All very valid points. I think what he could do to make the church more relevant, is, instead of preaching equality take a step towards it and set an example. Allow women priests. Give women an equal say in the church. Also allow priests to get married. Women run things so much better and if you looks at church attendance you'll see more Eve's than Adams's The "only men can lead", "only men know best" thinking from medieval times needs to change. Look at what's happening around us. Someone needs to lead by example and the church has the moral authority to do so.
408
Look at what's happening around us. I look at the empty Episcopal churches and see what is happening to churches that bend to the current fashion. And even those churches suffer schism.
3
Whether or not "[w]omen run things so much better" is irrelevant. So is women's rate of church attendance. Women are equal to men as humans and as souls. No further justification, or patronizing judgment, is needed for women's rightful status and identical roles.
We can also do without the condescension of "allowing" women priests. Ordain them. Anoint them as bishops and cardinals. Elect a woman pope. Do the same with trans and gender-nonconforming people, and repeat until gender is no longer a factor for consideration.
Then we can talk.
2
As a Catholic and 69 years old, I have long considered whether the Church should allow priests to marry. Among the arguments I routinely hear is that doing so would reduce the risk of priests behaving sexually inappropriately. As an attorney for a law enforcement agency I can tell you that being married is no insurance that the individual will not commit sexual assault. Of course, it would probably result in more men entering the priesthood. However, one fact that needs to be considered is this: being a pastor A LOT of work and takes up most of a priest's life. Add a wife (or husband) and children, and the priest could find him or herself giving less due to the demands of the other. I have come to believe that the answer to the dearth of Catholic priests could be resolved by permitting women to be ordained.
2
Jesus was a Jew deeply critical and troubled by his faith’s black-and-white, rule-based culture. He preached a radical two-commandment gospel: 1. Love God and 2. Love the other as yourself. Everything else—including the evolution of religion and the culture itself—evolves from here.
Unlike any other pope in my long Boomer Generation lifetime, Francis preaches that kind of open-ended, love-driven inclusion of the other. Yes, its a radical mindset. Yes, its not rule-based or even tradition based. Not surprisingly, conservative Catholics are shaken. Everyone else is lifted.
Especially those of us that believe—like Jesus the radical, dare we say Progressive, uber-prophet—that the Spirit works through all of us.
400
That's a lie. I am over so many of you securlaist that try to put Christ perceptions to be the same as your own. Christ was very faithful to his own faiths traditions.
Well said, sir.
Rule based? Black and white? Try skipping tired, anti-Semitic readings of the Torah and read Jewish Biblical historians who will explain how the Law was actually interpreted at the time of Jesus. BTW, where do you think Jesus got his doctrine of loving the neighbor? Leviticus. And loving God? Deuteronomy. You might want to also look at the Prophets he quotes from.
2
When I read things like this I can’t help but roll my eyes. Who cares? We give this religion and its leaders too much legitimacy in secular life as it is. (Apparently we REALLY love fancy costumes and glitz.)
The Catholic Church is like Donald Trump. No matter how many sex abuse cases, financial scandals, or illegitimate power grabs, we just can’t seem to get rid of either one.
33
Ross, it's far simpler than you make it out to be. It's very very simple. Republicans are liars. I know you've been lying so long like all Republicans you don't know the difference (actually you do, you just don't care) between truth and lies. Not simple little white lies, Not little political exaggerations. Huge, outrageous, proven, contemptible, despicable lies. Like Alex Jones for example. Pope Francis is the Catholic that the church is supposed to be. When he removes all Republicans from the church, hopefully by excommunication, it will be the church it's supposed to be.
4
I've never seen as big a communion wafer as that one showed pictured either. Such an intense gaze, like discovering a wheel for the first time and dwelling on of the ramifications.
Conservative Catholics will love this article and buy his forthcoming book. Maybe it will come with a red baseball hat: "Make the Church Great Again".
30
Dear Ross, Read "Evangelii Gaudium" if you want to understand Pope Francis. Vatican II attempted to turn the Church back to its origens, and away from two thousand years of western cultural embelishments. Make no mistake, the European cultural veneer on the Church was just that, a veneer, and was more about "culture" than it was about the Church of Jesus Christ. Conservative Catholics look to the cultural practices and claim they are the "true" church. Not so. John Paul and Benedict tried to take us back to the pre Vatican II church, not because it was authentic Church, but because it was authentic western european male dominated ossified institution.
I am a Catholic who believes that God made us ALL in his image and likeness, females, gays, drug addicts, the poor and the powerless....ALL. I don't believe the clergy are more worthy than I am. I don't believe that Jesus intended His Church to be the hierarchical "monarchy" it has become. To the extent that Francis wants to move the Church away from the clericalism which has strangled the life from it good for him-----he has my prayers
35
Another aphorism: The last thing a priest wants in his parish is a saint.
Saints tend to shake things up, at least the old fashioned ones did.
16
Did Ross Dothat write about Pope Benedict XVI so critically? Was Pope Benedict's Papacy a "disaster" to Ross?
One only has to look at Newt and Calista Gingrich and their welcoming by Pope Benedict to see the hypocrisy of Ross Dothat and his selective view of what is perfectly fine for a right wing Pope to do and what he criticizes when a Pope who actually believes in helping the poor does. Ross' hypocrisy on the Pope mirrors his hypocrisy when it comes to the Republican Party.
35
The saying is," ask the Church a question and they will back to you in 100 years.". The single, but not yet, "tick" of time that is the Papacy of Francis, does not allow for the sweeping conclusions that Douthat is trying to make. I believe that his use of conservative and liberal does not serve the argument well, it is exclusionary and reductionist. I prefer to reference progressives and traditionalist, no one is a bad person, they just see things through a different lens. My reading of Douthat when he delves into faith makes me believe that he is someone who favors the continuity of ecclesial fences. They hem the Catholic in, and make decision-making easier. He mentions the decentralization of Francis' management style, but neglects the long reign and tight centralization and control of JPII. Francis has called the universal church to a field without fences, and challenged them to live by gospel values. He is returning control to the local conferences of Bishops that has accrued to Rome under JPII and BXVI. It feels like a return to subsidiarity...
As to reforms to the Vatican and the Church? Get back to me in 100 years.
11
Interesting how you consistently characterize Pope Francis' opponents as "faithful" Catholics: a term reserved to them and never used for those who support his efforts. As Jesus literally spoke in today's gospel according to John: He came and died to draw to Himself "all" peoples, not just conservative Catholics like yourself, who believe that doctrine is frozen in a "time" of your unquestionable choosing -- ironically at a time when the very nature and meaning of time itself is of ascendant cosmological debate. Thank goodness for Francis opening the doors wide to discussion of "doctrinal' subjects that prior and far more arrogant Popes decided had ended with their own pronouncements. Nowhere is scripture does it say Jesus came to save the "institutional" Church, or any particular "doctrine" - He came to save all peoples, and at least Francis seems to understand that. Wish you were as tough on the sex ring disclosures on your Roman friends as you are on the dangers of progressive thought, or just "thinking" for that matter, about "closed' subjects. But thank you for being so clear on what is most important to you. No doubt you consider women priests, for example, an impossible subject to discuss -- but do you ever ask yourself why the New Testament reveals that the Risen Christ appeared first to women, who recognized him, and only later to men, who did not. So what exactly would Jesus do now on that question: you're pretty sure, Francis is not - I'd bet with Francis.
16
As a non-Catholic, I view Francis as a surprising breath of fresh air. He has shown a trait all too uncommon both in this country and in comparison to his predecessors. He has demonstrated humility and I am hard-pressed to find any evangelical leader in this country to have done similarly. And, in contrast to the popes who came before him, he has gained my respect by demonstrating both empathy and sympathy with the growing number of people left behind.
He has walked with the poor, the weak and the afflicted. And, he called upon his Cardinals to devote their energies to ministering to those in need as opposed to finding faults in others. Would that the Evangelical leaders in this country make such a pronouncement! Instead, they dole out mulligans much as prior Catholic hierarchy sold indulgences.
In other words, Francis walks the talk. He should be a role model to religious leaders everywhere. Of course he has his flaws. Who among us does not? At least he has admitted that. In and of itself, that is a quality and a strength to be admired.
23
I do not know the numbers of conservative bishops and cardinals but I do know that for about 35 years the combined papacies of john paul and benedict appointed very many conservatives to the hierarchy. Francisi 81... the oldest popes over the last 150 years have not made it past 85, except Ratzinger who is now the oldest (90 yrs old) and retired at 86. Francis doesnt have much time left to influence much and he has not had that much time to appoint enough liberal bishops to make a difference. I think Ross view are interesting theoretically and certainly reflect some conflict between liberals and conservatives among the laity and clergy... but politically, Francis' days are number and his effect on Church teaching probably minimal. But he is a beacon of compassion which has a magical and inspiring effect and reminded many that simple charity and good will counts for the greater part of any good life
5
The core gospel message is love, to love God, to be loved by God, and to love your neighbor. Pope Francis has brought this back into focus. A disaster? He is the Vicar of Christ, so if his administrative decisions miss the mark, if his movement of reform stalls, but he has loved and helped others to love, I can't call that a Papacy that is a disaster.
22
Stated perfectly Barbara!
4
I don't have a stake in this, as I am not and have never been Catholic, but the author seems to be decrying Pope Francis's decentralization, which is really a return to more traditional lines of Church governance. And regarding the possible compromise with China, there remain two bishoprics -- the Archdiocese of Strasbourg and the Diocese of Metz -- where the Archbishop and Bishop are appointed by the President of the French Republic. (My understanding is that Presidents of the French Republic today keep out of such matters and appoint whomever the Popes want, but the Popes aren't likely to nominate anyone who would cause problems for a President.)
7
Pope Francis will leave the world a better place than he found it. This is as great an accomplishment as any person can strive to achieve.
But in a few more generations it will be mostly irrelevant. The Catholic Church, and all the world's religions, will be mostly irrelevant. Worldwide, society is moving in a direction of rationality, in the understanding that life and the universe reveal their secrets primarily through the efforts of scientific rationality. In every important way, our lives are shaped by these discoveries.
Life expectancy has nearly doubled in just 200 years. This happened NOT because of revelations in the static bible of millenia past, but because of growth in our understanding of processes such as water as a disease vector, knowledge brought to us through our own curiosity, our own pursuit of scientific knowledge.
I could say the same of food security, space travel, worldwide communications networks and so many more issues that are essential to our survival.
Nothing I say here is an attempt to change the world views of Theists. I only aim to point out that their extra-worldly concerns are growing more and more irrelevant with respect to the course of human development.
All that said, Ross, I always enjoy your editorials. You express your world view very well.
3
Of course, criticism of Pope Francis or of any Pope is legitimate, but I refuse to look at Francis or the Church through the prism of Father Douthat's conservative lens. There are so many assumptions in this article that are characterized as fact. Please Ross, tell us how far back you go in your definition of traditional teaching, and please describe what you consider to be the sexual ethics of the New Testament. Further, please explain how the head of the Church, whom the Church tells us is infallible on faith and morals, can be a heretic. Do you need a "full disclosure" note that you do not believe in that particular doctrine of the Church? The onus of "ceded the moral authority earned by persecuted generations . . ." seems more provocative (a spicing up) than prescient (likely to happen).
10
There are many comments criticizing the Catholic Church but the Church has been the target of criticisms since Peter built his Church on that rock over 2000 years ago. Nothing has really changed since then.
I remember discussing this with my Monsignor friend, a wonderful priest, who after seeing me in an upper east side Catholic Church for sometime asked me to become a member. I was so flattered that this humble priest would ask me to become a member of this wealthy parish when I was just a girl of average means. This occurred over 30 years ago but it has still left a lasting impression.
I remember one day while at brunch telling him how upset I was when I heard people criticizing the Church. He reminded me that the Church has been ridiculed since its founding and yet it has withstood the test of time. He said that it will endure as it has for centuries and that there is nothing a person could do to stop the jabs. He said just defend it the best you can.
And that is what I have been doing ever since. I do defend my Church when it is unfairly criticized and will continue to do so. I know my Church has made mistakes but the people inside the Church are only human.
My father once said that he would remain Catholic as long as there was one nice priest present. There are, of course, many fine priests and nuns who serve the Church admirably. Even if there was not one nice priest, I would still attend. Jesus is the one in whom I put my trust and he never disappoints.
4
Mr. Douthat ,as a Catholic ,I seriously doubt your premise. You value the institution of the church more than the teachings. We have some living relics in the church that are so focused in minutea , ceremony , architecture, that many times fail to see our simple purpose of living a life & helping others without harming . Francis introduction of himself ,when he was elected Pope ,he stated his purpose of being a shepherd , of love,not of casting stones. As Pope ,he has to look at everyone being his flock & how we have all preyed on those we have help to create. Many victims ,not just a few.
12
It's important to remember that the Catholic Church is and always has been primarily a political entity, using ignorance and fear as a tool of domination just as every political despot in history has done.
8
How very rebellious of this Reagan Catholic. Mr. Douthat obviously considers a day a wasted if he hasn't found some homosexuals or abortionists to castigate till noon, then self righteous complacency and philosophizing abounds until dawn, which involves taking the holier-than-thou-high-ground from the Trump-infatuated Evangelicals and trying to get into a fight with some clergy for self/book promotion (in praise of Mammon, which he doesn't consider bad, of course). As for the arguments, I am sorry to say that this is just lazy. There aren't just two truces to be made. Francis makes hundreds and opens up thousands more, getting back into the fight for a social cohesiveness that is important to him. That's in the Bible, too, whether you like it or not.
15
"Pope Francis Is Beloved. His Papacy Might Be a Disaster."
How timely. Why, just this morning I was thinking the very same thing.
Douthat is writing a book.
Isn't everybody?
1
I'm a "tainted" i.e, divorced practicing Catholic. It's difficult for me to reconcile local Church with the Vatican. My parish has on loan a priest from the Phillippines and nuns from India because hardly any young people want to live the Religious life.
For example, divorced and gay people are apparently welcome to worship if the divorced don't remarry or the gays act upon homosexual tendencies. Annulments are another matter.
I can't speak for Jesus, but is the bloated, male bureaucracy in Rome what he had in mind? I don't want to dilute Catholicism into nothingness, but meaningful reform has to start sometime. At least Francis has put a human face on my faith.
14
Dear Ross, your fundamental mistake is the notion that Catholic moral teaching is immutable. Catholic teaching in faith and morals is a world view, not a set of rules which have to be obeyed in the same way for all time, and which to disobey will result in punishment and exclusion. You are born in 1979. The only papacy of your life (potentially half of it), is that of JPII/BXVI. No wonder Pope Francis is a shock to your belief and worldview. I could be your father, Ross, and am blessed having vivid memories of Saint John XXIII and the Second Vatican Council. To you the Council is a distant event, one which probably, as is my impression when reading your contributions in these pages, would better not have happened if it were up to you. Yet happen it did, thank God! In spite of the ongoing attempts to have it suppressed, removed from the Church's history, and maligned as a collection of falsehoods and heresies, it will remain, and is, forever part and parcel of the Church. However you wish the Council go away, it won't, and however you disparage Pope Francis: he does not care. His mission is to implement what the Second Vatican Council has promulgated, and that is The Way Forward. I urge you to at least attend some decent courses in theology and church history, especially on the Second Vatican Council (preferably taught by Jesuits). Unless you prefer to continue to publicly embarrass yourself as someone who knows absolutely nothing of what he writes about.
17
Lots of my friends in church think of the NYT as anti-Catholic. I don't agree but everytime it prints one of Ross Douthat's self-aggrandizing, ill-informed, my way or the highway columns that mischaracterizes and homogenizes our dear mother church, I wonder if they might be right.
17
As CNN's Van Jones puts it, "The truth is messy." Conservative Catholicism likes neatly categorized "truths"~doctrine. But if the Church is to be a living community, then it must embrace an evolution of truth, not merely truths. This is a wonderfully alive endeavor, requiring ongoing dialogue. Dialogue can be messy; it occurs over time; and it must be negotiated with mutual understanding & compromise, simultaneously considering multiple systemic factors. Messy. Risky. Some will leave.
An evolutionary vision of Catholicism is not in Mr. Douthat's view. He wants "clean" definitions, safe categories, immediate proclamations. Francis knows (as did Teilhard de Chardin) that the Church is process ... evolutionary process, humanistic & humanizing, striving (as Spinoza said) toward truth.
Years ago, a young Catholic University graduate in Religious Studies, I was working for the Archdiocese of New York on a never-published syllabus for Jewish-Christian relations. [Francis Cardinal Spellman, who'd initiated it, died. So, too, the syllabus.] Working with academics from both faiths, I encountered a nun who slapped me when I explained our purpose. Returning to Rabbi Marc Tannenbaum’s office~he oversaw Jewish aspects of the curriculum~I slumped, black-eyed, into a chair. "You must remember, Lois," he said, "that your man [Christ] never promised you that the truth would be simple. Only that it would set you free."
8
Heretic??? Humanity, Love, Care, Peace is much more meaningful and relevant in this 21st Century for a great religion being led by a very courageous Pope.
To keep on harping on heretic, it seems that author either lives in a medieval times or in a most extremist regions of Middle East.
Please live in present time or look into eyes of your own children.
7
Ross , your embittered epistle here only shows your dissatisfaction with the Catholic Church . Francis is still a human being tasked with leading a church which over centuries has had corrupt Popes , warrior Popes , married Popes , and yes even a woman Pope! One thing about being a leader , you can't make everyone happy , and you are open for criticism . I will remind you of what Jesus said to a group who wanted to stone a woman for adultery " Let he who is without sin cast the first stone " . But I do agree with you , the passing of years will determine whether he will be a visionary or heretic . It is not up to us at this moment in time to do so , we can only express our opinion.
4
A lengthy and angst-ridden discourse on the inner workings of religion - any religion - most especially the Catholic Church - is an exercise akin to deep consideration of the philosophies and inner power struggles within the officers of the Titanic.
5
Doctrine, dogma, rules, regulations, Palace intrigues.... versus Jesus' very simple message. I think I'll stick with Jesus. And if I hadn't made that decision many decades ago, this piece would have been the final straw.
We "love" Francis because he represents hope in humanity and the joy of simplicity in faith and its "practice". The weight of being born to a life time of suffering "Catholic guilt" is more than most can or want to bear any longer. What is the point of it all?
"Who am I to judge?", said Francis...and Jesus.
What is the point of Catholicism or the Church if Jesus gets more lost than found in the discussion of what it takes to be a member in good standing of the Catholic tribe. Your obsession and fixation with "sex" is something I don't recall Jesus making the hall mark of his mission.
10
Ross, given this convoluted essay, you need to do a lot of explaining. Please tell us your definitions of "New Testament sexual ethics," "heresy," and for that matter, "Christianity." It seems you are more interested in conforming to church authority than in digesting the message of, or faith in, Jesus Christ, as I understood it from many years of Sunday School and Bible study.
2
"It is wise for Francis’ Catholic critics to temper our presumption, always, by acknowledging the possibility that we are misled or missing something...."
Indeed you are misled in your core expectation that a powerful organization like the Vatican can escape the truism that "power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely". (A saying incidentally coined by a devout Catholic!)
You and all Catholics need to cast off the immature chains of outsourcing your spirituality to an institution whose ultimate goal is self preservation, not sacrificial laying down of one's life for one's friends, as Jesus taught!
1
Official Roman Catholic teaching has changed radically over the centuries--but it did so slowly and out of the limelight. There were no newspapers, television or internet to notice when "usury" oh so gradually changed from lending money at any interest at all to lending money at excessive interest, to give one example.
Even the elimination a few years ago of the doctrine of the existence of limbo would have caused much more of an uproar today. (The explanation that it was not really an official or central teaching is balderdash--I'm old enough to remember when it was quite official and central, thank you very much.)
It may be that Francis is preparing for necessary doctrinal changes, especially around issues of sexuality, by getting people used to the idea gradually over a long period of time, and by offhandedly reminding us of the primacy of individual conscience.
Some changes that are doctrinally possible today but that would change the atmosphere greatly would be allowing Latin Rite priests to marry, allowing women to have more official power, and even naming women as cardinals.
9
Ross: I really appreciate your thoughtfulness and balance about this and many other matters. But, as you note near the end of this essay, I think you are missing something - something big: The biblical and theological depth behind what Pope Francis is doing. He's going back and recovering crucial aspects of the Catholic tradition -- the primacy of conscience; the open deliberative nature of synods; a collegial, more equal notion of authority -- that are NOT products of a liberal or Anglican culture (as your piece here supposes) but are age-old fruits of Catholic thought and practice. Like all good reformers, he's a conservative at heart: going back in order to go forward. The Catholic tradition did not start with John Paul II and Benedict XVI, as too many conservative Catholics today think.
15
Humans have faults and failures which includes the leaders of the church’s hierarchy. We will never be able to see how it will all work out. Have faith, though, the the Holy Spirit will find the way.
3
Choosing a path that has only the destinations "hero or heretic" is what saints do.
Heretic to the nonbelievers, hero to the faithful - whatever your platform may be, whomever the faithful, whatever the article of faith. Douthat is even on with the tired chorus of those telling us what the Pope "can't" do, as if their theological insistence would put the brakes on a church that said some things they don't like. He compares himself to the selfish son who rejects the father's welcome of the wayward brother home - then Douthat actually continues on with the role anyway. Christ's teachings are fine as long as they aren't liberal, I guess.
Hero or heretic is common. It's felt when a spouse leaves for work as a firefighter, or as a missionary. What of those left behind? What of one's duty to home and family? It's also the strain of one organization paying a cost for another. Sometimes, an organization must pay a cost for itself - leaders must stand up to the church to preserve what it was supposed to stand for when the church forgets.
The world cannot afford leaders too afraid or incompetent to choose the difficult path, and Jesus chose the same - heretic to those whose more comfortable order he threatened and hero to those who followed. "They will know us by our love" is not echoed in schools that fire lesbians and employ divorcees. It's not echoed in pro-birth policies that ignore children who are hungry. Francis wants the world to stop knowing Catholics by their spite.
5
The sins you list are either general, hypothetical-in-the-future, or governance choices you do not dare for that you have framed as sins. For instance, praising a subordinate for good work while that subordinate stands ACCUSED of "turning a blind eye" is not very compelling when supporting the tendentious title of "Might Be A Disaster." You reach for straws, because you do not like his politics. So I believe, based on your body of work.
Meanwhile, Ross, your country is burning and you are soft-peddling clear and open high crimes and misdemeanors. I do not refer merely to the execrable Trump, but also to his enabling GOP. They (and you) built him a platform. He merely stepped on it. He is too diseased to do much else.
When will you get serious? When will you heal thyself?
4
Many of the intransigent problems of the Church are resolved by modernization.
