence.



There are, to put it bluntly, sinister forces in the Church, and there always have been. The continuing existence of these forces in the Church is one of the conditions Jesus was addressing in His parable of the weeds among the wheat (Matthew 13, 24-31). These forces are doubtless displeased with the direction Pope Francis would like to take the Church. Most of these priests, bishops, and their lay henchmen are not, or at least not yet, expressing their displeasure in the open, but these are not courageous people; they prefer to work in the shadows, to talk behind people’s backs, and blindside their targets. But they didn’t take their jobs to work among the people or to be “poorer.” And many of them would just love to live in the luxurious Vatican apartments and wear fancy red designer shoes. These people will do all they can to make life difficult for Pope Francis. They simply cannot fathom even the possibility of another John XXIII (Again, see my 3/13/13 piece.); such a shake-up would spoil their very comfortable lives.



While there is much wisdom in the old expression that you’re not paranoid when they ARE out to get you, I’m not being paranoid here I am just counseling our good Papa to be very careful. To quote Michael Corleone in the much, and overly, derided Godfather Part III, “This Pope has powerful enemies.”



Blessed Easter to our new and wonderful Papa and to all of you.

POPE FRANCIS: THIS IS STARTING TO LOOK LIKE A MIRACLE!

3/13/13




That sure was a shocker.



The Cardinals have selected Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, archbishop of Buenos Aires, as our new pope. Cardinal Bergoglio is now Pope Francis.

At mass Monday morning, the pastor of one of the churches we attend in Naperville said in his homily that we can’t predict who will be pope. I agreed with that, though I took issue with the examples he used. He said that no one could have predicted that either the Polish Cardinal Karol Wojtyla nor the German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger would have been selected by the papal conclave. Wrong. Cardinal Ratzinger was the heavy favorite going into the 2005 conclave that selected him, a near shoo-in. Cardinal Wojtyla, though not known much outside Church circles in Europe, was one of the contenders at the 1978 conclave at which John Paul I was chosen. Wojtyla was a favorite, or near favorite, entering the conclave only weeks later that selected him to succeed John Paul I. Anyone could have predicted Ratzinger, and most people, at least inside the conclave, could have predicted Wojtyla.



But just about no one would have predicted Bergoglio, even though he was supposedly the runner-up eight years ago when Benedict XVI was chosen. He was considered, by 2013, too old and having had his chance. He was mentioned almost only in passing as being among the papabile. I was teaching when the announcement was made and, heading home and listening to CNN on satellite radio (Satellite radio is one of the world’s great inventions, but I digress.), I thought someone had made a mistake and meant Scherer of Brazil, not Bergoglio of Argentina, of whom I knew nearly nothing.

This is a terrific selection. A Jesuit (Ad majorem Dei gloriam, to be sure!) of any stripe would delight the Jesuit educated yours truly and ought to delight any Catholic; after being God’s paratroopers since the Reformation, the Jebs deserve to have one of their own in charge. A Latin American is only logical and long overdue. Someone from outside the Curia was necessary with the problems that permeate that organization; selecting someone on the inside would indicate that the Church would be trying to avoid a thorough housecleaning in favor of more sweeping of nastiness under the rug.



Beyond the demographics and relationship to the Curia, it is Francis’s personal traits that make him such a wonderful selection. He apparently eschews, to the extent he can, the pomp and circumstance (Some, including yours truly, would use the term “pompousness.”) that seems to permeate the mindset of elements of the clergy and hierarchy. One wonders what the reaction of the world, both Catholic and non-Catholic, was to the Cardinals’ parading around for the past week or so in expensive, elaborate, and ornate robes among the gold and glitter of the Vatican, being chauffeured around and generally kowtowed to. Such showiness and outright silliness stuck in this Catholic’s craw; it seemed as if they were parodying themselves, and the Church, and not being sharp enough to realize it.



It is utterly amazing that a Church that increasingly seems to thrive on its showier aspects has selected such a seemingly humble man to lead it. The signs are all there: He cooks his own meals and takes the bus to work. His crucifix was utterly simple. His bow to the people as he asked for their prayers as the new pope was extraordinary. His call for fraternity, charity, and simple kindness say much about the man. And his appeal to men AND WOMEN of goodwill? Wow!



