Just last week, I condemned Pope Francis for denying the Dalai Lama’s request for an audience to appease the Chinese.
Not since Peter denied Jesus, thrice, has there been a more craven (and venal) case of one holy man denying another.
(“In Denying Dalai Lama, Pope more Politician than Pontiff,” The iPINIONS Journal, December 15, 2014)
Well, I am happy to report that the Pope has now redeemed himself.
Ironically, redemption came in the annual Christmas message he delivered yesterday before the Curia, the governing body of the Holy See that governs the worldwide Catholic Church.
No doubt, when prelates congregated at the Vatican for this message, they expected to hear traditional words of good tidings and great joy. What they heard instead was an unprecedented rebuke of their pastoral temperament and ministrations, which Francis decried as the “15 Ailments of the Curia.”
They were not amused.
Pope Francis issued a blistering critique Monday of the Vatican bureaucracy that serves him, denouncing how some people lust for power at all costs, live hypocritical double lives and suffer from ‘spiritual Alzheimer’s’ that has made them forget they’re supposed to be joyful men of God…
Francis started off his list with the ‘ailment of feeling immortal, immune or even indispensable:’
Then one-by-one he went on: being vain; wanting to accumulate things; having a ‘hardened hear;’ wooing superiors for personal gain; having a ‘funereal face’ and being too ‘rigid, tough and arrogant,’ especially toward underlings — a possible reference to the recently relieved Swiss Guard commander said to have been too tough on his recruits for Francis’ tastes.
(The Associated Press, December 22, 2014)
Amen.
Granted, this expansion of the “seven deadly sins” is a far cry from the “95 theses” Martin Luther published in 1517 on nepotism, usury, indulgences, and other clerical abuses, which inspired the Protestant Reformation. Still, it easily constitutes the most damning internal critique of the Catholic Church since then.
What’s more, I’m sure the putative princes among the prelates (aka the cardinals) never felt more dressed down than when this pope scolded them – not only for behaving like teenage girls, but for being possessed of their mean girl mentality as well.
That said, how’s this for a confessional: My cynicism was such that I did not think Francis stood a snowball’s chance in Hell of ushering in any of his venerated changes, which he preached about during the honeymoon days of his pontificate.
The prevailing wisdom is that Bergoglio chose Francis as his papal name because he intends to return the Church back to its basic mission of afflicting the comfortable and comforting the afflicted — in honor of St. Francis of Assisi who was a bone fide champion of the poor…
Is Pope Francis going to instruct the Curia to redistribute what remains of the Church’s ostentatious wealth, after settling child-sex abuse cases, to caring for the poor? I don’t think so…
He might instruct the cardinals (aka the ‘princes’ of the Church for Christ’s sake) to follow his example by giving up their fancy apartments, cooks, and chauffeured limousines. But I suspect cardinals will be even less willing to follow the pope’s instruction in this respect than lay Catholics have been to follow the cardinals’ instruction with respect to contraception.
Of course, that the pope is only doing what Jesus would indicates how much leaders of the Catholic Church have perverted and corrupted their holy mission.
(“Habemus Papam: Hail Francis,” The iPINIONS Journal, March 13, 2013)
But he has already proven me wrong in many respects. Most notably, he has:
- Rebranded Catholicism as a religion of shepherds tending to their flock; as opposed to one of priests looking for boys to … pluck.
- Appointed bishops to key positions to help transform the ethos of the Curia – from a Machiavellian pursuit of power and status, to a monastic dedication to worship and service; and
- Created a new Secretariat for the Economy to ensure that, even if some high priests want to continue living like princes, regular and comprehensive audits will prevent them from using church money to do so.
Except that this compels even me to pray for Francis, especially mindful as I am of alleged plots to assassinate the pope:
Claims of a bizarre plot to assassinate Pope Benedict XVI are reverberating through Italy in what observers say signals the latest twist in an increasingly cutthroat internal Vatican power dispute…
Labelled ‘strictly confidential for the Holy Father’, the detailed letter reports several conversations that Cardinal Paolo Romeo, the archbishop of Palermo, allegedly had with Italian businessmen in Beijing on a trip last November during which he predicted the pope would die within 12 months and suggested his replacement would be Angelo Scola, the archbishop of Milan.
(London Guardian, February 10, 2012)
Scola the Italian is still waiting to be made il papa. And, at 73, time is running out….
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Pope denying Dalai Lama…