In particular, allowing women priests, and allowing priests to marry, would disallow much of the pedophilia that has so plagued the church in recent history.
This Pope has much to do.
1
He believes in miracles and that just about said it all! Don't we all?!
1
I have cancer. The people at Death with Dignity believe that the term "assisted suicide" is bunk. It's NOT assisted anything!!! Church or Pope or no. Is it somehow better to die or be maimed on the battlefield and to be patriotic? Oh yeah? We have no choice in coming in. Why can't we have one that's not termed"suicide" going out? Uh, we know what we're signing up for...
When I read Mr. Douthat's comments on religion, I'm always struck by his medieval approach that views it like a Crusade, a political battle over souls for worldly influence over others and things. The concept of spirituality, which is the essence of religion, appears to be imprisoned somewhere in the catacombs, never to see the light of day.
8
These old men are irrelevant to the world.
5
Ross, maybe the Pope isn't weighing what to do based on how many offended Catholics might come back to the Church as opposed to how many conservative Catholics might leave. Maybe he's just trying to live up to the mandates of the founder of his religion. Maybe he isn't trying for heroism or heresy, but discipleship. Ya think?
In any case he's doing a bang up job of that, compared to the cruel beliefs of conservatives everywhere, including yourself.
10
The Roman Catholic Church is one of THE richest, most oppressive organizations of all-time.
The Roman Catholic Church:
Has blessed and still blesses murderous mafia moss bosses,
Continues to cover-up the crimes against children by pedophile priests,
Helped Spain throw all of its Jews out in 1492 (Muslim Morocco accepted them with open arms),
Promoted the genocide of Native Americans (it has never repented or even acknowledged this crime),
Supported the enslavement of Africans, and
Turned its back on the Jews during the Holocaust (many of Hitler's concentration camp guards were practicing Catholics).
In fact, in the United States white Catholics overwhelmingly Donald Trump. Many consider Trump to be a Christ-like figure.
The Roman Catholic Church has been a disaster for 2,000 years.
6
The Pope is fabulous window dressing for the Catholic Church. The Public Relations department must love him. Unfortunately the reality is that he will not make any significant changes that are needed such as female priests, allowing priests to marry, and changes to annulment process.
3
The Pope had a grand chance to do something for the animals a couple of years ago - and didn't. In Argentina, there was a dying polar bear at the Mendoza Xoo named Arturo. The Pope could have used his influence to get Arturo, born in captivity, to a Canadian zoo (Canada was willing to take him). The Pope stayed silent on his visit to Argentina. Arturo is dead now, although his human advocates did all they could to make his last weeks as comfortable as possible.
Given the Pope's attitude toward the sexual abuse of children, and his silence on the Mendoza Zoo, he is no friend to the vulnerable.
3
Douthat gives a typically highly dogma-bound viewpoint on Pope Francis as expected from a knee-jerk conservative. He says this open man is endangering the most conservative views of Catholicism. Perhaps he should read the New Testament. Fidelity to Jesus. That is the key. He places himself and his arguments entirely in the spirit of the Pharisee's and Sadducee's who challenged Jesus, during his time, because Jesus seemed to be challenging (extending) the Law of Moses and they and only they were keepers of God's Laws according to Moses. Well, I and many other fallen Catholics, would more want to believe in Jesus, his sayings and behaviors, than the keepers of Conservatism. Dogma is the mind killer and love destroyer.
7
This article makes several assumptions that are questionable;
1. The sexual ethics (all ethical positions for that matter) of the New Testament are transparently clear and not a matter of debate among Scripture scholars, bishops priests and other Catholics.
2. The only millennium of the Church's history was the second millennium of its existence.
3. What is often referred to as "tradition" is defined by believers who are prisoners of their immediat epast.
4. The Church IS the magisterium.
5. Canonical law is divine law; laws that are merely man-made laws of the Church are divine law.
4
Let it be duly noted that to the right of this column about Pope Francis
is an advertisement for "Linkshe" which features scantily clad models.
That the New York Times does not have enough sense to run such ads
elsewhere on its web-site, or not run them at all in the age of the
"Me Two" movement may say all you need to know as to why Ross
has put his finger on something that needs to be said.
We live in an age that is so self-assured that it is the wisest and kindest
of any in the course of human history.
Thus the Catholic Church must meets its demands, even though those
demands do not concern needs but wants. And if the Church will not
immediately meets its demand then the Church is deemed irrelevant.
Ironically enough, the Anglican Church in the West had tried to meet
all of those "progressive" demands and still grows smaller and smaller
and smaller.
I am not an American Catholic, I am not a "Modern" Catholic,
I am not a Westernized Catholic - I am a Roman Catholic -
I don't want each diocese or National Conference of Bishops
to decide differently from other dioceses.
Attempting to please the "Progressives" is a neverending task.
Their ultimate goal is to allow each person to do whatever they please
as long as they do not harm anyone else even though they are harming
themselves - the blindspot of modernity - "No one, not even the
Creator has the right to judge us for we alone know what is best for us" -
deceives them of their, dare I say, sinfulness.
3
All great institutions are corrupted over time by the men that run them( not the women who don't). I liked his attention paid to the poor, etc. But is it like Ryan's washing cleaned dishes in a closed food kitchen , ALL FOR SHOW.
Why does he continue to protect the guilty in the church of child abuse?
Why does he ? Because the truth will decimate the business. It is hard to change centuries of practice in the world oldest business.
5
As a Catholic priest, i find your right-wing agenda offensive.
Just because the hierarchy of the Catholic Church in America got into bed with the Republican Party years ago doesn't mean that the majority of Catholics here did.
Pope Francis is an honest, holy man. He is trying to move the Church forward.
You're not helping.
35
Was in ARGENTINA on a grant from HOOVER to conduct interviews with those affected adversely by dictatorships in power during the "guerra sucia," 1976-1983, when country was terrorized by a series of juntas led first by Gens.VIDELA, AGOSTI and Admiral MASSERA--,1 of my interviewees was a suboficial, "enfermero" who doubled as MASSERA's chauffeur-- and if there was 1 issue on which all agreed, whether ex military from ESMA, "torturadores" now imprisoned for life at MARCO PAZ penetentiary or "familiares"of those disappeared is that il Papa, when he was a cura, known as Jorge Mario Bergoglio then head of Sociedad Jesuista was a friend of the armed forces which allegedly kidnapped, disappeared almost 30,000 victims during 7 years they held sway. What a shock to Argentinians who still remember terror of the"anos locos"that Bergoglio would 1 day be chosen to lead the Church. He even held a special mass in1977 for junta leaders. Last time there spoke with, inter alios, Maria Antokoletz, whose brother , was "sequestrado" as well as sister of Mercedes Mignone, arrested at 5 A.M. 1 morning in 1976, and disappeared.. Witnessed hearing in court of 2 ex Marines who were her raptors. Consensus was that Bergoglio was pro military, pro junta.Douthat must take into account negative side of il Papa's career in Argentina if he wishes to write an honest biography. Antokoletz was also a friend of Leonie DUQUET, French nun also kidnapped and killed by armed forces.
3
One single reform would have a massive impact that would inform the day to day life of practicing Catholics, as well as those Catholics who find no place for themselves in the Church. It would instantly mitigate the shortage of priests, while eliminating the necessity of living a lie for the thousands of priests who are celibate in name only. Through attrition, it could begin to eliminate those men who cling to the priesthood as a cover for inappropriate sexual desires: allow priests to marry.
30
And another thought- Pope Francis has brought MANY back to the pews, myself included.
13
I look forward to reading this book and I am very curious to what extent the author has followed some of the financial support shown by the Catholic Church under Francis to spread the "gospel" of anti-genderism, the radical critique of Gabriele Kuby of gender mainstreaming, same-sex marriage, and overall of contemporary feminism. There is no daylight between Kuby's hateful depiction of these developments and Francis, who has praised her openly and under whose leadership her book has been translated into many languages and made available to many conservative Catholic and even Orthodox Christian organizations whose main goal is to overturn the legality of same sex marriage, of gender studies as a legitimate field of knowledge (because we are born women and men and need to abide the good lord in performing our duties to be uteruses first and brains afterwards), and feminist politics that embrace the radical notion that women should be trusted the same as men to make their own decisions about reproduction, work, and family.
2
Why do people continue to speak of God as one would speak of a sentient human being who wants, feels, etc? I think that instead of God creating man in His image, mankind created "God" in mankind's image.
13
He does make lapsed Catholics want to believe, but wanting is not the same as doing. He needs to be a better legislator (at least in the US), because too many conservative Priests won't change. Church used to make people feel good. It is too hard to be moral and be active the in Church and that is why Catholics leave. Priests are political but seem to be promoting what looks like the wrong thing, like cuts to social programs. Divorce is still a sin. Woman are second class. Priest are not engaged about important stuff, like homelessness. Why? I'm not sure Christ would want someone to only pray about when activism is the answer. American Catholic Priests continue to promote a fantasy: TV type families with the strong, thoughtful dads, clueless, under educated mothers at home baking pies and popping babies. Is the Church ignoring the real plight of families, the terrible effects of social media, the growing threat of Fascism, the reality of grave economic injustice, the threat of nuclear war and environmental destruction? Is it leading, or is it behind? Pope Francis needs to inspire priests (an allow them to be married, and female, too) and the flock will return.
8
A pope and a journalist walked into a bar. The pope says, “I’ll have a glass of seltzer,” then sits in silence.
The journalist takes out his notebook and writes,”This pope mocks his environment and symbolizes the end of a long tradition of spirits and meaningful discourse in the people’s place of weekly refreshment.”
No one in the establishment can figure out what, in God’s name, either of themselves are saying or not saying in their place.
6
"The last few months have been particularly ugly: Francis just spent a recent visit to Chile vehemently defending a bishop accused of turning a blind eye to sex abuse ..."
-------
It is a sign of Mr. Douthat's intentional blinders that he makes this statement to prove a point. This is not where things stand at present. On the way home from Chile, Francis apologized for his wording and immediately sent a trusted cardinal to Chile to investigate further. He has met with victims and will make his report.
The other thing about Mr. Douthat is the frequency with which he throws the terms "heresy" and "heretic" about. He is in no position to be making those kinds of accusations.
25
Pope Francis is working for the long view of a church long in need of a "Vatican III" which will probably not happen in our lifetimes. If something is not done to reach out to people as they are, young people will continue to stay away, the marginalized will continue to sit outside, and the Russ Douthats of the world will smugly sit inside with self-satisfaction as they shut the door in the faces of those they themselves have deemed unworthy of the promises of Christ.
14
It seems to me that there is a lot more to criticize about the Catholic Church and the countries and people the Pope is trying to help than the Pope himself.
4
Hero or heretic? Douthat usually gives us rich analysis, but Pope Francis just drives Ross into Manichean fits. This column requires more than a labor of love to fathom. He is more than versed in the historic compromises the Church made in the Americas, from colony to independence, and knows deeply that no agreement escapes the depravity of human relations. On most issues, Douthat's insights provide deep thought; on Pope Francis, his words just don't break through the shrillness of the day.
4
This article makes me sad. I do not understand the point of it. It does nothing to bring about the unity of the Church that you would desire. It only increases the division within the Church among its people, and gives another black eye to Catholic Christianity. I do not see the love of Jesus in this article. Would Christ put his stamp of approval on this book?
14
Mr. Douthat:
it appears that you are in the process of shortchanging your publisher...
through the years, i have noted:
that when you chose to "agree" with a pope,
it is because he is infallible - -
that when you chose to "disagree" with a pope,
he is a heretic.
difficult, then, to assign yourself an impartial, comprehensive review of the current pontiff.
secondly,
as with our own President Obama,
( who found himself mercilessly encircled and hemmed in by a recalcitrant, treasonous behaving republican't party congress ),
the Vatican has built in centuries old and ancient practices whose walls, caverns, and labyrinths are legendary.
would that this Pope Francis were younger and could find the wherewithal to wield a much larger broom - -
then,
the many disgraces of the current Church could be swept clean.
too bad you were not around for John XXIII and the Second Vatican Council - -
those were transformative times ...
would that we could have those good-fortunes once again.
pax
17
Mr. Douthat tries to hide his genuine and honest conservatism behind a fragile frame of objective reasoning with critics to both kinds of Papacies 'left and right sides'.
The reality is that a Papacy exempt from critics does not exist and Douthat should know this truth very well. A global religious entity traversing more than two millennia is still standing up because it has integrated a lot of history and changes, merging them in its own theology and political structure.
Obviously, this means that it has been under systematic attack from the left side of a 'perennial theology of progressive modernization' as well as from the right side of traditionalists. So Douthat has written yet another book from the traditionalist side to criticize a popular pope who wants to progressively update the Catholic theology and policies just like the other very popular pope Johannes XXIII.
Maybe he does prefer to stay back in time to the marital sexuality promoted by Saint Alphonsus Liguori some 150 years ago with a clear submission of the woman spouse to the man's desires.
9
Important
The Catholic Church changed it’s teacing on the salvation of those who die by suicide decades ago. They may be blessed with full Catholic funerals and with understanding that their suffering that led to suicide is also a path that leads to union with a loving and embracing God.
12
I'm sure that Ross remembers those science-fiction novels set in a distant future where various good, bad or weird conditions have come to be, but where the Church itself remains the same in every respect (including Latin.) We now live in something like those fifties dystopias (authoritarin thugs work to destroy democracy, fabulously wealthy corporate owners shape the world as they like, masses of helpless refugees suffer and perish or are shipped to distant planets to labor and die) -- and the church, while still projecting its eternality, changes, crumbles here, rebuilds there to the point of unrecognizability, and seems to join the common degringolade however it struggeles, or yields the sturggle. Its future may lie in the fun it provides to self-selected populations, an escape from the actual divine punishment we suspect and expect.
Pope Francis has been great at PR. Not so great at actually changing things for the better.
Hundreds of thousands of children were systematically raped by officials of the Catholic Church. The rapists were protected by the highest members of the Church. And still are.
Pope Francis is the response to that. A heartfelt, sincere, attempt at deflecting criticism without protecting children or holding anyone to account.
How anyone was fooled is beyond me. The Church cares only about itself- and so it will go to any length imaginable to discredit victims and protect rapists.
5
I can never get passed the hypocrisy of main line Catholics who ignore the hardcore rules of the church on abortion, racism, etc. yet cling to the church rather than finding a religious community with which they thoroughly agree. As an ex-Catholic Unitarian, it still amazes me. It's sort of like saying, "Yeah, the Ku Klux Klan does some nasty stuff, but there are really nice people who belong so I won't do anything about them and their beliefs. I exaggerate to make a point here, but it is a valid comparison in a way
10
So, our own RD is stepping up, eyeball to eyeball, with Papa Francis. I' looking forward to it. I think there will be blood,(metaphorical, of course). Papa may yield to RD on some points. He may thank RD.
Upon Bedoglio's election, he addressed the College of Cardinals:
"May God forgive you for what you have just done! "
1
As a atheist, I find this tedious, if not ridiculous.
8
The Catholic Church's failure to retain its former presence and ward off decline is likely due in part to the fact that many former Catholics (and Christians of many groups) have become atheists or agnostics. Like myself.
2
One can derive from this article what everyone already knows: Francis is seeking some sort of reconciliation between the Medieval and the Modern. A Counterforce is alive in The Katholick Zone; the author sez that it's bound to fail...
The rest seems to be all about how this strategy might be 'divisive'--particularly since katholicks believe different stuff, geographically speaking. Newsflash: Irish, Poles and Ugandans are far more anti abortion than French or Germans, and all that.
So in his own, uniquely gossipy way, the author has taken a pro-Medieval doctrinaire stance as to what, for him, being katholick is all about. Is anyone really listening?
1
The Catholic Church is not a social club nor a political party, but a means to bring people closer to God. When Mr Douthat shows signs of understanding that and its implications, I will start taking him seriously again.
12
My very Catholic sister-in-law told me early in Pope Francis' tenure that he would definitely "do something for women." She knows that I have "left the faith" over the failure of the church to even consider women's issues. Still among his praises and criticisms the lack of any initiatives for women remains and is a topic never even discussed or reported. I lost interest in this writer's piece because of this.
Then there is the sex abuse scandal. It's still there, but Francis seems to have done his job to get it out of the headlines.
The nice guy image is cute, but the reasons why I no longer am interested in the catholic church are still there. He may be good at diversions to big political moves, but he fails at fixing core problems.
They're at it again. The Catholic church simply cannot resist moving Ross's cheese. First, Vatican II turned the altars around and dispensed with a millenium of Latin mumbo-jumbo that nobody understood anyway. Now we have a pope who might actually liberalize communion rules and recognize divorced Catholics and gays as being more than incorrigible sinners unworthy of fellowship. Where does it end?
After decades (centuries) of self-destructive scandals, and church leadership that placed outmoded orthodoxy ahead of the needs of its flock struggling in a changing world, the Church finally has a leader who seems to embrace the (gasp) liberal, inclusive teachings of its Founder who, by any contemporary characterization, was a radical socialist.
8
I don’t think so. This president has a strange staying power that confounds those who know better and are better than him. He appears to paralyze those who look on reducing them to impotent rage and colorful rhetoric describing the hideous plight with which he skewers the country. I think we’re in for a long and painful ride.
I am Catholic and I am a progressive liberal. I am very involved in my parish. I serve communion, I sit on a committe for immigrants, I cleaned the retrato of our Lady of Guadalupe for years. I still bring her flowers. She is my heart. I am from a very large Mexican-American Catholic family. I love the church but I do not want politics, especially social politics in my church. It has no place in the arms of Jesus. I do not care if you are gay, female, trans, poor or homeless or that you’ve had an abortion. You are loved. I am loved. We are called to love. We are called to serve and give hope to the hopeless. We are called to love one another as God has loved us. Love is hard, it is difficult and makes us face hard truths about ourselves. It is the falling away from love that is the most dangerous thing of all. We can say and do all the right things and have all the strict social constructs but if we have not love, we are empty and so are our words and deeds. I believe Jesus will sort out what is most important in the end. Meanwhile, there are three things that remain faith, hope and love and the greatest of these is love. Corin. 13.
15
I have always thought of the monolithic catholic church as just the largest bureaucracy in the world, slathered in gold while its worshipers starve. I don't understand how women and all participating catholics can contribute to an organization that is so hypocritical as to worship Mary and treat women so poorly, how participating catholics can attend services and offer respect to a person in the guise of "pope" who heads up an organization that has institutionalized pedophilia. How do worshipers sleep at night knowing that their tithings support such evil? No one was more joyous than I when much of the property owned by the church in and around Boston had to be sold to pay the victims of the pedophilic priests and their Bishops. And there was Cardinal Law, under whom all of this occurred, banished to the Vatican when he should have been in Walpole prison. I salute Ross for exposing the good and the bad of Pope Francis and the church.
1
Conservatives like Douthat like to say elections matter when it comes to political elections in the U.S, and Catholic conservatives said the same when John Paul and Benedict were elected. But when a Jesuit is elected, it's a problem?
6
I gave Pope Francis the benefit of the doubt and liked what I first saw. I'm an atheist who can see why organized religion is a comfort for many while not believing myself. However, his inability or unwillingness to treat women within his church fairly and his abdication of responsibility to speak out directly about Myanmar's treatment of the Rohingya have been disappointing, to say nothing of his behavior re. the church's pervasive sexual abuse. He may be a nice guy, if you're not a woman or an abused believer; not a real reformer. clearly, I expected much too much.
35
Francis is a ‘feel good’ Pope when the Church needs, and deserves, a ‘feel right’ leader. Too often he speaks from the hip, confusingly, instead of ex cathedra and authoritatively. Embracing hookup culture, however predominant, and the resulting carnage is the purview of Progressives and Democrats, not the Catholic Church. When people, like Francis, say, imply or allow others to infer that “it’s all good,” they miss the mark considerably.
The more interesting question is how a church departed so dramatically from the teachings of Jesus that Douthat views the pastoral approach of Pope Francis as revolutionary and unsettling.
8
The only thing that we can be sure of in this world is Change. God is not now or has ever been stagnant. All of the worlds religions are man made. Jesus did not create Catholicism. Man did, particularly Peter. It is time for humanity to leave the church and return to God as comedian Lenny Bruce once said. Real religion is constantly changing and moving forward, not backward like the Catholic Church has been doing for 2,000 years.
In researching "Sexuality in the New Testament and its historical environs, Mr Douthat might usefully consult the following: "Making Sense of Sex: Attitudes towards Sexuality in Early Jewish and Christian Literature," "Sexuality and the Jesus Tradition," "The New Testament on Sexuality,"and other volumes on the topic both in the Bible and Pseudepigrapha. All are authored by William Loader, professor emeritus of New Testament at Murdoch University, Perth, Australia. Information about and reviews of these works are readily available at A.
Also "God and Sex: What the Bible Really Says," By Michael Coogan (editor of the New Oxford Bible and director of publications for the Harvard Semitic Museum.
Hope this helps
1
Any comment that relies upon Francis’s popularity with fallen away Catholics and secular world misses the entire point of being Pope. His job, whichever he has woefully failed to do, is continue continuity and integrity with the Catholic faith.
Regardless of personal feelings, Francis will be regarded as one of the worst Popes in history, and most likely as an anti-Pope both for his election and his tacit teaching of heresy.
1
If the Church wants to last it needs to end the celibacy nonsense and allow women. The current restrictions are not required by scripture and have always harmed its reputation. It needs to reject any rapprochement with China, and remain true to core values of the sacredness of life . The Church must always strive to be universal.
1
Trump isn't and his "presidency" is beyond disastrous !
Pope Francis is the apotheosis of Vatican II the goal of which was to make bring the Church in line with the modern world by introducing the idea of the flexibility of truth or Modernism considered by prior popes to be the heresy of heresies. Thus, plain and simple Pope Francis is a heretic, perhaps the worst pope in history. He is Martin Luther returned as Pope of the Catholic Church to finish destroying it.
Pope Francis is undermining Catholic moral doctrine with the clearly false concepts of pastoral direction and accompaniment. There can be no difference between doctrine and pastoral direction.
Pope Francis is not so much a religious figure as a manque communist politician whose style is dictatorial and subversive. He is selling out the authentic Catholic Church in China. He has a penchant for Communist leaders in South American. He has done little to correct confront the predatory homosexual Bishops for which he is well aware.
The Pope's behavior is anything but laudatory. His is the pretense of humility while in reality he a shepherd who feeds his lambs to the wolves.
Ross, there are plenty of us out here (recovering Catholics/Christians) who have more than done our homework in Comparative Religion courses, and are anything but "clueless and malicious." Given the HISTORICAL RECORD and the lazy penchant for blind faith of traditional religionists, it's more than interesting you'd choose those two adjectives to describe----informed people of the 21st century??? Cluelessness and malice are better suited for uninformed hypocrites whose claim to spiritual superiority and penchant for division is based on mythologies posing as fact being transferred through the ages, sowing hatred and intolerance.
