I am beginning to think that the easiest way to understand this Pontificate is to imagine a screenplay about a papacy written by George Orwell that is also a black comedy. With furor among Catholics around the globe over the Pope’s remark that the great majority of sacramental marriages are invalid the Vatican has attempted to send the comment down the Memory Hole:
So everything now is hunky, dory!
Pope Francis and his repeated gaffs was permitted by God for reasons plural I’m sure. The one I notice revolves around the clergy and author careerism that prevented any well positioned Catholic from dissenting on the death penalty change of St. JPII and dissenting to the world press. Just as we had no well positioned Catholic who broke ranks and who was heroic against Church lethergy on sex abuse, so also we had no hero against the death penalty 180 degree turn which SCOTUS research from 1972 to 1976 showed deters murders of a premeditated sort….the type that is decimating the two largest Catholic countries, Brazil and Mexico. The other strong fans of St. JPII and of Benedict were often pan infallibilists…..loving them so much that they saw their every word as probably infallible. Francis is an ongoing correction of pan infallibility partly brought on by Lumen Gentium 25 and its lack of caveats. Just as Osee and his wayward wife was a sign of God loving the sinful people of God, Pope Francis and his loquacious imprudent mouth are a sign that infallibility
is rare….just as Pope Saint John XXIII inferred it was to a group of Greek seminarians.
I think that this Pope is mentally defective in some way. he says stupid things. he doesn;t remember what he says. He retracts and revises as needed to keep up a good face. But leave him to himself in a public setting and he is a bathering idiot. And his writings are so illogical that they can’t be followed.
I had a very good friend who is now resting with the Lord, I am sure. He thought that Pope John XXIII was a nut, a view I disputed. Now, I agree that Pope Francis cherry-picks from the deposit of faith, and that means that I will carefully and respectfully cherry-pick from his remarks.