“The historian of the Church has the duty to dissimulate none of the trials that the Church has had to suffer from the faults of her children, and even at times from those of her own ministers.”
Pope Leo XIII, September 6, 1889
PopeWatch has long held that Pope Francis is worse than Alexander VI, since Alexander VI, although a very evil man, never promulgated heresy. What Pope does Pope Francis remind you of? What Pope is he most unlike? Respond in the comboxes.
Before you can promulgate heresy, you first have to promulgate. Francis is careful not to teach error. Just as he is equally careful to not correct error. (Which itself is arguably heretical).
Both the “hermeneutic of continuity” and the doctrine of Papal Infallibility are our friends here.
As I keep saying.
“Francis” and “careful” do not go together. His occasional fairly orthodox statements tend to be in documents prepared by Vatican staffers. In interviews or when he wanders from a prepared text, his freak flag flies freely. I hope to live to see again a papacy which does not consist of endless “what the Pope really meant” statements.
I would say Pope Francis moat reminds me of Pope Honorius I. As for Popes he reminds me of, Is have to say he’s sui generis.
“Francis” and “careful” do not go together.
I think his personal phone calls, congratulatory letters, free wheeling bull sessions with Marxist journalists who write from memory, etc. are all deliberate and intended. Just as are his silences, and hence careful.
Could be, although I doubt it. That the proposition is debatable is astonishing considering that he has held the most high profile job in the world for six years and so much about him remains mysterious, no doubt deliberately so, because he, or the men behind him, or both, wish that to be the case.
My wife has made this judgment on our pontiff: 1) he is not very intelligent (which, ES, would contradict your proposition about his adlibs and silences being deliberate); 2) his culture is that of a Peronist with all the consequent faults. I believe there was a post on point 2.
Abu Dhabi document and changes in the Catechism regarding death penalty are more than enough to say yes. He is worse than Alexander IV.
You can mention also Zachetta, McCarrick and the contempt for Dubia cardinals.
It was said about FDR that he was a second class intellect but a first class politician.
Bergoglio is a Peronist, an Argentine Leftist. Look at how he goes after his enemies, like the FFI. The difference between him and another disgusting Argentine, Che Guevara, is often one of degree rather than ideology. He throws carrots at the FSSPX but treats orhtodox Catholics nasty. It’s all politics with him. As Latin America is a place of extremes, there is no compromise or middle ground. Bad priests and bishops have their uses in his world. Whether the Lavender Mafia controls him or he uses it for his own benefit is not clear. Only the German bishops have any influence, mostly Marx and Kasper. What is clear is that nothing will improve until Bergoglio meets his maker. Then, God willing, the Jesuits will be suppressed and we will get a better Pope.
Just because he’s not that intelligent, doesn’t mean he’s without cunning.
We run the risk of falling into the same trap the left fell into with chimpy McHitler Bush, and that other idiot savant master of the dark arts Donald Trump. Just because somebody doesn’t take the same view as we does doesn’t mean they’re unintelligent.
True. The opposite extreme is that an opponent is the reincarnation of Machiavelli and always playing fifth dimensional chess. The fact that he was elected in 2013 either indicates cunning on his part or his handlers or that most of the Cardinals in 2013 had a severe deficit of both cunning and common sense. What I have heard is that the Conclave was bowled over with an address that he made. That is very odd since even the most ardent fanboys and fangirls of this pope have never claimed him to be especially eloquent. Notes on the speech are linked below:
https://cathcon.blogspot.com/2013/03/full-text-papacy-winning-speech-of.html
I guess you had to be there. To me it sounds like the usual vague psychobabble this Pope spouts at the drop of a Jesuit.
s
Bergolio was the runner up in 2005. It wad his turn.
I believe his is neither Machiavellian nor idiot savant. Nor is he an average to slightly below average intelligence at the mercy of bad counselors.
What I suspect he and his closest advisors and cooporators are seeking to do is to change doctrine (which can’t be changed –as he very well knows–) by warping praxis.
Just like the rest of the “Spirit of Vatican II” crowd.
I’ll add this: I think he fits into the category of “[Church] Intellectual” as defined by Thomas Sowell in his very useful Intellectuals and Society.
Not because he’s particularly verbally dextrose, but because he subscribes to the opinions, outlook and manners of other (some verbally dextrose) Church Intellectuals.
Okay another thought: Francis is a political Pope; a type not seen since the Renaissance.
(I hope everybody understands the implicit distinction between “political” and “politic” I’m making here.)
ES, your distinction between “intelligent” and “cunning” is well taken.
“…Francis is a political Pope; a type not seen since the Renaissance.”
ES, I assumed JPII, teaming up with Reagan, Maggie Thatcher, and Lech Walesa, was a tad political but, clearly not on the Anti-God left as we have to wonder about today.
That story about the wink and a nod approval by failing to condemn the suicide of a parishioner of St. Therese parish in the arch-diocese of Seattle is an example of what I mean by praxis warping doctrine.
The church teaches suicide is a grave sin (subject to exigent circumstances. which may lessen that gravity). In this case, a man was “accompanied” to an unnatural death.
So does the Church, at least where “death with dignity” laws are concerned, “really” oppose suicide? In the archdiocese of Seattle, that’s no longer clear.