The Abrahamic religions of the West would have a great deal to learn from eastern spiritual persuasions re: impermanence and perpetual flux----if only they'd OPEN their EYES....
2
The Revolution in the Catholic Church began when Pope John Paul I was elected in 1978, and his 1st act was abdicating the Throne and Coronation Popes had for a 1000 years. Saying the Pope is only a simple Priest was a clear signal he was going to clean house putting all the Cardinals and Bishops on notice. He was dead in a month. More importantly, it was a clear signal to the World of a shift in power and the Spirit of Christ is coming closer to the People. Pope Francis conveys this by example. Search Google for 'THE IMPERIAL POPE' under my name.
1
Being raised Catholic is much of the reason why I am now an atheist. Abuse, hypocricy and misogyny run rampant in the Catholic church. Francis has done nothing to stop any of it. He is style not substance, but many can't see that. They've been trained to believe style is substance. The indoctrination continues.
1
Writing as an Anglican I can only say how moving and inspiring it is find such a clear example of Christian charity on the throne of St Peter. It has been a very long wait since the days of the equally loved Pope John the 23rd
6
The Catholic Church is the epitome of the long game. It is structured and survived over 2000 years. Nothing else even come close.
How it does that is a balance of both change and no change. Over the decades and centuries evolution and change takes place, yet in any year stasis seems to reign.
Hurry, hurry, hurry is not the way.
What this article completely misses is the forceful change that the Pope has made in the College of Cardinals. This is the long game.
4
Ross, dear, I think you missed the boat on the Perfect Pope. HE died about two thousand years ago. So sorry.
50
Perhaps I nitpick, but when Ross and others refer to the rampant molestation of children by Catholic clergy as a 'scandal' it angers me. A scandal is when people cheat on their spouses, an athlete dopes up with steroids, a politician gives a job to his nephew. Consensual and nobody gets physically hurt.
Just sit and watch the closing credits of the movie "Spotlight" and it is sobering: they list every diocese around the world with known cases of Catholic clergy raping and molesting kids. The list scrolls on and on and on and on..........
This was not a 'scandal'. It was an atrocity. Making it even worse, pastors and bishops made the deliberate choice not to protect the kids, but to cover up what was happening to protect the church's reputation, thus feeding more young bodies into this physical and emotional wood chipper. Only getting caught by investigative reporters and being exposed brought about any sense of responsibility. This was plainly and simply an atrocity. And Francis' missteps on his recent trip when he was dismissive of new accusations and protective of the accused cleric were simply shocking.
I know several people for whom this sexual corruption was the straw that broke the camel's back. As the pews get emptier and emptier, and Catholic parish schools close their doors, we have yet to reach that place where the Vatican seems to have fully grasped how to handle this: calling new accusations "Fake News" is definitely not the way to go!
85
Joanna Stasia,
I also live in New York City (Manhattan) but do not find the pews empty on any given Sunday. My upper east side Catholic Church is well attended at the 5:30 PM Mass with many young people in attendance. These people could be spending their valuable time doing something else but they find the power of prayer and God meaningful in their lives. Of course, it is not as crowded as it was in the 1950s but it certainly is impressively well attended. I am always pleasantly pleased to see the
People still find the Catholic Church an important part of their today when there is so much chaos and uncertainly in the modern world. They find consolation and comfort which few institutions offer today. The priests and nuns are very welcoming and kind and caring. They give so much of their time to others who have no other place to turn to. It is not perfect but it is about as perfect for many of us.
The sexual abuse scandal (and it was a scandal) was horrible and should never have happened. The Catholic Church was the first to deal with this head on and we have since learned that this scandal has occurred in the Protestant and Jewish faiths. The Catholic Church did not hold a monopoly on sex abuse. Sexual abuse has even occurred in public schools, private schools both day and boarding and in Hollywood. No one has been spared from this devastation.
I love my Church and will always be a member. It has its flaws but its goodness and truth outweigh all flaws
I would like to include a few words to some sentences that seem to have been cut off and are incomplete :
I am always pleasantly pleased to see the significant number of people attending each week.
People still find the Catholic Church an important part of their life today
when there is so much chaos and uncertainty in the modern world.
What is being missed in all of this discussion of Pope Francis, is the fact that Christianity is based on the concept of absolute forgiveness and love. It is NOT for us -- or the hierarchy of the church-- to judge the conduct of individuals, certainly without true knowledge of what is in their hearts. That is reserved solely for a just God to do. The sacrament of reconciliation (or confession) offer one way to restore ones relationship with the community of believers , i.e., the church. However, that is not the only way this can be done. Cultivating and having a personal relationship with a forgiving God through Christ is another way of accomplishing the same thing. It is a way that is equally meritorious and often results is one being "born again" as a Christian with a faith that has been revitalized. So, let's dispense with all of the legalities. It is NOT our job to judge the behavior of others; rather, we must offer forgiveness and love again and again, just as God through Christ offered the same forgiveness and love to others without reservation. No one ever claimed that being a Christian is easy. That is the message of Pope Francis and why he selected the name, Francis, a saint who exemplified such a way of life.
10
In a spirit of continuing dialogue I have persevered and read yet another in Douthat's series of columns criticizing Pope Francis. The comments I have read sum up my position. Douthat's version of true Catholicism reads like a nostalgia for a 19th-early-20th century Church under siege by new thinking in philosophy, culture, and politics, and in some cases real, that is, actual, political threats. His attack this time is a series of unreflective tropes. As one example, now it is Francis who is divisive. Never mind the schisms that predated Francis from a complaining right.
As for specific problems in Douthat's argument, I'll again stop at one. It has long (centuries long) been recognized that the pastoral office (e.g., the confessional and other places) is not the place for policing doctrinal correctness. Other readers will list the half-dozen or more contestable assertions that Douthat has made.
Last, not a word here about the poor, not the poor in spirit, the poor. This is one of two overriding concerns in all of scripture and tradition along with loyalty to God. No, Douthat remains focused solely on personal probity and can see nothing at stake but the Church's sexual ethics in moral matters.
There is no threat of potential heresy, but rather the manifestation on Douthat's part of a theological understanding crimped by a desire not to know God, but to be absolutely certain of one's knowledge of God.
13
Good article. I have been puzzled by the soft face on unchanging doctrine, and Douthat thoughtfully explains possible future directions for the Church and the consequences. I suspect that to expand the Church in China and other non European countries will require harder, clearer, and more deeply conservative teachings in order to compete with Protestant Christian fundamentalist and evangelical sects. People in affluent countries are drifting away from religion in general, but seem delighted in hearing stories about the kindly pope, especially if they don’t have to think about what it all means for the future.
1
Religions (and I mean to included all religions both main stream and cult) are anachronisms. The are built upon ancient superstitions and a human need to seek some control over the conditions that influence the lives of human beings.
There is more pain and suffering inflicted upon the world by Religion than the alleviation of it.
My hope is that Francis is helping (knowingly or unknowingly) to drive a few more nails into the coffin of the Catholic Church and religion in general.
5
John - agreed, religion *should* be an anachronism. But it lingers on atavistically, a part of human nature that stubbornly refuses to evolve, or at least is doing so very slowly. As society evolves, religion, like the practice of owning slaves, becomes more and more barbaric.
The balkanisation of the Church which Mr Douthat suggests might happen (and quite possibly could happen) could result in ridiculous situations. Example: when in 1964 the U.S. bishops ruled that it was no longer a mortal sin to eat meat on fridays (as if it ever was anyway, let's be honest), other dioceses in other countries refused to make the change. So we thus had the silly situation that what was a mortal sin in one country ceased to be a sin at all the moment one boarded an American-flagged plane or ship!
What really needs to be done for a proper reform (and prevent balkanisation) is to take away from the bishops the near-feudal level of power they still possess, and make them more accountable for their decisions to synods comprised of a cross-section of Catholics.
It was, by the way, the feudal power that bishops once (and in many places still do) possess which enabled them to invent sins like eating meat on friday.
The are in fact 2624 "sins" against the Church on the books, and that's before you get to the telephone book-sized list of sins against the 10 Commandments - a lot of them made up too.
The Church never really abolishes sins, it just makes "dispensations".
4
Ross
Interesting Article, I say that as some one who was raised Catholic. I love Pope
Francis, it is interesting to me that you are criticizing a Pope whose values are turn the other cheek, Protecting the poor, while believing that abortion is wrong, still believing that all people are loved by God. Interesting these are the values I learn when I read the Bible. Pope Francis still believes the basic tenets of the faith you do, He is just more open to forgiveness. (A nonamerican Ideal based on the response of the American church to this man.) I am sure your book will be a best seller and praised by the American bishops as a must read for all American Catholics.
Chuck From Ohio
10
The reforms Pope Francis encourages are at the level of the relationship between the individual and God, restoring Catholic love and universalism to the everyday lives of Catholics. The problem most Catholics have had with the institution, not Christ's teachings. I remember learning that the church or a priest should never, never withhold sacraments from a person-- sinner or saint, of any religious persuasion or none. By encouraging the giving and receiving of sacraments Francis is restoring no questions asked universality and love, the core of Catholicism. There is no need to change the laws. The church can disapprove of some behaviors but the community cannot and should not withhold Christ's love of every individual. A priest cannot see into a person's heart or soul. A priest is not the ultimate judge.
I can't defend his failure to clean house. I only hope that there is some reason he hasn't dealt with abusers and their protectors. Yes, Christ's love extends to them, but they can be removed from every institutional role. But even they should not be refused the sacraments.
7
Maybe it doesn’t matter if the traditional church survives. Christ needs no temples or worshipers that box in unconditional love. Our institutions will change, maybe even crumble, but the very simple task of loving will continue to be the message at the heart of it all.
5
Actually, the real risk for the Church is for the Francis critics to prevail and in time become curators of a mummified and ill-attended shadow of the faith. If the Christ of the New Testament stood for anything it was shattering slavish devotion to a rule and hide-bound temple that spent, as have Catholic conservatives, more time trying to decide who and what is not welcome than on tending the flock and in the case of the RCC, spreading the love of Christ to a dispirited and struggling world, as this Pope has done. Clinging to and demanding strict adherence to rules for their own sake is an act of fear. Casting a wide net and extending a welcome to all is an act of love.
17
I acknowledge and admire the faithful even though blind faith has little appeal. But leaders of all stripes are politicians and must demonstrate and reinforce their support of their followers.
The issue faced not just by Catholics but by all the Abrahamic religions is how to communicate a religion that was written and created in tribal times fit into a modern world with global communications. In other words to separate what was tribal culture and behavior that was inculcated into the spiritual teaching and reformulate them into a modern context. Consider the following the practice of usury, charging interest was an excommunication offense until the 16th century. It changed because the West moved to a mercantile way of life. It was unsustainable as a teaching.
6
Sad that the institution is so hard to change, and that power has corrupted the middle managers in the Vatican. I think generally Francis will be thought of as a good man who embodied the original gospels.
10
The doctrinal, theological, disciplinary, and even political disputes of the Catholic Church have existed for its entirety. Francis proclaims the salvation that Christ accomplished and wants everyone to be in full communion around that central belief. All the rest has indeed evolved, changed, in some rare circumstances even reversed itself in the course of the church’s history. Mr. Douthat makes an easy “dime” exploiting the current variations on the themes.
7
When he started the journey towards "Amoris laetitia", I wondered about his strategy for addressing the Church's institutional decline especially to Pentecostals in Latin America which was a real concern he brought to the job: increasing number by reducing quality through doctrinal compromises. The consequence was : "But there is no sign as yet that Francis’s liberalization is bringing his lapsed-Catholic admirers back to the pews; from Germany to Australia to his native Latin America, the church’s institutional decline continues.." as well put by Ross, was easily predicted because of the extreme sensitivity of Faith issues worldwide , even as the Catholics in China are protesting the planned truce with Beijing. The real problem of his Papacy so far is that never since the pre-Reformation era has the Church been so sharply divided almost to a schismatic level from the curia to the ordinary Faithful. And the task of healing this festering sore will be the key challenge of his successor. But in the meantime, there is the critical need to pray more to the Holy Spirit for greater counsel across both sides of the divide and to Mary, the mother of the Church, to heed her eternal advice in Cana: "do whatever he (Christ) asks you to do"!
3
Stand in a beautiful historical church, Mr. Douthat, and address a majority of Roman Catholics on the demise of your parent; some who have rushed to be present as a code of honor, while you know in a written testimony that they threatened your loved one afflicted by dementia in your absence. Stand and thank them for their courtesy; and while they assure you they have come to say prayers for the departed, you may slip and reply 'She is praying for us'.
Glance to the left and right of the Congregation and look at your sibling sitting alone in the first row; a self-proclaimed Atheist looking lost. The time to cry is not now.
Such beautiful voices are singing, and the Priest has allowed women and children to be mentioned in these sacred psalms. And you know, while you are thanking these fervent Christian souls for taking the time to join until we are 'resurrected', the counting till is being tabulated in their mind where greed is breeding.
True 'Christianity' in the times we live is a rarity and has a political and economic twist to it. Brother Francis perhaps underestimated the corruption in our midst and there is reason to believe that he was not enthusiastic about his visit to America.
Pregate per me, Papa Francesco, and it is a photo of you and President Obama that come to mind on solemn days; a source of hope and inspiration.
6
Those who are afraid to die cannot be reborn. So to those who are afraid of change are doomed to the eternal death that is irrelevance. Pope Frances is wise to seek the path of rebirth, though it will inevitably lead to the death of the old way of viewing the world.
9
Lay Catholics have already made their decision on contraception and divorce + remarriage. The hierarchy continues to resist the wisdom of the people on these issues, but the way forward is clear. A Vatican II commission researched contraception and recommended almost unanimously (only one abstention, although that WAS by a soon to be well-known Pole) that traditional Church teaching was flawed and should be reversed. Paul VI decided not to, but he clearly had the authority to decide. And of course all licit marriages are forever; no reason for that to change. Therefore marriages that need to end were never licit in the first place. Mother Church dealt with as tough a logical conundrum when it moved to declare legitimate all children born to parents in marriages later nullified. And clearly, the financial challenges to annullment must be done away with; it's viler by far than the sale of indulgences that the rich can afford to pursue annullments, where the poor are left with the option of the nearest Episcopalian church. On early-term abortion, well, our Church has gotten the science wrong before, and there's plenty of wiggle-room among the Fathers & Aquinas to deal with that. Oh, and as to same-sex marriage, might I recommend to Mr Douthat the work of the late Yale historian John Boswell; when there is (inevitably, I think) among Cathoics the will, Prof Boswell has laid out pretty clearly the way.
12
Yet another who wants to make the Church the way he wants it rather than the way it is. Sad.
Mr. Douthat seems to want less change, but we actually need much more. The truth of Francis' pontificate is constituted by the extent to which it manifests the compassionate heart of Christianity, not whether it generates an increase of churchgoing, more baptisms, greater popularity, or enhanced institutional power. Francis is charismatically gifted but not institutionally adept. The pope has a major blindspot when it comes to women, people who are LGBT, and clerical sexual abusers. So his papacy has to be seen as ambivalent. his most important contribution, like that of most popes, lies in the quality of the bishops he has appointed. One hopes that among the men he has appointed, some will turn out to combine pastoral responsiveness with the institutional acuity needed to enact serious reforms of the curia, to allow greater subsidiarity, and to create structures that allow a significant role to lay decision-making within the governance of the church. The church is a divinely-inspired human institution, not divinely constructed institution that happens to be inhabited with human beings.
4
"...the attempts by John Paul II and Benedict to maintain continuity between the church before and after Vatican II ended up choking off renewal...." Yes, it did. Mr. Douthat is too young to have directly witnessed this effect, but renewal withered because it would have required deep change. Thus the church went through decades more accretion of the weight of practices that do not serve well in a world that is designed to undergo constant change, and that is currently undergoing profound change, for instance the changing physical climate. The Holy Spirit has Its work cut out for it here, since It is charged with working directly in the human milieu. How wonderful it would be if the church itself can shift to working primarily in love rather than in fear as the basis of its decisions. That change could leverage so many other positive, adaptive changes to help bring people closer to God and improve the conditions of life on earth--which have become so desperate for so many. In insisting that its traditions must be like unto the unchangeable laws of the Medes and Persians, the church acts from a fear basis--seeking to stop change. Those cultures which are shifting into more love-based ways of dealing with human relations will thus find themselves ahead of a church which is wedded to the fear-based model. Francis heads a church which must adapt to that reality, or else remain cut off from the source of its renewal--God coming through every person who answers the call of love.
6
Mr. Douthat was very wrong in predicting Mr. Trump's rise to power. He consistently said it is impossible for Trump to be the Republican Party's nominee. Here we are!
Now he is predicting that Francis is likely to fail in his effort to reform the church from the bottom up. Other commentators have remarked how Jesus was not popular in the temple and that his teaching can really be boiled down to two principles - 1) Love God; 2) Love thy neighbor as thyself. The rest of the teachings and the church's attitudes and dispositions MUST change over time. They must change because they are not part of an eternal truth like the two principles mentioned above, but the products of specific cultural systems. The principles of love and decency towards the "other" are the foundation and not the church's attitudes towards sex, women, and homosexuality. The genuine application of these principles is what will help the church survive and, perhaps, thrive again.
As someone who loves and admires Pope Francis, I am comforted by the fact that Mr. Douthat often gets things wrong. I am pretty sure his views on Francis's work and influence are wrong. Pope Francis is a real reformer, like his inspiration Jesus of Nazareth.
8
Why do so many converts like Douthat think that actions such as giving communion to a Melania Trump, for example, is so anti-Catholic, which is another way in his mind of saying anti-the teachings of Jesus? Poor Douthat. If he only knew that Jesus would embrace Melania, Stormy, Rachel Maddow, Ellen DeGeneres, and all their male counterparts, and even Ross, the guy sitting in the front pew loudly thanking God that he is not like them. I grew up on May processions, pontifical high masses and large Irish catholic families. Believe me, Ross, it ain't what you imagine.
14
Growing up as a methodist in the south I didn't know many catholics. To us kids the word pope mostly conjured a historical religious figure from the past.
The current pope has his opinions just like any one else has their opinions. I've known people who have changed churches because they didn't like the opinions of their current preacher. Some of them changed several times until they found the right fit.
Mr. Douthat may not agree with the pope but he's the only pope they got, right? Maybe he'll like the next one.
1
Ross Douthat, like Congressional Republicans, is very selective about his Christianity. The teachings of Jesus in the Gospels often go missing. If they disagree, they condemn the gospels, not themselves.
And so it goes with the Pope. People who think they are more Catholic than the Pope might need to do some soul searching. Pope Francis is putting the Christ back in Christianity. Perhaps the power and wealth the church represents is not as good an indication of the best and spiritual part of the original religion.
I recommend the Sermon on the Mount, the ten commandments, and don't forget that pride is the most deadly of the sins.
20
You hit the nail on the head.....People like Cardinal Dolan of NY once wondered out loud if the Pope had the right to offer a new view on any matter of dogma or doctrine.. he wondered about the POPE for god’s sake. That’s what it’s all about now cardinals and Bishops who think that the Pope is just too Christlike!
I may not agree with Francis all the time but he’s the Pope and his bishops and cardinals should give him some respect...Ross should also but then the only kind of Pope he want is one that will stump for Trump or at least the GOP.
4
In terms of tradition, covering up pedophelia to preserve the Church's moral authority and therefore its ability to leadmore people to salvation was what God demanded. The sophistication of theology would serve to justify this to those needing justification.
The Church used to conceive of itself as the sole source of salvation; people like Socrates were born too early to be eligible period. If this belief is still the official one, it is certainly softpeddled these days. If it isnt, then dogma has undergone a change that makes married priests or men or approval of noncoercive attempts to control the earth's population trivial in comparison. There are other changes, like from monarchy and heirarchy to democracy or from patriarchy to most roles in society being available to either sex, that make today's theological struggles seem petty.
Conservative Catholics have already eaten multiple camels, but they are still gagging on gnats. They should start being honest with themselves about the lack of immutability of their dogmas.
4
The Papacy is overladen with negative history. It's present condition is little better. This Roman Church still teaches as dogma that humans consist of a material and a spiritual component. This is contrary to scientific findings and provides a platform for the medievalists who would imprison women in their physiology. The timing of "ensoulment" is a topic to rival the count of angels on the head of a pin. It's a topic that allows biology and embryology to be brushed aside in dogmatic statements about the personhood of a fetus. That this Pope can say he accepts "evolution" while separating humanity from the rest of the animal kingdom is unacceptable. Love God, Love your neighbor, of course. But leave the philosophy to philosophers and the dogma to theologians. The road to heaven is not paved with cobblestones made of dogma.
1
What you call the "decentralization" of authority to national and local branches is itself a paradigm shift. This was one of 4 key recommendations made by Hans Kung at the beginning of the recent Benedictine pontificate on steps needed to adapt the church to the 21st century.
The other paradigm shift embodied by Francis is his observation that communion is "nourishment for the weak" and not a "reward for the perfect."
Mercy for the hoi polloi, with strict justice for the presbyters is an ancient formula that has served the greater church well for centuries. Alleluia it is being rediscovered!!
2
My spouse read this column and pronounced it worthless and ridiculous. He’d never read Douthat before. And he never will again!
He was baptized by his own uncle (a priest). He’s not interest in rules and regulations, but he’s a sensitive person. Who wept openly as we watched Pope Francis’ first appearance at the balcony, after he was named Pope. He was moved to tears by his humility.
I was moved at the solemn occasion of his installation as Pope. He prayed at the tomb of St. Peter and included the Eastern Orthodox Patriarchs. He had an Orthodox Deacon carry the Gospel Book and sing the Gospel in Greek! He chose the name Francis - a Saint of Love. He sees evangelization as taught by how one lives. As I recall St. Francis once said: “Preach always. If necessary with words.”
Pope Francis is an example of Love personified. it is sad that Ross seems unable to receive the preaching of LOVE through Action demonstrated by this Pope - beloved around the world by many Christians and people of other faiths.
9
The evidence is irrefutable that the messages of the Gospels are nearly as irrelevant to the Vatican as to American Evangelism.
2
As a non-Catholic, I might point out that Orthodox Judaism regards the words of the Law given at Mt. Sinai as immutable. They are the Words of the Omnipotent as given to Moses the teacher, and that is that.
Except that is not that. "You shall not make fire on the Sabbath." But first, it says "By these words shall you live." So, if it is a choice between making fire on Shabbat or dying, then one MUST make the fire.
