UNITED STATES
Crux
Fr. Dwight Longenecker
March 15, 2017
CRUX CONTRIBUTOR
Vigorous debate over various aspects of Francis’s papacy is entirely appropriate, since the Church is a big Italian family and arguing is what they do. However, what we don’t need is a revolution along the lines of the Protestant Reformation, which ended with everyone being their own pope.
At a church gathering the other day, I quizzed a conservative friend about one of Pope Francis’s latest media bombshells. My friend is a good and cheerful Catholic, but he thought for a moment, then smiled and said, “Every day I pray for the pope…then I ignore him.”
His response reflects a growing discontent with Pope Francis in conservative circles. Anti-Trump protesters wave signs reading, “Not My President.” Perhaps conservative Catholics will soon march on the Vatican waving signs reading, “Not My Pope.”
The reality is not too far from the fantasy: last month Rome itself was plastered with posters picturing a disgruntled Pope Francis. Written in local Roman dialect, the signs charged that the pope had “removed priests; decapitated the Knights of Malta” and “ignored Cardinals.”
The critics are not only wild-eyed right wing conspiracy theorists. Respected journalist Phil Lawler regards Francis’s papacy as “disastrous.” Rod Dreher has joined the chorus of those who not only question Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia’s involvement with a homoerotic mural in a church, but also his appointment by Pope Francis as president of the Pontifical Pope John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family.
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