At least as important, the new Pope seems to be nearly fixated on serving the poor and the sick. His work among AIDS patients is legendary in Argentina. His upbraiding of Argentinean priests for refusing to baptize the babies of single mothers for “turning away our own” is a great sign, if indeed that story is not apocryphal. Priests couldn’t deny baptism to babies of unwed mothers…can they? Maybe I’m being naïve here.



I, and many of you, would have liked someone less conservative, more likely to make some major changes in the Church regarding the role of women and married people in its structure and hierarchy. But, as I said in 2/12/13 post THANK YOU AND GOD BLESS YOU, POPE BENEDICT, we weren’t going to get a progressive out of this conclave, in which every participant was selected by John Paul II or Benedict XVI. Yes, Francis is pretty much a down the line conservative in matters of doctrine, but his personal humility and sense of perspective and mission still make him stand out among his brother Cardinals who share his innate conservatism.



Like many observers, I am reminded, when I consider Francis, of no one more than John XXIII, the greatest pope of my lifetime. John was 77 when he was selected; Francis is 76. John was, and Francis is, expected to be a caretaker, to not make any waves and keep the seat warm for the next guy. It didn’t work that way for John; in his own words, he threw “open the windows of the Church and let the fresh air of the spirit blow through” by convening Vatican II and changing the Church forever. It seemed at times as if John’s successors were working to render Vatican II irrelevant, and it more than seems that of late many elements of the Church of consider Vatican II to be an obstacle that must be worked around or eradicated, like the mustard seed that sprouts, grows wild, and makes life problematical for those who must contend with its voracious growth. But, like that bothersome mustard seed, Vatican II lives on as a testimony to John XXIII who also was a humble man who came to the Chair of St. Peter with few expectations.



It looks as if, besides being a man of the poor and servant of Christ, Pope Francis is a reformer. That reform may not take the direction that more progressive elements of the Church might like. But, in many ways, there is nothing inconsistent with theological and doctrinal conservatism and a spirit of reform. And God knows our Church needs reform. Pope Francis may be the man to achieve it.



Please join me in saying a prayer for our new Papa and heeding his call for fraternity, charity, and kindness.

THANK YOU AND GOD BLESS YOU, POPE BENEDICT

2/12/13




Yesterday, the 266th Pope, Benedict XVI, became the first successor of St. Peter to resign since Pope Gregory XII stepped down as part of schism 598 years ago.

On hearing the news, yours truly’s first thought was that the 85 year old pontiff was resigning so he could still have some, perhaps extensive, control over the choice of his successor. Benedict may have wanted to insure that he was replaced by a conservative in his ideological mold, only younger and stronger so that the Church could accelerate to a sprint what seems to many of us to be the its current brisk jog back to pre-Vatican II days.



But about two minutes of reflection shot that theory down. After 27 years of Pope John Paul II and eight years of Benedict XVI, who differed in personality and temperament but not in their approach to the faith, the College of Cardinals is filled, nearly exclusively, with conservatives. Short of a miracle, there is little chance of anyone who thinks much differently from Benedict becoming his successor. The new pope, in all likelihood, will be a younger, more vigorous, perhaps more charismatic, and maybe even more conservative version of Benedict XVI. That would have been the case whether Benedict resigned or died while holding the Chair of St. Peter.

The Pope stepped down for the reason he said he stepped down: he was too tired and sick to continue serving his God and his people. There was no more to it than that.



As my regular readers know, I am no fan of Benedict XVI, primarily because of his tendency to “reinterpret” Vatican II to irrelevance or meaninglessness and his near obsession with Papal authority, the latter of which manifested itself most dyspeptically in the Vatican’s crackdown on large swaths of the American sisterhood for “radical feminist themes inconsistent with the Catholic faith.” The expensive designer shoes didn’t help, either. Regardless of what I or you think about him, though, the Pope’s resignation is perhaps his finest hour. The Pope is 85 years old and in poor health. He is, of course, concerned about his own health, as all of us are. However, he is more concerned with the health of the Church. Benedict realizes that he is no longer capable of providing the leadership that the Church needs at any time, and especially at this troubled juncture in its history. This decision was doubtless made after extensive prayer and meditation with the Boss...and it was a very good decision.



For the good of the Church, the Pope stepped down to hand the reins to a younger man. That in itself would be a gracious, magnanimous, faith filled gesture. But to the extent it sets a precedent, that it tells future pontiffs that it is okay to step down when they are no longer capable of leading the world’s 2.25 billion Catholics, it was an even greater, more enduring step that should serve the Church well for centuries.