So too, there are many offenses for which the punishment is stoning (to death). And yet Jews do not consider death (by stoning or otherwise) appropriate for these offenses today. How is this reconciled? No problem at all. The rabbis have taught, "let he who is without sin cast the first stone."
So Pope Francis' acceptance of behavior that recognizes the real world in which he lives does not seem so strange after all (at least to me).
9
Thoughtful, as always, Ross, but your logic falls into the trap Francis warned Catholics about: of using the culture wars to divide believers. In effect, Catholicism has been dwindled into the belief of same sex marriage and remarried Catholics. You can believe in all tenets of the faith but if you disagree on one of those topics, you’re not a true Catholic. The debate is black and white. Accepting the core features of what originally differentiated Catholicism from Protestantism is now old hat.
The remarried Catholic issue is easy to me: just lax the allowed circumstances for an annulment. Annulments, practically speaking, are just like divorces only they’re sanctioned by the Church. I understand the spiritual distinction but an annulment “unhappens” a previously performed wedding ceremony - similar to a divorce. If the Church already accepts that, why not add more circumstances to permit it more often?
Same sex marriage is more difficult. There’s the compassion issue, as we are to treat others with love and understanding. But at what point should that be allowed when the faith is tested? Weren’t prostitutes, lepers and tax collectors considered sinners during the time of Jesus? Yet he cavorted with them and changed the rule of his day.
Over time, a similar thinking can evolve. Perhaps the biological potential for creating life won’t be considered paramount for matrimony. Monogamous sexual love and respect may overtake it, which is how our current society sees it.
1
Yes, Francis is beloved by liberals, politicians and others who hope that he will eventually "transform" the church into becoming what they want it to be. There are moral absolutes which many in society want to toss over and replace with secular relativism which in some instances PF appears to do. He hates America and lectured us in the Congress about American greed and capitalism. He is still functioning and maintaining a clerical culture which allowed the clerical child abuse scandal to foment and judging from his recent comments regarding Chilean victims, still knows is continuing.
There is an old saying that "there is nothing worse than a convert" as they are usually filled with the fervor and enthusiasm which their change of heart has brought about within them. Perhaps Mr. Douthat falls into that category. It would be nice to if PF were more shepherd of his flock and pastor than politician and opportunist often scolding us and making us ,particularly Americans, feel we are never doing enough. Many hurting and wounded Catholics are away from the church today for many reasons. Perhaps PF might consider seeking them out as Christ did, hear their stories and try to restore them to a place of peace within themselves and the church.
1
Yet another rousing Douthat endorsement for a conservative, irrelevant, and shrinking Church. Francis is taking steps to make prayer and religion meaningful again, defining a new role for Catholicism in modern life. The only possible good to come from Ross' Catholic recidivism is that it will be much easier to find a parking space at at your local parish church on Sunday (since, of course, so few people will be there and the ones that are there will be too old to drive...).
20
As bright as he might be, Mr. Duthout misses the point that Conservative Catholicism is a rapidly dying religion in the U.S. and in many other more advanced countries. Other than during their sparsely attended masses, it’s rare to find an open Catholic Church in Western Europe. Adherence to practices and beliefs grounded in the subordination of women is an express to oblivion. Insisting on uniformity of actual practice in an ununiform world is nonsensical. Mr. Duthout elevates the man made rules developed over a couple of thousand years by a Church which was highly political and reactionary during most of its existence as the teachings of Jesus. He is entitled to his views. But in my judgment, if such views become prevalent the Catholic Church will continue its inexorable descent into irrelevancy that was briefly interrupted by John XXIII, and has been paused by Francis.
15
Oh Ross, if only you were the Pope... But then it might be like having DT as Pope..He acts like a pope, why not.
4
"The promised [RC Church] cleanup may never actually materialize" partly because Pope Francis seems to have lost is mop and pail.
4
It may take ten thousand years or more, but the sooner humans can extricate themselves from the bonds of these medieval relics like the roman catholic church, the better. Nothing has stunted human growth nor perpetuated war and unrest and misery more than organized religion. If Jorge Bergoglio moves the church in even a slightly saner direction, the world will be better off.
17
Douthat and a few commenters here are looking for Pius IX. As a convert, he seems disappointed that he arrived at Catholicism 150 years too late. Perhaps his demons will be better appeased in the 21st century with fundamentalist bibliolatry. That would give him the comfort of universalist strictures and relieve him of the obligation to produce sesquipedalian prose.
17
There is no doubt that his papacy will be a disaster for just as the St Malachy "prophecy" says, it will be the last. You do not have to believe in prohpecies to see that, it is written every day in the New York Times.
1
I just wonder how many people care about all this Vatican "stuff"?
10
Probably Mr. Douthat's most mean-spirited column ever.
And you claim to be a man of religion?
What's missing here?
14
Any papacy that doesn't/can't/won't fix the International Pederasty Conspiracy within the RCC can only be deemed a grotesque moral and social failure. Camel still won't fit through the eye of a needle.
And when the above is fixed, then the Vatican Bank and the faux-poverty of the RCC should be addressed.
4
"Beloved" by whom? Five years into his papacy, Pope Francis is not "beloved" by more than a small percentage of us American Catholics who go to Mass every week. In fact, many of us consider him the worst CEO imaginable. He derides faithful Catholics who are merely minding their own business as "rigid"; he publicly embraced Italy's most notorious, unrepentant abortionists, calling her "one of the greats"; he has plenty to say about issues that Catholics are free to have any opinion on, such as climate change, but almost nothing to say about Heaven; he casually makes heretical statements, such as dismissing the concept of Hell; he installed a statue of Martin Luther in the Vatican; he meddles in politics, to the extent that he has spent exponentially more time encouraging Muslims to overrun Europe than he has encouraging Catholics to attend Mass - and that's no exaggeration. And all of this shows: check out attendance numbers at Mass around the world: down, down down. If Pope Francis is "beloved", it isn't be Catholics, which is both weird and irrelevant.
21
"encouraging Muslims to overrun Europe" - What? Where are your facts to back that up?
I think there is evidence that Francis has embraced the Beatitudes.
I suggest you try to focus on these three:
Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for justice,
for they shall be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the clean of heart,
for they shall see God.
6
Pope Francis is reviled by the more 'conservative' group of Catholics because of his 'liberal' views. However, as far as I can see, the very words of Jesus (the red type in the bible) say simply to love one another and do so through actions. No pope has ever walked the walk and talked the talk like Pope Francis. He's leaves judgment to our Maker and acts righteously, not self-righteously.
8
So true. This Pope sees Christ in each of us.
3
What a shock that a neoconservative writer like Douthat will trash a liberal pope. He probably thought the priest sex scandal was just one of those things...
10
No such thing as a good Pope.
A French Catholic priest, the Curé Meslier, who had actually been an atheist for all of his adult life, famously wrote something about humankind only being happy the last priest...
You may supply the rest of the sentence.
Really, you’re worried about heresy? When I saw that word I stopped reading. This is the stuff that is emptying churches. What a misdirected use of time and energy. Go volunteer at a soup kitchen or a homeless shelter - stop wasting space.
17
Once again, Ross conflates religion with political ideology. Make your choice once and for all, Ross; do you worship God or do you worship William F. Buckley and Ronald Reagan? Here's a hint, Ross; of the three I mentioned, two are dead and gone.
14
People are leaving the church in DROVES. On a recent trip to Ireland, tour guides stated numerous times about the falling out of church in this Catholic country. I don't want to hear about how it will take decades for any Pope to make the changes that are necessary to regroup the church. If he is indeed God's emissary on earth, then make the changes NOW and be dammed about any naysayers. Women who give up their lives to serve the Lord should be allowed to say Mass and consecrate the Host. Sex offenders must be dealt with immediately and the Church should embrace ALL who want to join and attend. That includes divorced men and women, no questions asked. Then and only them will I see and believe in a Pope who really loves and follows Jesus's message to love one another, no questions asked.
18
Douthat is apparently an Evangelical. Since 85% of his cohorts supported and continue to support Trump, it's clear they have no moral compass, and actually despise the basic truths that Christ did his best to communicate to ALL of humanity.
10
Jesus preached a kingdom that was irrelavant and rejected by the Roman Imperialists, the Jewish legal pharases, and the Zealots of Jewish nationalism. The ideologues of today's Right and Left fail to see that he is not interested in their power trips when they gather in his name.
3
Wasn't Jesus Christ a hero and a heretic?
7
Many may disagree with Mr. Douthat, but Lordy, his prose is inspiring.
3
Thank you for confirming that Pope Francis is in fact a heretic. That he is literally trying to destroy the church from the seat of Peter. It will be God who must deal with anti-christ leader we have been forced to deal with. My prayers going forward are for his removal. He is not even close to being the great leader that Saint John Paul II was. He is exactly what Pope Benedict XVI tried to help us avoid. The introduction of secularism into the church. A war is afoot and we will the true faithful will win with God's assistance.
2
Breathtaking! An entire column devoted to whether Pope Francis a good pope, or a bad pope, or a [fill in the blank] pope.
With all due respect to the Faithful, as they style themselves, the pope, more than any other leading religious figure in the world, resembles the Queen of England: nice house, elegant outfits, lots of servants, plenty of property, no real power. Thank heaven.
In the Muslim world, the word of the right Iman can get somebody killed. In the Jewish world, the word of the right Israeli rabbi can stop you from marrying, can block your entrance to the country, can strip of you of citzenship, and can determine whether you are killed in a war. In the Hindu world, the word of the right pandit can get you legally lynched.
Conservative Roman Catholics long for the wonderful 16th century, the glorious days of Thomas More, who burned Lutherans at the stake for reading the New Testament in English. A pope who acknowledges other faiths, a pope who understands his weakness in the real world, a pope who grasps that he can no longer command, but only request twists them knots of frustration. They secretly envoy those religions that can still shed blood. Our sympathies. Civilization can be brutal.
9
"Francis just spent a recent visit to Chile vehemently defending a bishop accused of turning a blind eye to sex abuse, while one of his chief advisers, the Honduran Cardinal Óscar Maradiaga, is accused of protecting a bishop charged with abusing seminarians even as the cardinal himself faces accusations of financial chicanery."
Until the pope makes an all-out concerted effort to stop Catholic priests and their supervisors from raping children and covering up the crimes, he remains feckless, culpable and undeserving of respect.
Taking on the pope, Ross? Let us know how that works out for you.
2
There are problems with Christianity:
The church tries to lead people to an ethical and moral life in a world now accustomed to using MSNBC and the students of Evergreen State to set their moral compass. And even the compass is becoming controversial.
Francis and Liberal theologians are Interested in finding people where they are, and spending less effort on where they need to be. Without the latter, Christianity becomes useless; a political party or self help book could do as much.
The Anglican model is a dead end. Getting as many people as possible into the large tent says nothing about what goes on in the tent. And as the Anglicans are beginning to learn, if you stand for nothing you are nothing.
4
It wasn’t “grisly sex abuse scandal,” it was an unconscionable global pedophilia cover-up that arguably did more damage to the Church’s reputation than the Medici popes and the Inquisition put together, given modern expectations for religious behavior.
9
Mr Douthat has been repeating this nonsense for a long time. Now he has written a book about it. Pope Francis's Papacy is not a disaster. In fact, the pope has been getting the Church ready for the Return of the Christ. Those who do not follow this Pope will find themselves on the wrong side when the Christ returns - among the goats.
2
"...the present pope has a great gift for gestures that offer a public imitatio Christi, an imitation of Christ." The church and all church doctrine and liturgy involve dramatic imitations and quotations of a man about whom little is known other than that : 1. he preached how to live a decent life amid religious fanaticism and hypocrisy and oppression by a foreign empire with its own then hierarchy; 2. he made enemies; 3. he peacefully gave himself over to Roman soldiers probably to protect his followers from likewise being arrested and tortured; 4. he was executed, taken from the place of execution by his loved ones and followers and in three days, he was reported to be alive. Ross Douthat works for the Romans; he would have worked for them back then as well.
6
There is no reliable history about what transpired in the first century in Rome. St. Peter beginning the linkage to the Pope is myth. Yet Ross twists himself into a pretzel
trying to make sense of it.
3
Ross, you fling around words like "disaster" and temper it only with "might". Is this hyperbole for headlines and clicks? You do not make a case for disaster especially as you start the article on a positive note regarding a catholic state of mind. Please don't be a voice for alarm over discussion as many of your points are valid issues.
IMHO this is a relatively young pope in a lifetime position and while progress on reform is slow it is a political landscape that is largely behind closed doors. His path may take a little longer than the next news cycle but he has the advantage of the long view.
2
The Pope is a fallible man, like so many before him, simply a human. We humans, from time and memorial, have always sought our golden calf, including our created gods and deities. We had no power over feasts and famines, good harvests, lack of rain, too much snow, pests of locusts. the lists are long and harrowing. So we humans and our self-appointed shamans created Religion to pray for help with the totally uncontrollable.
Here we are centuries later still praying for help from an unseen G-d, who is a creation of our imagination. So many rules, hate homosexuality, abortion is bad, fall on our knees to be "forgiven" for some unknown thou shall not. Finally, my G-d is better than your G-d. So many murdered or ostracized in the name of Religion.
My Judaism is showing, with the word God. I too have been persuaded but all these weekly prayers and sermons are meaningless to alter the harsh reality of life. When will we allow ourselves to become what we are, "One Human Family?"
3
You offer a curiously American take on the papacy, focused primarily on sexual and financial scandals. Are you aware that these are not primary concerns of real Catholics, you know, those funny people who live in or near Rome?
3
We get it Ross. You're more Catholic than the Pope. You've been telling us so for a while now.
Isn't arrogance a sin? If it's not, it should be.
17
Another thing that Douthat stumbles over--and whose dialectical logic, as a Christian fundamentalist, he can't bring himself to understand--is: "...What you shall bind on earth, I shall bind in Heaven, and what you shall LOOSE on earth I shall LOOSE in Heaven..." Just as the Church once justified slavery, just as she once praised "just wars," just as she once allowed married priests, just as she once condoned executions, she might very well once again "BLESS" a ritual for the same-sex attracted called "sworn brotherhood," as she once did in the past, as Alan Bray proved in his book "The Friend."
2
I remember Vatican II as a much improved way to attend Mass, in English, not in Latin that we did not understand and with the priest's back to us;not a welcoming sight;Vatican II priests wrote good homilies, didn't insult & bore us with repetition of the readings;the music then got better & more beautiful every year;with these hideous changes made by JP II, who evangelized the church into the white, racist, evangelicals,and by Benedict Ratzinger, Mass is an unlovely, divisive event. The music is mind numbing with the "follow the bouncing ball" repetitive melody of ennui and a spin on the Gloria which is now only for "people of good will". Jesus would never say that, "all are welcome" and people of bad will need Christ's mercy most of all;because JP II and Benedict don't live in the real world they change they prayer from "keep us free from all anxiety" to "distress";well, they are lucky if they only have distress, most of the world has anxiety and worse,but like these conservative fanatics, they can never say the truth,just pretty things up;the arrogance of the prayer change that God "should graciously grant" is a lot of nerve,if you believe in God,then you believe in his graciousness&told tell him that,and worst of all the so-called catholics who joined fanatic evangelicals who pray for the end of the world;how dumb,obnoxious&offensive they are,not working to improve things, just destroy.This is what JP II&Benedict brought;Francis is a light over the darkness they created.
4
All this is skirting the real issue. All religions will continue to lose believers until “truth” replaces “heresy” as a guiding principle.
What the Church did to one of the world’s true geniuses, Galileo, when he decided to see if Copernicus was right about the earth orbiting the sun as opposed to church teaching of the opposite, was terrible. But that was in the 1600s. What is truly unforgivable and shows the obtuse culture of the church is that took 300 YEARS, to 1965, for the church to grudging pardon Galileo when the rest of the world knew the TRUTH for centuries!
Nope, this pope may do this and the next pope may do that but all that amounts to is nibbling around the edges!! Unless the core value of religion has the strength to be influenced and modified by truth for the good of mankind, people who actually “think” will leave the pews!
“I feel no obligation to believe that the same god who endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect intended us to forego their use!” (Galileo)
1
Supernaturalists looking for real politic are adorable until you have to listen to them.
The Church must either change or die a slow, undignified death.
Since the 1960's, the U.S. Catholic population has grown from over 46 million to over 68 million; the number of priests, though, has shrunk by almost half. In the eighties, the ratio of laity to diocesan priests was 875 to 1; now it's 2000 to 1. There are over 3500 parishes that have no resident priest or pastor.
Worldwide, it's even worse. In poor, remote areas, parishioners might hear Mass only two or three times a year.
Research tells us that if celibacy were optional-if priests were allowed to marry-there would be four times as many vocations. Yet still the Church clings to this outmoded doctrine, even though it wasn't canon law until the Middle Ages. When will the Church give up its weird obsession with chastity and virginity? It's deeply offensive, forcing men and women religious to forever give up a part of existence that is so human, so joyful. It's led to all kinds of shame and abuse. Let priests marry, and you'll see the church revive.
1
A short note on St. Francis of Assisi (follow-up to my longer comment):
Francis of Assisi, alive in the late 12th-early 13th C., is known for his dedication to absolute poverty and dividing his existence between prayer, work, preaching, and serving the poor. It is indeed fitting that Jorge Bergoglio would take the name of Francis.
Lesser-known about St. Francis is that he went with the Crusaders to Damietta (in present-day Egypt), although he wasn't a soldier. Upon his return to Italy his brothers in faith were organized into an official Order, approved by the papacy in 1223. No surprise, then, that he missed the evangelical poverty of his earlier days.
But the most disturbing part of the story is that after his death his faith-brothers were implicated in the Inquisition. Proving, once again, that no good deed goes unpunished.
Let's hope St. Francis' radicalism is reincarnated in our current Pope.
1
"Heretic" comes from the Greek word, "haeresis," meaning "another 'choice'." That's it; nothing more. Over the centuries, the official RC church--starting with the Pope--were the sole arbiters of who got smeared with the opprobrium, "heretic." In the earliest days (3rd-4th C.) this was straightforwardly applied to "traditional" religions like Judaism and Paganism, thence to Christian offshoots like Gnosticism and Manichaeism, and culminating in the Crusades against not just Muslims but plenty of fellow "Christians" such as the Cathars in Spain, France, and Italy.
Catharism is particularly noteworthy because its adherents were much closer to the early Christian church's ideal of walking in the footsteps of Jesus: Vows of poverty, dedication to serving the poor, and preaching the Gospel far and wide. That the Pope and RC church saw this as a threat to their authority and literally wiped them out (property seizures, imprisonment if you were lucky and burning at the stake if you weren't) says all you need to know. A key component of the RC church's longevity and wealth accumulation was that it was tax-exempt from nearly its inception in the 4th C. Some things never change.
Pope Francis is as close to Evangelical (in the traditional sense) as any pope ever. That alone makes him a threat to the traditional power structures and ossified hierarchy of superior clerics. Let's hope he uses his bully pulpit and papal infallibility wisely. Jesus would approve.
2
Speaking of heresy: Isn't merely questioning the Pope's infallibility grounds for excommunication, Mr. Douthat? Or have you yourself made some truce with doctrinal purity?
Atheist here; just curious.
4
Today’s RC Reading from the Second Chapter of Wisdom:
First reading
Wisdom 2:1,12-22
Let us lie in wait for the virtuous man and condemn him to a shameful death
“Let us lie in wait for the virtuous man, since he annoys us
and opposes our way of life,
reproaches us for our breaches of the law
and accuses us of playing false to our upbringing.
He claims to have knowledge of God,
and calls himself a son of the Lord.
Before us he stands, a reproof to our way of thinking,
the very sight of him weighs our spirits down;
his way of life is not like other men’s,
the paths he treads are unfamiliar.
In his opinion we are counterfeit;
he holds aloof from our doings as though from filth;
he proclaims the final end of the virtuous as happy
and boasts of having God for his father.
Let us see if what he says is true,
let us observe what kind of end he himself will have.
If the virtuous man is God’s son, God will take his part
and rescue him from the clutches of his enemies.
Let us test him with cruelty and with torture,
and thus explore this gentleness of his
and put his endurance to the proof.
Let us condemn him to a shameful death
since he will be looked after – we have his word for it.’
This is the way they reason, but they are misled,
their malice makes them blind.
They do not know the hidden things of God,
they have no hope that holiness will be rewarded,
they can see no reward for blameless souls.”
Mr. Douthat, your church has a lot to answer for: centuries of subjugating women, demonizing homosexuals, systemic abuse of children in order to protect a morally bankrupt organization. There was never any justification for a top heavy hierarchy of OLD WHITE MEN living large at the expense of the faithful.
8
Ross, Thank you. I appreciated that very much.
1
You are letting your faith get in the way of logic. The definition of "heresy" is being rewritten every day: Francis with regard to religion and Trump with regard to politics. The iterations attempted by the Pope and far easier to accept than those of our esteemed leader. In the long term, time may be on the Pope's side. Not so with Trump.
5
I say fire the pope and all the cardinals and bishops. Dump the whole vatican bureaucracy and let those that believe have a direct and personal relationship with their god.
2
I cannot believe anyone takes this hocus locus stuff seriously anymore. No one i know does.
7
Where are Gemli and Socrates when you need them?
3
Politics, politics.
Where is the real religion, Ross?
1
If wish that I, like Ross, could make a living writing books based on false premises.
2
Pope Francis is the first Jesuit Pope. This upsets many conservative Catholics like Ross Douthat. It's about time the Catholic Church had a more liberal pope. It's not like the church is suddenly going abandon 2000 years of doctrine or start ordaining female priests. Give it a rest Russ...
5
Mr. Douthat, substitute “Rome” for “China,” and almost every idea here could have been written about Jesus or St. Paul.
1
Douthat should consider switching sides. The Southern Baptist religion is a better fit. After all, the Southern Baptist's are the defacto religion of American conservatives.
4
“...operates in a media environment in which traditional religion generally, and Roman Catholicism especially, are often covered with a mix of cluelessness and malice.”
“...if it found a way to slip the knots that the modern world has tied around its message.”
Yes. Poor Catholic Church. Everything would be coming up roses were it not for all those godless journalists.
5
I think I understand Douthat’s point: Pope Francis threatens to erode the grandeur, the majesty of the Catholic Church with his obsessive attention To Jesus Christ,
9
It's amazing that Douthat finds the time to criticize the Pope, the only Pope to utter the words, "who am I to judge" in response to a question about homosexuality. Yet, not one word about the Christian "Taliban" in this country....right wing religious extremists who are destroying and dividing this nation with legalized hatred via the Republican Party.
9
The zeal of converts is always empty. RD will someday look back on all his fulminations, excitement and interest in papal strategies as a black hole of wasted time.
