Tuesday, August 06, 2013

Hurricane Francis

Pope Francis' of-the-cuff comments on that plane ride to Rome last week are still providing a lot of editorial fodder. For National Catholic Reporter writer, Vaticanista John Allen, what we are seeing is a genuine revolution. (This reminds me of a comment I heard during the days surrounding the conclave: it seems that in the 2005 conclave, one senior cardinal commented, "I don't know why nobody's talking about Bergoglio. He'd change everything in three years.") No wonder everything Francis does seems to be newsworthy!
Monday's Boston Globe had an appreciative piece (which rather demonized Francis' two predecessors as if they had been the incarnations of negativity; he must have missed the part where Francis spoke of the "poison" of consumerism); the National Catholic Register offered an ironic take with "10 Quotes that Prove the Pope is a Liberal" (don't be like those pitiful commenters who failed to read anything but the headline and completely missed the punchline; this is worth reading all the way through!); and my friend Pat Gohn (author of Blessed, Beautiful and Bodacious: Celebrating the Gift of Catholic Womanhood) shared some insights with the Washington Post on the Pope's call for a "deeper theology of women in the Church."
What do you do to track this Hurricane Francis?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The church is under seige. Biden tried to impress the "Globalistic" point of view on Pope Francis. For prominent individuals going contrary to this point of view, it like poison, a form of Fascism backed up by financial institutions.

He is acting as if he were confused, and uncertain about how to react. Another way to go is to remain formally correct, defiant.

May God bless and assist him.

Anonymous said...

Not much any more. He dissed women with his comment on women's ordination so I'm not as keen on him as I was.

Anonymous said...

The media are quick to pounce on every word Pope Francis utters, and we only get snippets of conversations, often taken out of context. Therefore, I take all the supposed radical shifts, encouraging remarks, etc. with a grain of salt. I look forward to reading official, Vatican sanctioned news of reforms. Until then, off the cuff remarks as well as media frenzy are not worth my time. - Jean

Sister Anne said...

Here's another interesting post on Francis as a cultural icon--an aspect of this whole media dimension of life: http://www.religionnews.com/2013/08/06/analysis-pope-francis-the-improbable-pop-culture-icon/