The Pope Unmoved by Rats in the Ranks-style Mutiny

By Michael Koziol
The Age
October 16, 2015

http://www.theage.com.au/world/the-pope-unmoved-by-rats-in-the-ranksstyle-mutiny-20151015-gka383.html

Pope Francis is dealing with a Rats in the Ranks-style mutiny aboard the good ship Vatican. The right faction, led in this case by Australia's penny-counting Cardinal George Pell, is rebelling against a perceived shift to the liberal left during a three-week meeting of theologians in Rome.

The Synod of Bishops, which is to determine the church's policy and rhetoric on familial matters, is particularly vexed about whether to grant Communion to divorced Catholics who have remarried.

Punishing divorcees might be considered something of a breach of taste in some circles, but for conservative Catholics it is an article of faith. And like a disgruntled backbench, the cardinals weren't content to sit around and watch history pass them by. So they reached for the oldest trick in the book – a polite but firm ultimatum to their leader, duly leaked to the media.

Veteran Vatican-watcher Sandro Magister reported that 13 cardinals had signed the letter to Pope Francis, including Pell, who delivered it. A version of the text, which may not have been the final composition, was published by the Italian magazine L'espresso, revealing that the disaffected group felt the synod lacked "openness and genuine collegiality".

"A number of fathers feel the new process seems designed to facilitate predetermined results on important disputed questions," they wrote. The fathers did not fail to note the "collapse of liberal Protestant churches" that had jettisoned too many hard-core Christian beliefs.

Previous synods had been fairly predictable affairs, in which the prelates – dominated by conservatives – rubber-stamped the teachings of yesteryear. Francis, an Argentinian who briefly worked as a nightclub bouncer in his youth, is generally regarded as a more liberal Pope, and promised this synod would allow for bold and open debate.

But the Catholic Church is "not an organisation that can turn on a dime and change overnight", as Thomas Reese, author of Inside The Vatican, told the ABC with a degree of understatement. Indeed, Polish priest Krzysztof Charamsa? found that out the hard way when he was booted from a senior role at the Vatican after revealing he was gay and had a male partner.

It hasn't been a great month for the church, all in all. The mayor of Rome, Ignazio Marino, resigned following an expenses scandal and ongoing concern about his competence in running the city. He also took a beating for accompanying the Pope – uninvited – on a recent trip to the US. "He professes to be a Catholic and he came spontaneously," Francis told reporters. Ouch.

The series of events seemed to culminate in the Pope issuing a broad apology at his weekly address on Wednesday. "I would like to ask for forgiveness in the name of the church for the scandals that have happened in this last period, both in Rome and at the Vatican," he told his audience, but did not get into specifics.

Where Pell and company go from here is anybody's guess. A leadership challenge seems out of the question. And with only 13 signatures from about 270 delegates, it would appear the numbers aren't quite there for a wider insurgency. The synod is due to conclude on October 25.