1
This pope is a fraud. He is just a populist like Trump. He may not consort with porn stars but his behavior towards autocratic regimes is inexcusable. His refusal to receive Cubans against the regime, his inability to criticize Maduro, his continuous acceptance and endorsement of the most vile corrupt politicians from his Argentina is unacceptable.
He clearly wants people to remain poor. He was once asked why he didn't talk about the middle class and he had no answer for it.
Unlike JP-II who understood that capitalism takes people away from poverty, Francis attacked it. He prefers them poor and uneducated.
And don't forget he celebrated the Funeral Mass for Cardinal Law. He should have avoided that.
1
Legitimizing Chinese communists as "Catholic Bishops" is tantamount to introducing a Trojan horse or malicious virus into your own computer. The Communist party controls China-not the other way around.
Good grief! Francis needs to follow Benedict's example: retire, leave Rome and keep quiet.
2
"He leads a church that spent the prior decade embroiled in a grisly sex abuse scandal, occupies an office often regarded as a medieval relic . . ."
Amen.
Gee, Mr. Douthat, you obviously know what's true and best for the Holy Mother Church, I guess *you* should be pope. Like was said about pornography, you've effectively said that you can't define heresy but you know it when you see it and Pope Francis is preaching it.
And here I thought the Pope was the guiding light of the Church....goodness knows she's been needing one to lead towards light and grace....as opposed to goose-stepping dogmatic rigidity so far from Jesus that has been so absent from the authoritarian and privileged (and perverted) hierarchy of the Church for so long, so badly absent that the last Pope examined his conscience and abdicated...the first Pope to do so in some 600 years. Maybe something was wrong? And if Francis hasn't overcome the tremendous inertia of the Church, perhaps it's because he's human, because he doesn't have a quiver of lightning bolts, because he is, in the end, primus inter (an enormous horde of) pares. But maybe you could resign your post at the NYTimes and devote your life to making real substantive change in the Church....instead of cheap shots at all and sundry, such that it seems like nothing that Francis is doing is making a difference
4
Lots of nattering about what ultimately boils down to a collection of fairy tales...
4
The Catholic Church has always had the unyielding hierarchy/unchanging teachings tempered by individual priests (and nuns) who "bent the rules" in individual cases. The difference now is that the rules-oriented "purists" are coming after priests and nuns who actually "accompany" individual Catholics. These rules-oriented "traditional" Catholics are acting like the Nazi SS: they root out LGBTQ Catholics who have the nerve to love one another and proclaim that love in a civil union. They call social justice-loving nuns "radical feminists" and start investigations. American Catholics are not having it. We have embraced the primacy of individual conscience that was validated with Vatican II. We are not going back. We want to go forward. Pope Francis is harkening back to the "good old days" when priests and bishops let one another "live and let live." He is not stopping the terrorist bully bishops from attacking the pastoral priests and bishops, using "the letter of the law" as its cudgel.
4
Ross always wants us to believe that the conservatives in the Catholic Church have the better idea. But the ideological conservatives ruled for centuries and gave us the scandal of the selling of babies by the Irish Church to the cooperation with military regimes in parts of Latin America (hence liberation theology). Just a bit earlier, the Church accepted Mussolini and did little to stop Hitler. And in the US, though things were better by the 1960s, they accepted Jim Crow and the oppression of blacks. A Church that started with martyrs ended with meek office holders.
And by the way, even gay marriage can be incorporated into the Church. Matrimony, after all, was not a sacrament for most of the first 1000 years of the Church and even after, many peasant couples simple co-habited.
The Church has a mixed up message that it built up over the years. Starting with Jesus’s wonderful sayings, the Church layered on Roman law and over time incorporated a host of ideas that simply cannot be worked out. For example, transubstantiation is unworkable - just how long is the sacred host present in the body? Till when- to excretion? It is all nonsense.
Maybe the Church will wither away into something like what is in England. So great Christmas music and funerals, but little relevance.
5
Thank you for mentioning the "selling of babies by the Irish Church." The last Magdalene Laundry closed in Ireland in 1996. Catholic nuns operated de-facto torture chambers dishing out physical penance to Catholic girls until the 1960's as far as I know. And, unfortunately, I know some. Corrupt, oppressive hierarchies have always operated amid secrets and lies.
2
A load of intellectual mumbo jumbo.
Before you is a holy man.
You don't need to outsmart him or carve out corners of contrarianism.
Be strong enough --and smart enough --to look and listen with your heart and pray proper homage to a good and decent man.
A living saint.
6
Ross's Catholicism has rules and a backstory. Changing either messes with the integrity of the eternal game.
Many generations have passed believing in some hair-raising tale about the creation of the Universe and invisible eyes in the sky. Several legends have powerfully influenced human history; Roman Catholicism's success rests largely on the set of moral rules it has offered to diverse communities worldwide.
Before the rise of nation states and the rule of Constitutional law, religion provided a framework for human interaction. For example, the Church has forever condemned divorce, although the Church's executors have figured out a way to finesse annulments so that their most powerful supporters might have their cake and eat it too.
It's one thing to have rules that can be bent for friends. It's quite another to announce that the rules by which two millennia of most of Western Civilization have lived their lives were just guidelines that might be erased now that people no longer need them.
So, like a dramaturg jealously guarding the exact wording of an obscure Shakespearean metaphor, Ross hectors the players wearing the RC shirts not to color outside the lines drawn by earlier churchmen. I get his point: When you start fiddling with the rules and diluting the punishments, what's left of the game?
As has been demonstrated by another of the world's top religions, the surest way to grow the brand is to encourage ignorance and zealotry. Let's get back to basics.
2
I was amused by the dichotomy in the reference to "whether his agenda is farsighted or potentially heretical." Is not farsightedness usually considered heretical, especially when it first appears?
15
As an atheist who was brought up Catholic, and attended religious schools through 12th grade, I find it difficult to believe that so many people cannot come to grips with the idea that religion has gotten it wrong for millennia. The sexual mores espoused by many religions are utterly irrelevant in an era of reliable birth control. Sex has never really been about morality; the only immoral aspect of it arises from possible procreation without a pair of responsible parents. There is no reason to eschew sex if the likelihood of pregnancy is virtually non-existent.
The idea that marriage endures until death is ridiculous. How many people have lived miserable lives because they married the wrong partner? Does the Catholic Church propose that decades of unhappiness is preferable to a parting of the ways? It goes back to the idea that if you've had sex with someone, you're tied to them for life. Rubbish!
Francis has the intellectual prowess to question these antiquated ideas, and suggest that there might be better answers. He may offend the old guard, but he's making Catholicism palatable to a new generation that hasn't been steeped in tradition that dates back thousands of years. If the RC Church fails to abandon moribund ideas, it will itself perish. Why can't Douthat see this?
18
You forgot to say "consent-based sex." Where are the lines? So you disagree with "you shall not commit adultery" because you reject God and his law. So what's wrong with a 30 year old and a 13 year old? You can't just say "the law," which is arbitrary and changeable. With cheating on your spouse? Any problem there? etc. Morality is always relative for you, isn't it? Oh, but that would give away that it's really complicated, men and women are different, sexual relations are meant to bind people, just like the teachings and commandments, and commitment and self sacrifice do matter in love. But you never said the word love, did you?
1
I am not a Biblical scholar but I don't remember Jesus talking about the issues you mention in your article, Mr. Douthat. I think Pope Francis wants a return to the Gospel message: Living the Beatitudes, caring for the poor and marginalized, loving our neighbor no matter their age, race, nationality, color, or sexual orientation; ending the insanity of war.
10
The Pope is infallible. He can permit same-sex marriage and allow priests to marry either men or women. This would significantly cut the number of sex abuse scandals.
3
It’s amazing that you think you can write about the Catholic Church, yet seem clueless about one of its most basic truths: that it is ultimately the Holy Spirit who guides fallible men in choosing a fallible leader, who in the eyes of even more fallible conservative pundits, doesn’t appear to always make decisions that will please everyone.
4
Middle aged, lifelong Catholic here. What I'm discovering in adulthood is what I was never allowed to learn about Christ's Church when I was in school, both good and bad. The good is the beautiful and fascinating history and tradition, the teachings and morals that were displaced by a dumbed-down, watery, pale, rudderless and emasculated post Vatican II version. Meanwhile, the seminaries emptied and the liberals pushed their "sexual revolution," great idea, and thanks boomers for all the divorce and broken families. Hoorah for contraception and abortion! (And they get pretty upset when any Church leader or member speaks against it!) It's not a reactionary response to note that during this "revolution," part of the Church was infected (during my childhood and beyond) by child abusing perverts who were ignored by some, protected by others...and then there's good Catholic people who just pray and obey, or have had enough and stay away. I escaped, but here I am trying to be a disciple and follower of Christ, convinced as I am of the truth of the Church's teachings, that some things never change, it's just some people's "new" "enlightened" thinking which has always been. The self is not the center, Christ is the center. So I embrace this very human institution as a thinking person, willing to listen but knowing Christ commanded us to follow the letter of the law because he fulfilled it. The hard sayings of Jesus should be read first, then speak. Sometimes, change is not good.
3
Hey, I don't care if priests speak against contraception and abortion. They can preach whatever they want. Catholics can believe what they want. I get upset when they tell people who to vote for. We used to have this notion of separation of church and state in this country. That's over now. It's a really good thing there's no way I can become president because the first thing I would do is yank every church's tax exemption. Every. Single. Church.
All this Catholic stuff is a lot of twaddle. Catholicism has always been an a la carte religion because there were so many stupid rules, and nobody could reasonably be expected to obey them all unless they were nuns or priests. Every girl back in the day when oral contraception first became available was on the pill while they sat on their pews on Sundays. I think Christ had some pretty good ideas, but Christ was also a man, let's not forget.
Don't blame liberals for just being normal.
Mr Douthat melds present to future; and I think he's right. "These geographical divisions predate Francis, but unlike his predecessors he has blessed them, encouraged them and enabled would-be liberalizers to develop their ambitions further."
And here's his examples: "..church’s approach to assisted suicide is traditional if you listen to the bishops of Western Canada, flexible and accommodating if you heed the bishops in Canada’s Maritime Provinces. In the United States, Francis’ appointees in Chicago and San Diego are taking the lead in promoting a “new paradigm” on sex and marriage, while more conservative archbishops from Philadelphia to Portland, Ore., are sticking with the old one."
Mr Douthat categorizes Pope Francis' 'great achievements' as "truces" - attesting to a longer view that something's going to give.
"But the two truces (with cultural war and with Beijing) are similar in that both would accelerate Catholicism’s transformation into a confederation of national churches — liberal and semi-Protestantized in northern Europe, conservative in sub-Saharan Africa, Communist-supervised in China."
I think that the new believers will face great tribulations in China, possibly not seen since Christ's time. The yardsticks of Rome, The Old World, and America may be joined by one as significant (or contemporarily more significant).
1
My internal editor always arrives AFTER I hit Submit. I meant - "as seen from the time of early Christians."
What is China's leadership resolved to?
Governor Pliny wrote Emperor Trajan for advice in dealing with "The Christian Problem," AD 112:
.. in accordance with your instructions, I had forbidden political associations. Accordingly, I judged it all the more necessary to find out what the truth was by torturing two female slaves who were called deaconesses. But I discovered nothing else but depraved, excessive superstition.
https://www.christianity.com/church/church-history/timeline/1-300/what-w...
Douthat's book on this pope is going to have the same effect as a published book of George W. Bush's paintings.
Nice, but no one is going to buy it.
3
Ah yes. ..preaching liberation theology in the West while assuring Beijing it will never mix religion and politics.
2
This pope is a pastor--and also a pope with his hand on the tiller of the church.
But the last several popes have not been pastors. This is the source of the loss that Catholicism has suffered. Retreating to 19th century (heretical?) practices will only accelerate the loss.
Catholicism is a wonderful blend of intellectual and emotional faith, unlike evangelical Christianity, which is all emotion: heartfelt, personal, and generally exclusive.
The pope is familiar with sacred text, and knows what he is doing. We have strayed from that text over a few centuries. He is bringing the church into the modern world, as St. Francis brought it into the streets of urbanizing Italy.
The one thing neither Francis nor Russ has done is include the women of the church in its hierarchy and governance. Until it does, the church will not appeal to women and will retard their full equality.
Many would return if women were included and the Vatican mess was swept away like the moneychangers at the temple. We need a radical reset and attention to the text. Yes, church rules do not have to be obeyed if they are at war with faith, and faith is a matter that often contradicts protocols and expectations.
The essence of Catholicism must be reclaimed and proclaimed. Power to the poor, the disenfranchised, the women, the left behind, the slaves, children and the anathematized. This is the grand paradox of Christianity: it is a faith for sinners, not the pious.
5
Ross, how can you claim a "Catholic witness for human dignity" when the Church relegates half of humanity to a subordinate position simply on the basis of a genetic roll of the dice? How does "You can be a member of the clergy because of your reproductive organs, and you can't, for the same reason", translate into "human dignity"?
4
Maleness and femaleness is now just one's reproductive organs. Well shut my mouth. And that of the left. Someone tell them, please.
1
Claiming all Scripture is the Word of God, which all major religions do, was the fatal mistake. Stifles all debate and ability to progress and evolve. Christianity would be a nice social construct if it weren't for this.
Biggest mistake the human race ever made.
What other part of our culture is still the same it was in the sixteenth century?
2
Benedict was (is) more exclusionary. Francis is more inclusionary. Which is more Christ-like?
3
I think a Pope should disband the Vatican -- not the Church -- but the Curia and the offices. Every single person working for the RCC in the Vatican should be given another posting or an early retirement. Starting with the foreign office, the Congregation of the Doctrine, and the bank, every institution should be shuttered. Drain the swamp, and start over. Or, maybe the Vatican will never be functional again.
3
Thanks to all the Commenters who suffered through another Douthat column and weighed in thereon. Your rebuttals are all I need to remind myself that the Renaissance was not a fad.
I also stopped checking in on my buggy whips stocks years ago.
6
Arrogance I can put up with. Stupidity, as well. But the combination, as exemplified in your comment, is just intolerable.
I think that Francis should keep pushing. After all; no risk, no reward.
2
This is an intriguing piece, but like so many of Ross Douthat's discourses it is so laden with abstractions and overstated dichotomies that its ultimate argument eludes me. Can someone at the Times please lean on this highly intelligent commentator to write in plainer terms that make his concerns not just talking points but concrete realities? As a model, I suggest the down-to-earth vividness of John XXIII, still the greatest of our most recent Popes.
4
NONE of this geopolitical theology mumbo-jumbo matters unless he stops the priest sex abuse and restores a modicum of integrity to the priesthood. Though I was abused at age 11 by one of Pope Francis' fellow Jesuits, I still attend Mass EVERY Sunday and see, as everyone else does, that THERE'S NO ONE THERE, especially under 50 yrs old because THEY CAN'T STAND THE HYPOCRISY.
2
The office of Pope is an incredibly difficult one as spiritual leader, absolute monarch and head of state. God always finds a way of shaking things up and Pope Francis is no exception. Despite this he has managed to combine the pastoral and public appeal of JPII and the toughness of Benedict XVI whilst at the same time acting as a catalyst for change. Locally he has changed the curia through living amongst them and internationally he is respected as a world leader ranking in the top 3 and played a key role in the US-Cuba deal. To fully understand Pope Francis we must remember he is a Jesuit who have a history of challenge when they discern something is at odds with the faith. He also imitates Christ in the way at times his messages do not appear immediately obvious.
4
Douthat calls for the RCC to recognize "the consistency of Catholic doctrine and its fidelity to Jesus" and "the clarity of Catholic witness for human dignity." But how can iit hope to do the former when it so firmly stands against the latter? If a church must start by excluding half the earth's population from its priesthood, and further exclude millions more for imaginary "moral" offenses, it has no hope.
If Catholic doctrine was centered more on Jesus and less on the mean-spirited St. Paul, the actual founder of the Christian worldview, we'd all be better off.
4
Has Douthat lost his mind? Does he really believe that anyone with a modicum of historical knowledge forget that for all its vaunted sclerosis the Catholic Church has always sought to reform, to accommodate? For instance,it's not until the second Lateran Council in the early 1100's that priests were forbidden to marry. French Kings (and only them) even before the Renaissance were allowed to appoint their own bishops as they saw fit. Before the Council of Trent threw the kibosh on the Reformation, much of the high clergy of Northern Europe sought a middle ground between Protestant Evangelism and a freewheeling indulgence dispensing church. And speak of progress:The Catholic Church embraced evolution in the XIXth century while today's evangelists build creationist theme parks in the Midwest. All this indicated a sure sign: In due time priests will marry again, women will be ordained and same-sex marriage will be consecrated. Where does it say so in the Bible? Like always, look hard enough and it is written.
Thank God, Douthat's authority on matters Catholic matches his stodginess. Nothing enlightening in this column.
8
As an enthusiastic Episcopalian Anglican, I read your comments on the “Anglican model” with great interest. It is true that in many dioceses of the Episcopal Church we are much more concerned with building the Kingdom of God, pursuing spiritual growth, and learning to follow the Way of Christ than we are about doctrine.
I find this to be a very good thing and something the Roman Catholic church should try. Following Christ is not primarily about doctrine! It is not about being “saved”! It is about growing spiritually, building community, socializing and having fun, building the Kingdom of God on Earth, working for justice, and walking the Way.
By relaxing doctrine I have seen people’s energy and enthusiasm for Christ unleashed. The positive effects of welcoming the full participation of women in the clergy have been remarkable.
I agree that it is vital to study and debate doctrine. I agree that by loosening up, there is a danger in going too far. I agree that some sections of the Episcopal Church have gone too far and become too partisan. But all in all, I feel that it is far better to put spirituality and practice ahead of doctrine.
7
The clash between the medieval structure of the Roman Catholic Church and the 21st century need for viable, life-giving spirituality that can celebrate life's key moments in a community liturgy remains a key challenge for Pope Francis. His continued support for an all male, celibate clergy, to celibate the Mass shows his weakness as a leader/reformer. That said, his gentle, caring ways are inspiring in light of the Church's history and his austere, stern, judgment and harsh predecessors. He is a light in an otherwise dark history, a gift to all those struggling to hold on to their Catholic tradition.
4
Douthat writes that Jorge Bergoglio was chosen by the cardinals as "the austere outsider". Austere? He's neither strict nor serious in demeanor; he's known for his informality, common touch, and accessibility.
Outsider? Elected at age 76, first Jesuit pope, background was seminary studies, ordained priest, provincial superior of Society of Jesus, Archbishop of Buenos Aires, then cardinal, a prince of the church. He's conversant in Latin, the official language of the Holy See. He's the very definition of an insider because his entire adult life has been in significant service to his church and he has a knowledgeable understanding of how it functions.
The cardinals chose him because they were guided by the Holy Spirit. Neither hero nor heretic: he's a humble man with popular appeal. His critics are modern day Pharisees.
9
Ross - Again you get the intelectual side of our faith but not the spirit. Spend some time with a divorced woman denied a annulment or transgender Catholic and try to understand the other part of being Catholic
11
Ross hasn’t met any part of Catholicism he understands.
The New Testament isn’t what informs Catholic sexuality. That was St. Paul. And he just made it up on the fly. St. Augustine wasn’t much better. Paul detested the act of procreation.
One wonders if Douthat has read up on his own religion, and how its scandals involving children, and the deplorable acts of Irish nuns have led it straight into its own irrelevancy.
Catholic social teaching, however, does come from the NT. And, no matter how many times Douthat stomps his feet and shouts, the message of inclusiveness and helping the less fortunate is decidedly liberal.
10
They're all a bunch of guys. Men who cling to the old structures of domination, and view women as a threat to be excluded. I was raised and educated Catholic, and learned that the only females who could approach the altar, were the nuns who cleaned it.
If we don't learn to communicate and then discover our internal "other half", things won't change.
7
It's all bread and circuses. This pope is the theological equivalent of P. T. Barnum, hence the inability of many to see that great words can cover up a total lack of actions.
2
I see the Catholic Church going through many of the same changes as the Protestant denominations, and think that we are witnessing a new Reformation in which Christianity will either come, kicking and screaming into a more science based 21st century, or it will be consigned to the dustbins of history. (Clever turn of phrase, no?)
1
I have a growing suspicion that Pope Francis is being “managed” by some fairly progressive clerics intent on accomplishing a fairly liberal agenda.
2
As a former Catholic who went to Catholic school, I can only say that my opinion of the current pope is that he is a master manipulator. He appears to be something that he is not; he has made no real change in the church. Women still have no power in the Church, pedophelia still runs rampant I am sure, while priests are protected. The Church is an anachronism and so is the pope. Anyone who wants to honor “god” should do so by caring for “the least of these, my people”.
4
As a recovering Catholic I somehow need to keep up with its politics. I work very closely with my aged uncle, a saint of a priest who has worked 60 years in the cause of bringing Christ, in the form of worldly aid, to poor Mexican migrant workers, farmers and parishes.
He is sure that the Church is going to collapse of its own obesity and it will be reborn (Hindu pun intended) closer to the people it is supposed to serve. I hope he is right.
Except in the men and women like my uncle who truly serve the children of God I see very little of Christ in the Catholic Church.
5
More likely this papacy of the current Bishop of Rome will, in retrospect, be irrelevant. The sexual abuse scandals have and continue to open cracks in the edifice that are only opening wider; declining church and religious affiliation continues to drain its finances; the vaunted political empire of the Vatican remains a sealed-off crime family whose opaque financial concealments invite only more cynicism; aside from the developing countries with low GDP/population ratios, citizens are growing more educated, literate, knowledge seeking, and skeptical. As to whether one pope can turn all these realities to a different direction, probably won't matter.
2
Religion itself is smoke and mirrors, either fantasy or outright fraud depending on who is pushing it. So, why not a little more from its current superstar?
3
Ross Douthat chose Catholicism as not his first choice or even second as a religion. So he came to it because it met a need at that time for him. He has limited experience of Catholicism as a lived religion. As a "cradle Catholic" who attended Catholic grammar school, high school and college my understanding grew and changed as I did. His idea of the Catholic religion is frozen in time- the time when he came to it. And he thought it met a need of his. He needs to grow both in his understanding and how to live a religion rather than stating that since it does not seem to be the institution he thought it was when he picked it that it is wrong. Maybe he will just pick up and leave as he did with his prior choices.
13
I think Pope Francis is well aware that he is taking risks. But I think he is not trying to take these risks either for or against the propping up of his own reputation now or in the future, whether positive or negative. He is using his best lights which are always dimmed by the human condition; hence, the risk. At the same time, he is offering his own life in this blender of historical change when so many leaders at every level are forced to walk the best they can on a tight rope. I think he gave up being a pleaser a long time ago and knows very well that he may in fact be judged a loser. Just like Jesus.
The Roman Pontiff of all people appears to have forgotten the first of the four marks of the Church: The Church is one.
2
Mr. Douhat is incredibly unaware of his personal tribal biases and unstated assumptions. Success, in Mr. Douhat's eyes, is simplistically measured in terms of sheep gathered/souls captured by the Roman Catholic Church - any action which increases the size of the flock is success. On the other hand, any action which diminishes the clout of the Roman Catholic Church is considered by Mr. Douhat to be a negative, even though it might produce an immense benefit for humanity as a whole. Mr. Douhat has a painfully parochial outlook.
1
( 1 ) "He leads a church that spent the prior decade embroiled in a grisly sex abuse scandal..." Cardinal Pell's pre-trial hearing in Australia is going on right now; why the use of the past tense?
( 2 )"...that liberal Westerners tend to assume Catholicism must eventually accept — shifts on sexual morality above all..." Church recognized and registered same-sex unions (famously Cosmos & Damien, Sergius & Bacchus, and many, many others) were around forever; until they weren't.
( 2a ) The celibacy "rule" was established by the Second Lateran Council in 1139; hardly a teaching of Jesus, 1,000 years after the establishment of the Church.
( 3 ) The Church always enjoyed the wisdom of great women (Teresa of Ávila, Catherine of Siena - Doctors of the Church, both, not to mention an array of great abbesses), and we were kind of moving in that direction again, until the Polish Imperialist came along and stopped that in its tracks;
( 4 ) "...would require the church to explicitly cede a share of its authority to appoint bishops to the Politburo — a concession familiar from medieval church-state tangles, but something the modern church has tried to leave behind." There wasn't a priest appointed to a hamlet in Franco's Spain without his say-so, let alone a bishop. Not quite as "medieval" as you'd like to believe, Ross?
( 5 ) And as far as Francis himself is concerned: "Who am I to judge gay people..." Until he did, in Manila, a couple of months after saying that. Cf. "jesuitical".
3
I don't understand these criticisms of Francis at all. Consider that it was the guidance of the Holy Ghost that inspired the Cardinals to elect him, and, on matters of faith, he is guided by God almighty and thus his decisions and pronouncements on maters of faith and doctrine are infallible. So how can people like Douthat judge his papacy "harshly" ex post, since most
of what they really object to are matters of doctrine, on which Francis just transmits the will of God? Or perhaps the conservatives "know" what God "really" wants or intends regarding issues such as "the sexual ethics of the New Testament", and, in their eyes, He is not doing a good job of transmitting his desires to Francis. It's one thing to worship God and entirely another to think that you are God.
4
I don’t think he has ever come to terms with his history in Argentina.
2
Ross, what is your problem in "breaking bread" with so-called sinners? Pope Francis is certainly in good company, doing the same thing Jesus did when he ate with and welcomed the outcasts of his day to table fellowship. Francis, by encouraging the accompaniment of those struggling in their earthly pilgrimage to be faithful, is doing in the Church what Jesus did in his day when he was criticized for welcoming those considered to be sinners and eating with them.
7
The crux of the issue resides as the author states in “the consistency of Catholic doctrine and its fidelity to Jesus”. Currently Catholic doctrine has lost most of what the Christ preached, The current pope is discerning with the help of the Holy Spirit the best way to return to the true path. Of course conservatives and followers of the misleading and obsolete doctrine are not happy
Pope Francis is more of the same - ignore the child abuse of his colleagues, treat women as second class citizens and pretend to live a simple life while surrounded by the riches of the church. Same old, same old.
I'm a long-lapsed Catholic, more in tune with the eminent Catholic theologian George Carlin's view of religion than anyone else's. When Time magazine made the Pope its man of the year, my immediate thought was that he hardly deserved the honor, awarded more for what he might do than what he actually had done, which was as of then basically nothing. Rather, it was the year of gay marriage, and a wedded gay couple would have been the more obvious and appropriate choice. But making the safe choice is always, well, the safe choice.
1
As a Presbyterian pastor, I have found great truth in this saying: "Institutional change happens as the result of gentle pressure relentlessly applied. The key words being: Gentle and relentless." My hunch is that Francis is using both gentle and relentless ways to move the Catholic Church in a good, gospel direction toward the poor and greater openness. I pray he succeeds.
7
In his need to come up with a whole book of info on Pope Francis Mr. Douhat may be overanalyzing this. And if Mr. Douhat is talking to the old grouches who want the church to be like it was in 1958 if not 1558 he’s of course going to get negative reviews on Francis.
What’s going on is simple: Pope Francis is responding to the call of the Gospel and reaching out with love to all sorts of people, especially the marginalized--and he's doing a great job. Mr. Douhat makes an excellent observation that Pope Francis can’t change most of the many rules of the Catholic Church, and so he’s come up with ways to work around them. Of course, some of these rules deserve to be ignored, a great example being those driven by hatred of gay people.
In the process he has drawn the opposition of church bureaucrats and ordinary members who have more attachment to those arcane rules than to the big rule Jesus tried to teach over and over, that of “Love one another.” Jesus foresaw this problem when he upbraided the Pharisees in Matthew 15:8-9: “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.”
The church has survived 2,000 years, and it does change. Sometimes overdue change happens rapidly, as under the papacy of Pope John XXIII. But sometimes it takes time. Francis will also bring about positive change, although the changes he is setting in motion may not be felt for years.
1
It’s time for Francis to expeditiously and transparently prosecute priest sexual abusers and their enablers. I’ve worked with fine diocesan priests, and priests from several religious orders, who were deeply appalled by the trauma inflicted by their confreres’ on individuals, families and communities. Yet, they also demonstrated a deep aversion to exposing & dismantling the institutional dysfunction honed over centuries.
Catholics believe that Christ subjected himself to public pain, humiliation and crucifixion to atone for human sin. In my opinion, when Christ’s Roman Church desires reconciliation and resurrection it’s hierarchy will subject itself publicly to the death of clerical corruption, abuse & discrimination.
Still Waiting, I’m praising Pope Francis and defending him against his critics who are determined to preserve the church of 1958. But I’m quick to agree that his one weak spot is he’s allowed himself to be caught up in the problem you observe. This is that some of those who have grown up in the priesthood, not matter how wonderful they may be personally, can still have problems outing their fellow priests. But let’s hope the tough time Francis had on his trip to South America provided some on-the-job training for him on this issue. I’m such a fan of his that I still look forward to him saying something like, “Hey, this has been a learning experience for me, and I now realize we have to go once more into the breach and at long last purge any remaining perpetrators of child molestation and be sure we have done justice to all their victims.
But wait, how about this? As part of this, what if he also said, “And, we have to realize that one of the contributors to this problem was our long-antiquated requirement that priests can’t marry, so let’s get rid of that!” (Interestingly, this had risen to the top of Pope John XXIII’s agenda in the wake of Vatican II, but he died before he could make this happen.)
And of course, the ideal would be for Francis to then also say, “And furthermore, not allowing women to be priests also contributed to this problem, so while we're at work let’s open that door also, which we need to do now anyway for all the other obvious reasons!”
Of course it is also possible, Mr. Douthat, that he sees his role as pope less in terms of realpolitik and more as an attempt to focus on the gospel's call to metanoia. Maybe JP2 and Benedict got it wrong in their effort to centralize rather than inculturate Maybe Christianity is closest to the heart of Jesus when it leads with mercy rather than judgment. No pope is perfect, including Francis. But it does seem to me -- as a former RC, now an Episcopal priest -- that the Holy Spirit got this right. Whether Catholic or otherwise, it's nice to have a pope who leads with love, not dogma. We had 35 years of doctrine-first. Mercy and love need to be heard and felt, too.
5
The Spirit is a living thing, life itself in fact, and it obeys the same natural laws that all of life obeys - we evolve. I hesitate to accuse Mr. Douthat of not understanding that basic, all powerful fact, but it may be he does not. It is all very fine to conserve that which is virtuous but it is the peak of folly to attempt to stand in the way of evolution. Pope Francis does seem to understand this all important fact. Evolution is a messy thing and Mr. Douthat seems to be concerned that this messiness will end up with a failed papal experiment. I doubt that for the long run. People want and need spiritual communion and either traditional bureaucracies evolve and allow for a new revelations and practices relative to the tending of the spirit or those bureaucracies deserve to wither and pass. For example, my commitment to living up to the model of spiritual and egoic virtue that the Christ of the New Testament presents is a powerful spiritual fundamental and guiding animus for me. But I have zero use for theology and even less use for monotheism which, from my perspective is ego worship. If pressed I would claim The Enlightenment as my true religion and in that regard I suppose I could make a claim to being a Deist. I suspect in the 22nd century Deism will be a dominant form of "appreciation for the Divinity of life and the God inherent in Nature." And I suspect supernatural theology will have taken a great fall. Perhaps this is Douthat's fear.
3
Mr. Douhat seems to fall into the common fallacy that a Pope by himself can change the entire direction of the church. Mr. Douhat also embodies the attitude of American conservatives that Pope Francis has nothing to teach us. In fact, though, American Catholics could change our country for the better, toward renewal if they took his words serious. Words such as his 2015 address to a joint session of Congress, in which he spoke of a politics of the common good, of acceptance of the stranger, of working together to save the planet and the poor from the worst effects of climate change. Instead, Americans chose the cynicism, xenophobia and climate-change denial of Trumpism. In his writings, Mr. Douhat has not time for THIS Pope Francis. He instead has embraced the views of the politically conservative Catholic contrarians, many of whom have seized upon a slight opening for conscience for the divorced and remarried in receiving Communion and blown it up into a heresy. In fact, the Church already has a form of marriage dissoultion not spoken of by Jesus, called annulments. At any rate, a wide majority of Catholics and Catholic intellectuals will continue to see Pope Francis as a breath of fresh air, a man who is finally working to complete the work done at Vatican II.
6
Francis, like every Pope before him, is a businessman. Civilization has now rendered it impossible for businessmen to conduct themselves the way they did historically, ie using violence and intimidation to maintain monopoly power. Francis is trying to serve as many markets as possible in this new order. So, like McDonalds offering different products in different markets - vegetarian burgers in India - he’s segmenting his markets. In secular Western Nations, the message is anodyne (in the model of the Anglican church’s) and in traditional societies (eg much of Africa) the thundering denunciation of “sin, sin, sinner” continues. That’s why he needs the original message as well as the ability to dissent without too much in the way of condemnation. Notice that the church’s saints are from the undeveloped world; citizens of industrialized wealthy nations roll their eyes at the idea of “miracles”; but Francis needs the “miracles” for the third world adherents of Catholicism. His other alternative is to forsake the industrialized world entirely and focus on the third world. But that’s too big a leap for him or any other church leader to take.
3
All "Times Pick" comments expressed here are valid expressions of one's personal experience being Catholic or non-Catholic. The few that I read fail to point out the power of prayer. Does Pope Francis pray? Of course he does. His decisions, his leadership, his words, his humor, his genuine love, his humility come from his Father, God. Pope Francis is an inspiration to our troubled world and to so many people who need to feel loved, comforted, and respected.
2
The truest form of Catholicism takes shape in the teachings of Jesus, his openness to and forgiveness of all. This Pope has begun the early stages of an earnest effort to return to those teachings. Erasing the warping of these original ideas by two thousand years of self-interested men who were largely more worried about power and authority than the best interests of their flock, will not be easy or quick. The full restoration of true Catholicism will take several like Pope Francis generations to fully accomplish.
2
"But to choose a path that might have only two destinations — hero or heretic — is also an act of presumption, even for a pope. Especially for a pope."
Here Douthat falls into the trap of exclusive Manichean extremes, black or white. But that is the predictable track of one who laments the victimization of "disillusioned conservatives" who feel their desperately clinged-to notions of "their" religion are threatened. In this, what is called conservative is really a form of authoritarian, with all that implies. It is akin to Ed Meese's crabbed and sour view of the 1960s, which promoted too much freedom and change for the comfort and power of those in charge, or favored by those in charge, to abide, a distasteful threat to their self-impressed and hard-won (or inherited) positions of social power and advantage.
Douthat's religion of choice seems more capital-C Catholicism than catholic, just as Republicanism has perverted into a focus on the "R" in "Republican" rather than on the "public" in "republic." He's an institution man, a party man, a dogma man, a self-assigned Defender of the Faith, rather than a man of humanity, a man of spirituality. He could take some lessons from Francis's healthy humility and respect for the human in all of us.
5
Ross seems to think that the Church and the Pope are operating in some theological and temporal vacuum. He suggests that people are drawn or repelled by a Pope or a systemic organization in the Vatican. Both are powerless in the face of something like this:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/10/28/world/europe/tuam-ireland...
I don't think the Pope has much power to wipe away the images this story suggests.
As well, the diocese just north of me has been rocked by a yet another priest molestation scandal. It doesn't help that the bishop, in his previous post, was involved in a cover-up of the same thing.
As an institution, the church needs a stand down to clean its own house before guilty men start telling us about our sins.
1
The St. John Paul II "paradigm" (better put, "project") is to rescue the reforms of the Second Vatican Council from those invoking its "spirit" to promote the same liberal agenda on the table today--undermining the Church's teaching on human sexuality and marriage and dragging the Church down the road of mainline Protestant denominations that de-emphasize core beliefs and their proclamation to adapt to the individualism and false freedoms the reign in Western culture. That road has proven sterile and self-destructive. Reluctance to admit and address how far away baptized and even weekly churchgoing Catholics in the developed world are from the Evangelizing Church JPII and Benedict did so much to renew and build-up were the major "flaws" of their project. Francis has said and done much to promote this project of reform rather than rupture, despite some worrisome moves, and has my daily prayers.
1
The Catholic Church needs reform but lacks a real structure for reform. Reform administered by a potentate is doomed by definition. Frances needs to build the structure, set a direction, and then use his authority to insist that reform actually happens even if the reform is not what he wants.
2
Pope Francis's "liberalization" is rooted in the Second Vatican Council which addressed the relationship between the Catholic Church and the modern world. The mission of the Pope is not to bring "his lapsed-Catholic admirers back to the pews," but to be an exemplar of the teachings of Christ. Pope Francis is striving to achieve that role.
5
Converts to Catholicism seem to be more Catholic than Catholics because they tend to take things too literally, too narrowly. Growing up in the faith you learn not to do this. And if you leave the church a time or two and then return you may be even more relaxed, more in the spirit than the strict letter. Until I returned for the second time about 15 years ago I had never heard the term magisterium, which is where the problem is, IMO. That and the big catechism. Francis seems more in the spirit than the law, which seems more of Caesar than of Jesus. Jesus kept it simple. The church has added considerable encrustation, again IMO. Frances is trying to make it simpler: love and judge not. And there has been resistance, especially from converts. But the laws were intended to guide people to loving and judging not; the laws were never intended just to be followed. At some point we are to look up follow Jesus and not kept focused on man-made laws.
Catholic means universal, comprehensive: broad in sympathies, tastes and interests. It does not mean lockstep adherence to rules that may divert our attention from loving and forgiving as we are forgiven--from following Christ, including pooling our resources and meeting the needs of the poor before satisfying our wants. This may be why many Republicans have a problem with Frances. He seems as socialistic as Jesus.
6
Problems with the magisterium? I wonder what Francis would make of Phillip Pullman's "His Dark Materials" books.
The Pope's steps of encouraging some local experimentation respond to the diversity of the population under his wings, at the same time he is trying to address the decline of the institution that he is heading. His actions should be compared to those of Deng Xiaoping, who, recognizing the total failing of the extremely practiced Communist orthodoxy during Mao's time (economically), allowed various localities to conduct experiments in variations on economic markets that diverged from the orthodoxy. The tight central control over the range of the allowed divergence guaranteed that the variant remained within what the central government considered acceptable, yet brought an explosion of entrepreneurship and the number of stake holders in the economy as a whole. Such a model may work for the Catholic church as well allowing for renewal and bringing younger cohorts into the churches, not as visitors in cultural / archeological sites, but stake holders and true participants.
I read the headline then the byline and figured I could save some time by skipping this one, but I did the charitable thing and read the piece. Perhaps, Mr. Douthat, Francis will be a disaster for the church as you wish it to remain; that would be a good thing. And by "the sexual ethics of the New Testament" I assume you mean the teachings of Paul rather than the sexual ethics of Jesus, as the Gospels don't have much to say. I suspect that the Pope, like Jimmy Carter, aims to follow in the footsteps of Christ rather than model himself after Saul of Tarsus.
4
Since the flourishing of the Italian Renaissance the Catholic hierarchy has always been 300 years behind the times. Thanks to Pope Francis it is now 100 years behind the times. For that and his personal role modeling I am very thankful.
6
The first part of Douthat's editorial is reasonable and the Pope deserves some criticism for failing to keep up the change he initiated (or seemed to initiate) in the beginning. His embrace of some wicked men within the Church is troubling, especially as it relates to child molesters.
However, Douthat's criticism that implies the Pope is a heretic for some of his attempts to liberalize the church shows his lack of understanding of Christianity. The Bible did not create the papacy or most of the rules we now accept as though they were God given. There are also plenty of disagreements within the Bible and the man-made book is silent on many new issues as they were not around when it was assembled.
Thus, it is fine to disagree with the Pope, but just because Douthat may be a particularly conservative Catholic does not make his views correct or connected to reality. Some of this belongs in the NYT section for alternative viewpoints rather than here.
2
"Francis will have ceded the moral authority earned by persecuted generations..." Interesting that a conservative Catholic is equating generations of persecution with earned moral authority. Hopefully one can deduce from the history of our species is that morality is fluid and relative to the time in which it's presented. And in that light we can also say that Catholicism has had an illustrious track record when instigating its own course of systematic persecution. In context, we surmise that Mr. Douthat refers to generations of Chinese citizens that had to practice their faith in secret, and who suffered atrocious consequences if discovered. But those souls, silenced or eradicated as a result of their faith, have no more of a hold on morality then anyone in history who had to do the same.
Monsignor -- If dude's papacy "fails", you should obviously take due credit for your unending criticism of him and recognize that if dude's papacy fails, the church fails. But thanks for playing.
I think Douthat misses the true comparison. Francis is not heading toward Anglicanism as much as he is heading toward Orthodoxy. The retreat is from legalism binding on everyone at all times to orthodoxy of doctrine that still allows for pastoral exceptions. I would welcome this, as I would welcome a re-unification of Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy, if I could be sure that is in fact where Francis is really going. I think we will only be sure in retrospect and one of the crosses the RCC faithful have to bear in present is the uncertainty. This is the time to trust in the knowledge that God will work all things to the good even if it's not so good during our lifetime.
2
This essay clearly demonstrates that it is unwise for an author to write a biography about a person that is far wiser than himself.
13
Very little--very--that Ross Douthat has even written in these pages suggests that his certainty comes from depth, wisdom, or personal enlightenment. I read his work to know what shallow arguments are being shared this week among would-be authorities for Conservatism.
5
What is it about recent converts (like Drouthat) claiming to be more catholic than the Pope?
10
And by what standard does the Pope know more about conception than the woman (any woman) who has been pregnant?
1
Every papcy is a disaster for women.
12
Was it Ivan Illich that called the Catholic Church the first corporation.? At any rate your discussion on the Church's challenges is very much like the chat heard in corporate boardrooms "How do we improve product acceptance across different markets and still keep our brand value?" The Pope is a manager of a corrupt and self-absorbed institution that has lost all relevance to many thinking and spiritual people. Feetwashing and the like may be cool stunts for re-establishing street cred but it doesn't change what happened to the Jesus's elitist club since the original event. The church will forever be playing catch up to the zeitgeist until it finally collapses.
1
It must be scary for conservative churchmen/women like yourself. Life was simpler in the 50's and before, clear definitions of right and wrong. Everyone went to Church on Sunday, everyone conformed even if they were not devoted. It looked normal, safe, no need to wonder, worry or question. Today we know that homosexuality is not abnormal but instead normal, my Mother and Father's generation very rarely divorced but that is not true today. I would say that Francis is not 'reshapping' the Church as much as he is asking the same questions that many of us have been asking since Vatican II. You think we are a better Church when we exclude certain types of people who fail to live up to our ideals, but you might be reflective of the inclusiveness of Jesus and His great willingness, in fact desire, to forgive sin and bring the children back into relationship with the Father. Is Francis doing differently then Jesus, if he is then clearly he is wrong but if he follows the Lord's lead in extending the message of Divine Mercy and forgiveness of sin then I am in support of him. Are you sure that the Holy Spirit is not guiding the Church to a greater holiness, certainly most Cardinal Electors seem to think so, otherwise Francis would not be our Pope but instead someone more like Archbishop Chaput or Cardinal Dolan.
2
The quest for renewal and growth of the “Church”, whatever its definition, is abroad in the land. Societies seem to be caught in ambiguity and dissatisfaction with most religions. Catholics are not alone. The head of the Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria, Va. recently put out a call for suggestions on how the seminary can contribute to the growth of the Episcopal Church. Local participation in church services and activities seems to be more a function of the local leadership than the name on the door.
None of this should be surprising. Certainty is absent in most of our endeavors. Astronomy has totally remade the cosmos during current lifetimes. Astronomers have moved us from a realm defined essentially by one sun, one moon, several planets and the earth to the reality of multiple universes, many of which we know to exist but will never see. Our earth has become an unreliable provider as we deplete aquifers and snow caps. We foul the air we need to breathe, using fossil fuels that contaminate air hundreds of miles from the offending smoke stacks.
Uncertainty runs rampant. Dictatorial regimes featuring absolutes are headed for a fall. Perhaps the Pope understands that.
2
So the Pope's "office is charged with maintaining unity and continuity". That sounds like the office motto of the Jews that had to deal with the disrupting teachings of Jesus in the first century or the motto of the Inquisition dealing with the discoveries of a Galileo centuries later. While the Truth itself may not change the clarity and breadth and depth with which we see It may change. This fact acknowledged in the penultimate paragraph is relevant and reminds one of Jesus' words about removing the beam from our own eye before helping remove the mote from our neighbor's eye.
Maybe Francis has enough foresight to realize that even if he could resist the ethics of the sexual revolution for now, the Church will have to change its stance on a big part of its sexual doctrine - birth control - sooner or later. Global warming a much greater focus of concern today than over-population, but global warming issues will inevitably intensify overpopulation issues. The Church needs to get ready to jettison its proscription on birth control before this doctrine becomes an existential threat to the human species, and Francis is tugging the wheel in that direction.
Benedict was no better yet Mr Douthat did not have a problem following him. The thing that Mr Douthat hates is all in Francis trying to not treat marriage as a prison, to not treat LGBT people as the devil, Mr Douthat wants the freedom of evangelical Protestantism that does not exist in his Church. Which was fine when it supported hate more easily not so easy to follow now.
I think what scares, and yes I think it is fright that keeps Mr Douthat in his conservative bigotry, is that maybe people who ignore inequality, rich people who do not help, rich people don't get into Jesus' heaven. That those who are filled with a desire to hold others down, as Mr Douthat shows repeatedly in this article aren't filled with the love that will sit you near God.
What scares Mr Douthat is that as his Church looks at itself. It is moving away from the privilege that defines him.
5
The "Francis effect" is illusory. Women have not been ordained, priests cannot marry, birth control within marriage is still forbidden, the status of homosexuality and same-sex marriage is "Don't ask, don't tell." He has done nothing of real consequence to positively effect the lives of those of us who are not infallible.
2
The real problem Conservatives have with Pope Francis is his support from Climate Change and his opposition to Capitalism (disguised as ‘prosperity theology’). Everything else is a smoke-screen
This was a radical change from the policies of Pope John Paul II who cut a Faustian bargain - Capitalism would support him in Eastern Europe while he would turn a blind eye towards ‘prosperity theology’. This arrangement ran for quite some time
Came Pope Francis and threw a spanner in the works. He used to pedophile weapon very cunningly to crush the ‘conservative opposition’.
When it comes to his opposition to Capitalism/‘prosperity theology’, he is on rock solid ground. Lord Jesus Christ’s teachings, especially the ‘eye of the needle’ and ‘cleansing of the temple’ episodes, are firmly against Capitalism (especially the latter episode). Furthermore, St Paul, as quoted in the first epistle to Timothy, called the love of money as the root of all evils.
This aspect of Christianity, which Pope Francis wants to follow, is opposed tooth and nail by the establishment and loved by the actual followers.
His second crime was social liberalization. While the establishment opposes it, Pope Francis is taking some very large steps from they stand. However, where the present society stands, they are merely baby steps.
As per his tacit “decentralization of authority”, Christianity, in its origins, was a bottom up movement.
The author could have been honest if he stuck to the real reason.
5
Well, Ross D is bothered because he loves dogma, centuries-old dogma that cannot adapt to modern realities. To me, Pope Francis' message is to emphasize Christ's message of love and the upliftment of humanity. If this means working with a 'godless' country like China, then traditional dogma should be subservient to creating peaceful arrangements for coexistence. Unless Ross wants some sort of modern 'crusades' because he can't accept this new form of flexibility. Is it corruption? Does Ross D mean that 'women can't be priests' should never be changed?
5
Nothing upsets a "conservative" catholic more than a leader who follows the path of Jesus and inspires people to do the same. What Ross seems most upset about is not being able to fit a camel through the eye of a needle despite years of trying. However, he does keep getting paid for it. Therein lies the problem. Evil persists when it is rewarded.
3
In what alternative universe has the Catholic Church ever been not political? Anyone who believes this owes him- or herself an in-depth study of the last two millenia from the church history view. Further, a good many Catholics joined their evangelical brethren in marrying American Christianity to the brood of vipers currently slithering along the halls of power in Washington DC. The only way in which we ought to worry about the fate of the Pope is that in the VAST NUMBER of alliances between religious institutions and political power over the long history of mankind, those who suffered the deepest social and economic ruin are those who failed to learn history, who accepted ancient doctrine as immutable and infallible. The political alliances just allow them to drag the rest of us down with them. As to whether Pope Francis is a decent, humanitarian individual, time will always tell. Political power games aside, an ongoing failure to protect innocence from the preying paws of the priesthood does not bode well.
1
There is a fundamental issue here that overwhelms the Papacy. The lack of relevancy of traditional religion in the real world in which we live. It would not matter who is Pope or how they approach their role. Watch the news. Look at the front page of major newspapers online. You do not see any Pope's teaching, Catholicism, or religion generally reflected in anything taking place in the real world except in cases in which religion is being used to abuse others who are considered non-believers.
Religion provides solace to some in their time of need. It offers some the hope of life after death, and it provides like minded individuals a place to pray together one day or another each week.
Sports has more value for many today than does religion but we do not seek a greater meaning from football, basketball, soccer or baseball. It dos not make sense to expect more from a Pope or other religious leaders. A personal experience that provides relief from the real world.
Mr. Douthat is looking for perfection. Just because Pope Francis is a Pope, it would be wrong to deify him and rid him of the possibility of some flaws. Pope Francis has always acknowledged his own shortcomings. So, even if his reforms are only in good faith, they are worthy of some applause. In this day & age of religious skepticism where even the extremists openly acknowledge they do what they do for power, Francis still continues to clean the air with his earnestness and honestness, for that, like many, I'm grateful.
1
A dear departed friend always said, "Praxis supersedes orthodoxy." Francis has preached a gospel of mercy, compassion, and hope. He may not be perfect, who of us is, but I the acid test of Christianity is what we do, and that flows from what we believe. Francis is a believer not only in the Gospel but in the age in which we live, with all its doubt and fears. The Church will live on, but he has opened the doors that John XXIII opened and his successors quickly closed. If we are not open to change, we die. My money is on this Pope to breathe new life in a Church that can always be converted.
7
Rita,
Do you think Paul VI
closed the doors that John XXIII opened ?
If so why and how.
Sr. Douthat would like to elevate the parochial concerns of the US religious right to that of Christian doctrine. The genius of Pope Francis is that he liberates Catholic thought from this narrow, sexualized (sexually-repressed?) interpretation and frees it to address contemporary and deep-rooted challenges both inside and outside the Church.
Douthat seems to think that this is a forfeiture of Catholic thought, but the truth is that it represents a broader, more inclusive Catholicism that is much closer to Christianity´s earliest roots. Christ would be appalled at the US and Latin American religious right´s misogyny, inequality and cruel infliction of suffering on the poor and downtrodden.
What is curious about Pope Francis is that as a young Jesuit leader in Argentina, he followed the Church hierarchy in appeasing the brutal military dictatorship that disappeared up to 30,000 of his fellow citizens from 1976 to 1982. The experience seems to have deeply shaped his life so that today, as an elderly man and Pope, he seems to have distilled a truly Christian message that is transformational, respectful of earlier traditions, but also capable of speaking truth to injustice and the abuse of power.
No Sr. Douthat, Pope Francis is neither a hero nor a heretic. He is as he presents himself: An exemplar of the possibilities of Christianity that is as much of a light in the post-modern world as it was in the pre-modern one.
10
Thank you, Mr. Douthat, for letting us know what your book is all about. It's one I won't be reading. I love and admire Pope Francis. His choice of name said volumes about his humility. His comment about homosexuality--"Who am I to judge?" and his welcoming of divorced and other "sinners" back into the church--told me what he's really like: not the ultimate authority in the church hierarchy, but just another human being full of acceptance and compassion. I'm not sure who he reminds you of, Mr. Douthat, but he reminds me of Jesus, who likewise didn't follow the rules to the letter, but who loved and accepted everyone.
9
After reading this op-ed, Ross, I have a question: Have you read "Amoris laetitia: Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation on love in the family," March 19, 2016, by Pope Francis or the pastoral plan to implement "Amoris laetitia" by Cardinal Donald Wuerl (Archbishop of Washington, DC) "Sharing in the Joy of Love in Marriage and Family."
Neither of these document propose changes in the Catholic Church's moral teaching--your concern in church teaching seems to be primarily focused on sexual morality. What is being proposed is a change in pastoral practices, i.e., moving away from an excommunication or exclusion mentality to one that embraces accompanying those struggling but failing to be faithful to the moral norms taught by the church.
Also, these documents emphasize what the church has always taught about the primacy of conscience. In the 19th century, John Henry Cardinal Newman, at the end of Section 5 of his Letter to the Duke of Norfolk, remarks: “I shall drink – to the Pope, if you please – still, to Conscience first, and to the Pope afterwards.” The great Catholic theologian St. Thomas Aquinas, in the Middle Ages, states that even an erring conscience binds. Under no circumstance is one to violate one’s own conscience, not if the Pope demands it or anyone else demands it.
Pope Francis is actually proposing to do what Jesus did when he welcomed and broke bread with the so-called sinners and outcasts of his day--accompanying the alienated in their earthly pilgrimage.
17
Robert,
You do not quote either all of Newman's letter or all that
Aquinas has to say.
Until you define what a well formed conscience is -
what you have said is only misleading.
1
Saint Thomas Aquinas noted that even an erring conscience is binding: http://www.newadvent.org/summa/2019.htm#article5.
Father Roy Bourgeois followed his conscience in support of the ordination of women and was laicized for his action because church authority said he was wrong about the ordination of women, but I know of no one in the church condemning him for following his conscience. Franz Jägerstätter was an Austrian Christian executed for his refusal to serve in the armies of the Third Reich, after the bishop of his diocese and his parish priest assured him that his conscience should be causing him not to serve. Instead, he followed his conscience, which was not in agreement with his bishop and parish priest, and was recently beatified by the Catholic Church as a martyr.
2
Douthat is an unfortunate example of someone who can't take the toxicity of politics out of the purity of the spirit...
3
After listening to Douthat's pompous statements as a guest on David Axelrod's podcast, I cannot take him seriously any longer. He is unwilling to engage in self examination, and believes, for no good reason, that he holds some morally and intellectually higher ground than everyone else, most particularly his readers.
10
And clearly, he thinks he is more Catholic than the Pope.
2
The Ross we know and dread is back. The man holier than THIS Pope once again listing his musings. Perhaps, it's your age, young Man. Or, perhaps you are such an absolutist, seeking perfection in OTHERS, that you literally can't see shades of grey. It's NOT just a black and white world.
Seriously.
15
Few if any writers make clear the distinction, that Anglicans declare themselves to be Catholic, but not Roman Catholics.
3
1. Catholics do not "take" holy communion; they receive it.
2. Paging John Allen.
6
Don't forget Mr Doubthat, the pope is the living representative of god on earth, and not a mere man. How dare you criticize even the worst pope. Maybe you don't really understand God's will.
1
The Pope is no good; Trump is no good; Putin is no good; The Iran treaty is no good; NAFTA and TPP are no good; Tillerson, McMaster, Cohn and Sessions are no good; Mueller is up to no good; The Democrats are no good because they're really Republicans; and the NY Mets are no good.
So, what should I believe in ??
3
And a Happy saint Patrick’s day to you, sir. Some Irish advice: stop badgering the poor Bishop of Rome with arguments from a 1970s Jesuit retreat while we still have our big fat Nero here at home to worry about. And please don’t presume to compare yourself in any way to George Orwell.
21
Can we just forget about religion? Haven't organized religions and their followers caused enough problems in this world?
5
Correction to prior submission: mistakenly attributed column to Bret Stephens, when it was Mr. Douthat. Apologies to both.
2
Douthat's still living in the past, seems as if he'd be happier if a Pope named Pius was still in charge...
6
Sure. A disaster for right wing conservatives like Douthat and Steve Bannon. And a thrilling breath of much needed fresh air for the vast majority of Catholics.
I guess Douthat was happier with Ratzinger.
3
Stop preaching, Mr Douthat. This is not a catholic newsletter.
3
Beloved? Disaster?
Some people said that about Jesus too,
5
I'll take Pope Francis over Ross Douthat in a heartbeat!
7
Christianity in general is a disaster. If you followed what is in he Bible, you would be immoral. To be a "good" Christian, you have to ignore half of what's in the silly book. This comment can be generalized to other "faiths" too.
2
I am always glad for Ross Douhat provocations on belief and Catholicism. This I say in my capacity as a complete mess of a Catholic. Daily Mass; immersion in the Gospel of Matthew; love for the Church as the home of the poor and despised -- that legacy of youth still informs my sympathies and loyalties, though today I don't believe in a single sentence of the Nicene Cred. There's no amount of doctrinal "reform" that can ever bring me back, and I would bet the bank that many of the commenters here are similarly situated. I would guess that most of us fallen-aways are ready to blast the Church for its obsessive and oppressive rules on sex and gender, but wouldn't return to the Mass if those rules were suddenly waived.
And we might keep in mind that the Church is losing communicants all over the world to fundamentalist Protestantism, not to Buddhism or Unitarianism. These religious migrants are generally looking for tougher rules, clearer standards, more ironclad guarantees of heaven or hell.
Among other things, Pope Francis is an Argentine socialist. He is faithful to that culture's commitment to the well-being of the poor. And that is wonderful. But it would also appear that he shares the general disinclination of Argentine socialists to work on organization, management, and transparency. He could probably use a tough Monsignor with an MBA.
2
I am surprised that Christianity (and Catholicism) is still being defined primarily as an institutional Church, whose "success" is measured by how many people are in the pews. Following Jesus is a whole new way of knowing reality. Discipleship is a verb, not a noun. Francis gets this.
2
Excellent analysis. My own feeling is that the Church would do well by reducing the number of doctrines it deems essential to believe in order to attain Salvation ...the Assumption of the Virgin, anyone? How about the Immaculate Conception?
Official Roman Catholic teaching has changed radically over the centuries--but it did so slowly and out of the limelight. There were no newspapers, television or internet to notice when "usury" oh so gradually changed from lending money at any interest at all to lending money at excessive interest, to give one example.
Even the elimination a few years ago of the doctrine of the existence of limbo would have caused much more of an uproar today. (The explanation that it was not really an official or central teaching is balderdash--I'm old enough to remember when it was quite official and central, thank you very much.)
It may be that Francis is preparing for necessary doctrinal changes, especially around issues of sexuality, by getting people used to the idea gradually over a long period of time, and by somewhat offhandedly reminding us of the doctrine of the primacy of individual conscience.
Some changes that are doctrinally possible today but that would change the atmosphere greatly would be allowing Latin Rite priests to marry, allowing women to have more official power, and even naming women as cardinals.
1
Any institution that is male dominated,
Times Up!
6
C'mon, Ross. Cool it!
2
As a non practicing Catholic, I am aghast at the breadth of Douthat’s sweeping claims in the absence of evidence or historical precedent. Non-Catholics will find this column arcane. Let me re-assure them all it is arcane and assumes a doctrinaire slant on the Church. Douthat routinely takes the 1950’s view of Catholicism and Christianity. What he forgets is that the religion is not about it’s accoutrements but about Jesus teachings. the most important teachings are obscured by centuries of hubris. A fundamental fact about Jesus is that he would never embrace Catholicism, ever. He was an anti hierarchy anarchist who taught that this world is an illusion even to the point of his own execution. Francis has restored that perspective to the Church. “Love one another” “love your enemies” “the lilies of the field neither reap or sow...” Not a word about homosexuality (widely practiced), birth control, abortion, or preserving the authority of the Temple. So many contradictions that one is confused, not by Jesus but by the Church that claims him and the insane trappings of the long tradition of obscuring Jesus with foreign, Greek beliefs in Hell, eternal punishment, and ignoring the Jewish teachings that Jesus sprang from.
Pope Francis has a big problem and it’s not traditionalists. It pedophiles and those who hid, relocated them, and inflicted them on new communities, women’s equality. death and birth.
5
Ross Douthat should be "shown the door "! He might also want to go to confession. Shame, Mr. Douthat. Shame!
5
Dude, your ecclesiology is showing. As a cradle Catholic, I find it hilarious that you use "Anglican" as a curse word. Cut to the chase and admit that you signed up for a "Roma locuta, cause finita" church that Francis threatens, and neither his mistakes nor his victories will be judged outside of the frame of that threat.
7
Douthat: out of step with the world, and on the front page of the NY Times.
9
The Cardinals who chose him envisioned...and austere outsider? I was taught the Conclave was directly inspired by God. Is this no longer doctrine, Ross?
If the Church, with the humility characteristic of Christ, becomes a bit more elastic (forgiving is a word I might use), to the needs of the people, while still remaining centered on Jesus, this would be a mighty reform indeed. As you know, many doctrines have been mutable in the past, as much a product of politics as of faith. To disentangle the church from history, it’s context, is impossible.
5
Where in the New testament does it say divorced and remarried Catholics should not take the Sacraments the Church says are necessary for their salvation? It is curious that the Catholic Church prefers its doctrines over pastoral practice. In my reading of the New Testament, Jesus was put to death because he was a healer, not an orthodox Jew. Mr. Douthat's views are an insult to the rich history of Catholic thought, conversation, and practice. For example and John XXIII's strong emphasis on freedom of conscience. Gregory of Nyssa, a fourth century married bishop and father of the church taught universal salvation, and modern theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar clearly teaches that "only love is credible." This is why Pope Francis is credible, he leads with love, not dogma.
8
I am not Catholic. I still like this pope. If he makes the church look better that makes Catholicism look better.
4
Mumbo jumbo
6
Papa faz com que seja necessário exatamente isto, buscar a paz do mundo.
www.jornalbastidoresdanoticia.com.br
1
is Douthat aware that John Paul II gave communion to the founder of Taize, the Protestant Roger Schutz? Does Douthat know that Benedict XVI said "It is permissible to think that Hell is empty" and that this same supposedly traditional Pope admitted it is an advance in morality for a male prostitute to use a condom in order to protect his partners? The RC church is losing members but so are many mainline churches and quasi-religious organizations because of scandals everywhere - Greek Orthodox, Buddhists, Jewish groups, the Russian Orthodox horrible alliance with Putin - the list is long. Douthat lives in a fantasy world where all RCs were in line with Rome. It was never thus. The search for truth is arduous and centuries pass as it makes its halting progress. There is no going back to a mythical past. I speak as a Catholic.
5
With respect,only human males created this authoritarian top heavy mess.
Do what I tell you or go to hell !Or purgatory! Or limbo! Is there somewhere I
Missed?God didn’t issue much in the area of punishment in the New Testament. Through Jesus he spoke of kindness,gentleness ,brotherhood,and
Forgiveness,and sharing.Not much of that in anybody’s church today.
End this phoney “Grand Jury” Of guys here to instruct other guys and girls on how to live when they in large numbers commit the same atrositys againt small children as pedophiles in the general population, and anything the rest of us are guilty of,this Pope appears to want to model Christ.As to the rest of this bloated group,go and do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
Giving power over others to humans will always result in abuse.
5
Well, the politicians, pundits and priests conspired to kill Christ. So what should we expect for anyone that really tries to be like him?
6
Your complaints about the Pope and the Church could be made about any organization or governmental institution on every level.
The leaders in cities, counties, states, and federal government have huge egos. Not only do they have huge egos, such leaders are surrounded by lower level management who also have huge egos who jealously protect their turf.
Look at Trump's cabinet members who spend in excess for travel because they wish to be treated like royalty.
If leaders are to bring about change, they must create a culture of humble service. Changing bureaucratic culture does not happen overnight.
Sure the Church has problems. Pope Francis is one of the few world leader that is attempting to bring about a cultural change about what true service is about. He will not be perfect. He will have many failures.
Trump and Putin and other leaders in the world would make our world a better place if they tried to follow Pope Francis' example.
6
Pope Francis has sullied his reputation by cannonizing Pope Pius the silent Pope during the Holocaust . Lately, apologists have come forth defending Pope Pius, but what they can’t defend is that his flock throughout europe were complicit in the murder of six million Jews of which two million were children who were gassed to death in their mothers arms ".All the oceans cannot wash the blood from their hands “.
5
You don't understand....the Vatican seems determined to canonize every Pope, at least those of the past 200 years. Paul VI? Please! Pius XII? Wow....Pius X? Amazing....these guys take care of their own...
3
Why doesn’t the NYT get a Catholic to write about the Catholic Church? Someone with knowledge and critical thinking skills. Douthat has no underatanding of Catholic theology and spirituality. You can’t even call him a convert to Catholicism. Instead of converting to the catholic faith, he tries to convert the catholic faith to his right wing, evangelical faith. Douthat and his heretical notions of Catholicism offend me.
20
If it’s “devouts” like Steve Bannon and Cardinal Raymond Burke, or Pope Francis, gimme all the Pope you’ve got.
3
Ross your critique is an amusing mixture of the ultramontanist and John bolton. The pope is insufficiently old guard hierarchical for you and insufficiently hawkish. Again you find yourself twisted like a pretzel as you try to square your preference for more papal authority with your desire to submit to Roman authority at a time when that authority wants you to do things you don’t like. How else to explain your truly ridiculous preference for Benedict as pope? Even he knew he wasn’t up to the job, being a former Nazi and all.
7
Your essay lacks one ingredient, Ross. FAITH.
11
I think saying that Francis is going to cause a disaster because he didn't get the reforms in he claimed to be and that he hasn't challenged the power structure, or his attempt to make the church 'local', kind of flies in the reality that the church under the realm of arch conservative popes (JPII and Benedict) , who emphasized rigid orthodoxy and for example, did things like force Catholic Schools to toe the line on church teaching according to JPII and then Cardinal Ratzinger (my wife went through 12 years of Catholic school in the 70's through 81, her high school had sex ed, and not "don't have sex until marriage", was wiped out by JPII, basically did more to ruin the church then Francis ever did with his "anglicism". Ireland, once as conservative as Poland, in response to the horrific abuse crisis there turned away in droves from the church and legalized same sex marriage and divorce. During JPII's reign his rigid orthodoxy apppealed to places like Africa and Asia but saw church attendance drop to less than 50% in the US, and is like 15% in Italy. The slide Ross is talking about was a long time coming and you don't reverse that overnight. The church might decline more as conservatives like Ross turn away in disgust, but then it also could hope to get back the many more catholics, the 80%, that either have left or show up twice a year.
1
Douthat is apparently an "old soul". He writes as though the Roman emperor Constantine still rules the world and the Church. He equates conservative thought with authoritarianism and autocracy. In his religious world, democratic processes have no place. Apparently, they haven't been invented yet. As an American Catholic, I don't buy his fearful alarms. If the church must reinvent itself to survive, so be it.
6
Many conservative Catholics consider themselves to be more Catholic than the Pope. They loved the previous Pope's pageantry and rituals. This Pope said the Cardinals would be sorry for electing him. He has a one of the people style. He doesn't live in the Papal apartments and eats in the hotel cafeteria. That must be interesting to be a priest in line with the Pope behind you.
As far as the sexual abuse scandal is concerned, the Pope said it all on his first day. He went to visit Cardinal Law who was hiding in plain sight from the authorities in the US. He was implicated in cover-ups in 3 dioceses.The Pope did not demote him or remove him from his office. More recently, he attended Law's funeral. The most egregious of his sins is attacking those complaining about sexual abuse in Chile.
The Pope has made many lapsed Catholics more interested in the Church, but not enough to make them think Sunday mass is a tenet of the church. Many are still C and E Catholics if that. If he cannot weed out the sexual predators completely, the younger generation will lose interest. They have spent their whole lives listening to news about the sexual abuse scandal while not enough is being done. I know this is happening in all churches, but the Pope has the authority to fix it in his Church.
1
Typical politically conservative American Catholic assessment of the papacy. Please note the difference between a true conservative as to Catholic teaching and the American version of conservative religion, which is more driven by politics than religion itself. Please also note the complete lack of visibility of the source of Christianity, Jesus Christ. Not mentioned once in this article and never mentioned by those Americans critical of Pope Francis. Always a very telling sign in these discussions. Pope Francis has never been seen as a liberal throughout his career. In fact, he was known for his orthodoxy. What he does have is a love of the Gospels and Jesus Christ. He prefers the mercy and outreach of Jesus Christ more than well known keepers of the law, the Scribes and Pharisees of today. The Gospels continue to repeat themselves, and it's obvious who is walking with Jesus Christ and who is in the temple wanting to find any possible way to condemn him. I converted in December. I never would have done so without the presence of Pope Francis. I am very much a fundamentalist of Jesus Christ. I am conservative when it comes to most Catholic teaching. I am not a politically driven American who focuses on one to two issues as a definition of what a "real" Catholic or Christian is. Therein lies the difference. The Pew Research Center was eye opening. Those who love the Pope are the ones going to Church every week. Republicans do not like him, not Catholics.
2
If Ross and his co-politicos want to reject women and sexuality and divorce just to keep Catholicism "unified", they're way too late. The schism has already come and gone, and the judgment of the people of God around the world is apparent for all to see. Many, I suspect most, Roman Catholics and formerly Roman Catholics but still Christians don't believe the "traditional" nonsense about women's incapacity, loving sexual behavior, and the observable fact that some marriages end. Good luck trying to keep people in their divinely ordered place (as far as Ross's crowd knows) based on a poorly founded and selfishly proclaimed "theology". That's a losing strategy, and it's no wonder Francis isn't putting his weight behind that the way a certain hastily sainted papal predecessor and his "emeritus" successor did.
Mr. Douthat - Thank you for your Papal concerns, but if you care to learn about Life, study some Biology. Religion is ONLY about humanity, and Life is so much more than that. Pray for Life, and that humanity does not completely kill It (and thus kill ourselves) out of this prehistoric need to bring to our small earth all possible unborn human babies.
The history of the papacy is a long one that has seen wide extremes, to say the least. Pope Francis is Pope Francis. He brings his strengths and also his weaknesses to the role. His fellow Jesuit, the theologian Karl Rahner, famously predicted that Catholics would become the "anawim in the desert." The winnowing is happening. The Holy Spirit is in charge. Francis is 81 years old, and his true legacy cannot be assessed until well into the future.
3
With the exception of Pope Francis, who I believe actually talks the talk and walks the walk of what it means to be a "Christian", i.e. a decent human being, the Catholic Church as a whole has become irrelevant in this day and age. Organized religion has been at the root of virtually all human suffering since humans started walking the earth. It is nothing more than a bunch of mumbo-jumbo created by rich men to control everyone else. But that's just the opinion of a recovering catholic!
2
What you call heretical, I call agile and compassionate.
The Pope has humble yet visionary understanding that adapting to humanity, and accommodating cultural differences, makes the church stronger, not weaker. It is not moral for one columnist, no matter how dogmatic, to judge others on their living and dying needs and customs. Perhaps if this columnist kept his mind OUT of the bedrooms of others, his thoughts will feel more pure and his dogma will dial down.
Buried in this piece of overweeningly prideful book promotion (wouldn't that be sin for a religious man?) is an open question about the Pope's progress addressing and shutting down sex offenders in the church's ranks. That question deserves more air time and exploration.
8
I just want to say to some of the liberal commentators here. Some of them are saying "why doesn't the Pope allow women to be ordained or allow birth control, etc". The answer is simple. He can't. Under Catholicism disciplines can change. Doctrine can't.
So the Pope can change the teachings on celibacy and women being deacons because that's a spiritual discipline. He cannot change the doctrine on women's ordination or any other thing that is doctrine, because if he changes doctrine, that will cause a schism and a split greater than the Protestant Reformation and tear apart the Global Catholic Church.
Not only that he would be treated as an "Anti Pope"(one who's authority isn't legitimate) and possibly deposed, and that has happened in history. So it's not as simple as outside commentators seem to make it. Articles like this though from Ross Douthat, who's coming from a Conservative Catholic perspective shows that even though the Pope hasn't changed doctrine, he's still making enough change to ruffle a few feathers.
1
"... New Testament need to be revised or abandoned ..."
This implies that there is only one "New Testament". Also, it is far too late to concern oneself with the possibility of revision, it's already occurred countless times, to the point that the original is unknown.
"New Testament" is a suitcase term, the suitcase containing countless versions, translations, heavily edited content, self contradictory, which books should have been included, which books to discard, completely lacking provenance. The books of Mark, Matthew, etc Luke, should all be relabeled Anonymous-1, Anonymous-2, etc at least for the sake of transparency. No one knows the authors, or when any of these books were written, or how they were modified over the centuries.
The current pope appears to be a nice guy. The previous pope was a misanthrope who oversaw and covered for an army of pedophile priests.
The claim that the pope is the representative of god on earth is extremely dubious. The is simply the member of a closed group of self-anointed clerics who won the last election. As happened to the previous long line of popes, he will have his time at the top of the heap, then will die and be forgotten within a few decades by the vast majority of Catholics, just like all of the others. In the long haul, tensions in the Vatican can be likened to the rustling of feathers in the chicken coup.
1
Mr. Douthat's myopic view of the Pope's success or failure is evident in his preoccupation with how many people are returning to the pews. Or not.
Pope Francis is a unicorn. One of a handful of the penultimate change agents that have appeared over time. The failure of the institution was fait accompli from it's inception some seventeen centuries ago. It's success built on the heretical notion that groups of men at the top had all the answers, never to be questioned or challenged lest one be excommunicated from it's flock; or worse yet, face inquisition, torture, and execution.
Exhibit 1: Galileo dare challenging the Papacy by suggesting the Earth moved (circled the Sun), thus rendering it another orb in the universe, versus being the center of all things. Paradoxically, it was the men who have led the Vatican for seventeen centuries who believe they are the center of the universe.
Pope Francis is not nor ever will be the problem with the Catholic Church. The problem started the day they gathered together seventeen hundred years ago and decided to rewrite who Jesus of Nazareth was, and what he stood for. The rest, as they say, is history. Arguably the single most twisted, distorted version of history that has ever been produced.
Mr. Douthat is just another in a long line of their lackeys who continue to perpetuate the myth that these men have any real ecclesiastical authority of value. It really is the sickest joke ever perpetuated on humanity...
1
Again, for the umpteenth time in its long history, the Catholic Church has been outed as an organization with no credible links to anything we might want to call divine. Instead it looks, feels and behaves like an organization created by and for plain old men (and I do mean "men"). In fact, it's behavior is less honorable and less nurturing than that of many other secular organizations we know.
But I don't want to let the other myriad religious establishments off the hook either. Their popes and prelates all wear no clothes or vestments. That they endure is not a measure of their godly affinity so much as it is, as Bertrand Russell said, of the poverty of the human spirit.
2
I agree with the first part of the title of the article. However, after reading the whole article I conclude that saying now that his papacy or legacy might be a disaster is premature. It is obvious that Francis has made a revolution inside the Church. History and experience has thought us that whatever is the legacy of a revolution it will take decades and even centuries to appropriately evaluate its successes and failures. If the columnist's announced book intends to evaluate Francis Papacy, it will have either to wait to be published a good number of years after the Papacy ends, or moderate the qualification of potential long term successes and failures to hypothesis instead of facts.
1
In the early stages of humankind, religion provided answers to human questions and provided a means to support human cooperation. Nearly all the answers have turned out to be wrong, and the more we learn today, the less we need to invoke supernatural phenomena, none of which is backed up by solid evidence. This begs the question of whether we still need authoritative religion. We still have much to learn about natural physics and may never learn how they originated in a universe that supported the origin of life. The more we learn about the Cosmos, the more awesome it appears. Perhaps Deism is true religion, where Mother Nature started the ball rolling but takes no interest in individuals whatsoever.
1
By all means, think critically about the papacy if Francis, regardless of the affection felt for him by the People of God. But, as an ex-priest, a gay man, and a philosopher, I take issue with the notion that the “stability” of the church under the leadership of Francis’ predecessors is evidence of their superiority.
Totalitarian regimes often appear to be more “stable” than democracies too. But from that alleged stability nothing necessarily follows. Since the beginning, the Catholic Church has been one big, raucous family—and it’s the dynamic interaction of people and ideas that has contributed its vitality and durability.
2
Ross, well done. I am an ex- catholic so I may have a thought worth considering; the church is an anachronism, a fossil, an unholy alliance of Cardinals against Francis. Politics and egos are rampant; power is the goal. Nothing unusual here. Has always been so. Religion? No. It is, was, a church that became an instrument of control over the poor and ignorant a grip that at long last has lost that control. The Middle Ages are long gone.
This church has devolved ,totally, into a purely political organization. It is unfortunate that the church will continue to exist. It is no longer relevant, if ever it was.
Jim in Wilmette
2
"traditional religion generally, and Roman Catholicism especially, are often covered with a mix of cluelessness and malice"
Translation: now often covered with less reflexive deference and more appropriate journalistic skepticism.
1
Ross,
As an former altar boy and Catholic, I enjoy reading your columns as they attempt to outline the continuing struggles of a declining medieval institution based on myths, faith and superstition.
From my perspective, Francis offers the Catholic Church the only way forward - embrace modernism in a way that emphasizes positive Christian teachings will leaving the rest behind.
He has quite the task!!
1
Plain and simple- he has ceded any pretense to moral standing through his blatant lack of swift and effective action to eliminate the sexual predators that exist in the church today. His own appealing personal humility has not lead him to bring the guilty to justice or stop the rapes- quite the opposite. Just in January he forcefully defended Chilean Bishop Juan Barros from charges of extreme abuse cover up, and Australian Cardinal George Pell Francis' close associate has been credibly accused of rape and charged by Australian authorities. In 2017, he reduced sanctions against pedophile priests. He allows church leadership who blame children for seeking out their own molestation to keep their positions. These are all documented actions. The church hasn't changed one iota in ways that matter because Francis sleeps in a plain, single bed; not one child has been protected from his brother predators because Francis eschews ermine and red Prada shoes; not one rapist priest has been brought to justice because Francis washes the feet of the poor. Asceticism is not righteousness. A pleasant facade does not equate to justice.
3
Aside from the lack of structural changes and the continued misogyny, this Pope who speaks so eloquently about climate change, continues with the "increase the flock" messages - particularly to those areas that can least cope with population surges.
2
Interesting take. And by that I mean it's interesting that the author didn't spend most of his time talking about the Pope's abject failure to address the ongoing moral failure of the Church in handling and preventing child abuse at the hands of it's priests. Practices may differ between dioceses, but does that matter more than the fact that the Church is collectively accepting child abuse? It's almost (i.e., exactly) like this is taken as par for the Catholic Church, so why spend much time discussing it.
The latest poll (September, 2017) on Francis' popularity among American Catholics gives him an approval rating of 87.9%, up from 82.6 last March. Apparently, it is not only non-Catholics who like the warm, approachable, humorous and humble example of this pope. While some conservatives with ideological axes to grind may object, rank and file Catholics are enthused and energized.
The Church has been in steady decline for many years. Maintaining the status-quo is a recipe for irrelevance and eventual extinction. There are over 28,000 Protestant sects, fine-tuning their theologies and appeals to the market in a way that Catholicism, with its history and claims of universality, cannot. And given the monumental crimes and hypocrisy of predatory priests and their enablers in the curia, an absolutist approach on questions of sexuality would be completely ludicrous. Francis is 100% right to strike the balance as he has, maintaining the ideals of the Church while recognizing the reality of human nature. In this he is following the example of Christ himself.
1
Jesus came to establish new order reforming and/or replacing many Old Testament principles. The time has come to reform and/or replace many New Testament principles. We need to remove rules that hinder gender equality and sexual freedom, create rigidity of rituals and sacraments, give supremacy to priests, and enforce celibacy. We need to change the way we select and training priests. We need a church under the control of people and not under the control of priest and bishops. The people should be able to select and fire priests. We should be able to select good people from the parishes as our priests instead of getting imposed from bishops and act as their agents. It must be a church based on unconditional love, not rigid rules. Let us have direct contact and relation with our God.
2
There is something about the dogmatism of the converted which invariably trips them up in assessing the elements of The Faith. Ross, you seem to be among them. Either that or you are preparing to offer a book for sale and feel being a contrarian will help sales.
In very very first letter the pope admonished the Church to take care of the poor. (How Ignatian! "Being a man for others.") In his most recent he suggests (Horror of horrors) that that Church should be open to everyone, regardless of any—repeat any—past or present circumstances.
On this last, he has gotten plenty of pushback from the Vatican "deep state" who simply are stuck in time and with Church canon. The thought of change—or perhaps, expansion—of the Christian ethos, just goes down hard with many who still pine for simple answers to complex questions.
Francis is, above all, a pastor. He looks out at the flock called humanity and reaches out to them all, inviting them drink from the cup.
How in the world can that be questioned?
5
“The first truce this pope seeks is in the culture war that everyone in Western society knows well — the conflict between the church’s moral teachings and the way that we live now, the struggle over whether the sexual ethics of the New Testament need to be revised or abandoned in the face of post-sexual revolution realities.”
[Why just the New Testament? The Catholic Catechism states: "For Holy Mother Church, relying on the faith of the apostolic age, accepts as sacred and canonical, the books of the Old and New Testaments, whole an entire, with all their parts, on the ground they have God as their author and have been handed on as such entirely." (Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church -- The Profession of Faith -- 105, page 31).
There was ever only ONE God as The Trinity Doctrine demands.
The problem is there is no way real belief can be commanded. No homosexual or those who love them is ever going to believe they deserve to be killed for being what God made them.
So let the Church divide and stop pretending.
Translation: I don't like many of the things the Pope does, especially modernizing the church and being kinder to gay people, so his papacy is a disaster.
6
Unlike other lapsed Catholics, I find Francis' antics to be nothing more than window dressing. I was hoping for a true accounting of the sex abuse rampant in the Church, outing and punishing those who have preyed on children, providing restitution to the abused and undertaking reforms (e.g. women clergy, married clergy) to prevent it from happening again. Instead we get feet washing and Trump bashing. Which, to be sure, has its place, but I was expecting a lot more.
Not all non-Catholics are enamored of Pope Francis. For this high church Episcopalian who has far more respect for the Roman Catholic Church as it was before Vatican II, his indifference or even hostility to tradition and beauty (for example, making fun of young priests who appreciate traditional clerical garb) is appalling and alienating. As an Anglican I don't believe in the claims of the Papacy, but if you're going to have a Papacy, do it properly as they used to, with a coronation, triple tiara, sedia gestatoria, Noble & Palatine Guards, and all the rest. Vatican II was bad enough, but Francis is Vatican II on steroids. No thanks.
Fancy regalia and pomp are the very opposite of Jesus’ life and teachings.
It would seem that human beliefs, or lack thereof, and all the reactions and commentary are predictable, one can practically plot them in a graph, so they are quantifiable. I wonder if these thought patterns and theologies can be fed, or taught, or programmed, into an AI, or if they'll come up with them spontaneously. Maybe in the future there will be a PopeBot who will find God.
OK, so the Pope, being a mere man, is not perfect. But his positive message of love and faith, as shown by his acts, not just his words, overcome this and, yet, you fail to see it. Face it Mr. Douthat, the Church, as led by this Pope, has moved past you. For that, let us all give thanks.
6
I grew up RC, attending Catholic schools for fourteen years. I understood that distinguishing characteristics of Catholicism vs. other Christian denominations were unity and consistency. We had certainty, not endless debate. The Pope was infallible in matters of faith and morals. Period. "Heretical Pope" would have been an oxymoron. Doctrine was unchanging (or so I thought -- certainly no one in my parish suggested otherwise). The church always got it right the first time. Not very sophisticated, but a viewpoint shared by the Catholics I knew.
Consistency plus infallibility equals a fragile rigidity. The pill came on the scene. Most Catholics don't want seven or eight kids. Once most Catholic families (at least in the US) began to practice birth control, they became, perforce, "cafeteria Catholics." As women become the more educated sex and few men pursue the priesthood, a celibate clergy and hierarchy is less and less practical and increasingly questioned by the people in the pews. But reject one teaching and all teachings are open to question. Irresistible change meets immovable tradition.
Then came the child abuse scandals to undermining the very concept of church authority. Even in Ireland, the Church has been shaken to the core. Now the conservatives have piled on, finding ways to question, if not outright reject, Papal authority.
With both liberals and conservatives challenging the Pope, the Roman church is already more than a little bit Protestant.
I hope he ends clerical celibacy in the Latin church. That would save the church for generations to come. The Eastern churches all allow it and they have no problem in finding new priests. Married priests have the support of their wives and they are very involved in running the churches at a local level. The children of priestly families often follow in the 'family' business. It is ridiculous to require priests to be caste and celibate and is not based on any scripture - it's simply a silly rule from the middle ages.
2
The problems of the Catholic Church are not my problems.
Given that, it gives me pleasure to see the Church being dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st Century.
Pope Francis was supposed to revolutionize the Catholic Church and have people returning in droves in the western world; but unfortunately, it has not turned out that way. There are no more people attending Mass today then before he became Pope. In Africa, the Church has been growing steadily but they tend to to be conservative thinking. You cannot fault him for trying to bring people back into the fold but they must want to come. Pope Francis is a good man who loves Catholicism but he is not without his flaws.
The pope that is still greatly beloved and admired by many Catholics throughout the world is Pope John Paul II. He is now a saint and it is not surprising that this has occurred. He was regarded as a saint by many while on earth. I was fortunate to have been invited by my Monsignor friend to attend the Central Park Mass over 20 years ago and it was one of the highlights of my life. People absolutely adored him and the enthusiasm was contagious. He was a great and holy man who loved the people. And they loved him back. He was influential along with some other Polish people of bringing down communism.
Being a Catholic is not always easy and there are sacrifices that people make to remain faithful but the rewards are tremendous. I love the rituals such as reciting the rosary, daily devotionals and praying to the saints and during Lent saying the Stations of the Cross with others. These rituals bring Catholics peace of mind and hope in a turbulent world.
28
John Paul II is a saint in the same vein as Ronald Reagan is a great president. If there were a Saint in the Vatican in the 20th century it was John XXIII. His efforts to turn the Catholic Church back to the real teachings of Jesus (care for the poor, love of all neighbors, etc) were undermined by his successors.
The power hungry College of Cardinals rejected these ideas and set about destroying his legacy. They will do the same thing when Francis is gone.
Those of us who have left the pews admire Pope Francis with all our hearts. But he is trying to bail the Titanic with a teaspoon. and we will not be fooled by the hypocrites again.
155
The writer seems not to realize the profound demoralization that John Paul II caused among bishops, laity, and theologians for his narrow-minded aversion to discussion and to persons who might differ from his views . . .his views being not the same as "unchanging doctrine". The writer also seems to ignore that the canonization of John Paul II was a whitewash intended to drag attention away not only from the accumulating evidence of adminstrative dysfunction, cronyism, and financial mismanagement under his Curia but also his studied indifference to issues of sexual abuse. Indeed, two of his cardinals were found guilty of the abuse of seminarians (Groer and O'Brien). He let the Groer case drag on and let Groer retire with dignity. (O'Brien's case came out under Benedict.)
"Saint" John Paul II? Only if you overlook a mountain of sinful negligence.
And don't overlook the symbolic point that he was only canonized after Francis could canonize John XXIII in the same ceremony ... and is pushing Paul VI's canonization forward too.
9
If John-Paul II is a saint, isn't it primarily because the rules for sainthood were changed -- and changed while he was in charge?
1
Our prayer, should we care for the Church, is that Pope Francis would help fulfill what St. Vincent of Lerins penned, "Moreover, in the Catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken, that we hold that faith which has been believed everywhere, always, by all."
Some may say this is impossible, that this faith and practice can no longer hold up in the modern era. For those that believe that, there are plenty of other religious or non-religious groups that one can join that do not care for historic and global unity.
For those that do believe in this Body, may we continue to pray, debate, and serve our neighbor. Pope Francis faces immense challenges. He has consistently cared throughout his life for the oppressed and the poor. The world, thankfully, now appreciates this devotion, which is a deep conviction of the Church. May Pope Francis also find the ability to do this while caring for the doctrine of the Church, which many in the world would rather see disappear.
5
The importance of the Christian Church in shaping the world that we know really is difficult to measure, but if one becomes familiar with ancient pagan Rome and compares it with the subsequent history of the West, we know it's good affects have been great. But the one thing that the Roman Catholic Church insisted upon which gave it so much power, also has lead it into opposing the basic goodness of the message of Jesus in the Bible because it always ends up defying the core principle that the Church is infallible and so is the Pope. Once one views the church as just the leader of a well established and powerful organization and the church as just a human institution, then it's possible to address it's inconsistencies and vulnerabilities without alarm, and without having to silence heretics.
2
The level of uniformity Douthat demands in the "universal" church was born out of the desire of Rome to assert its authority as the middle ages progressed. All manner of doctrinal issues made good pretense to force a more loyal archbishop on some distant part of Christendom, excommunicate a king to please his enemies, or seize control of a holy order. To the degree hardline uniformity was successful it was heavily grounded in a degree of cultural homogeneity historically in Western Europe which can hardly be found in the whole of the Catholic world today. Returning to a system where regions have their own flavor in how they manage their flocks could well be a tremendous force to revitalize Catholicism.
7
Three comments:
First, the statement that Francis "operates in a media environment in which traditional religion generally, and Roman Catholicism especially, are often covered with a mix of cluelessness and malice." is ingenuous. The church is not a victim of the media; its troubles are of its own making through top-down authoritarianism and over reliance on decisions dating back 1000 years or more. Catholics are leaving the church in droves, or, even if they are staying, ignoring its teachings, because they see therein no relevance to their own lives.
Second, Francis is not out of the authoritarian Roman Curia, who seem to be doing whatever they can to oppose him short of open rebellion. Rather he is out of the South American liberation theology tradition, with its bias toward the poor and downtrodden.
Third, this column is not about Pope Francis as much as it is about Ross Douthat and his unhappiness that the Pope does not hold to his beliefs. Who is Ross Dothan to say what is heretical and what isn't? Ross has been criticized before by Catholic theologians for expounding on areas of faith where he has neither training nor authority, and in this case I have to agree with them. The church has a procedure for determining what is doctrine, and the procedure is built around the pope. Live with it.
To paraphrase Francis, the gospel stays the same, but our understanding of it can change. Change is hard, but sometimes necessary. Live with that, too.
15
I knew I could count on Ross to ensure that the Pharisees have a voice.
He's a true conservative: revolution was once and once alone (Jesus, too, was "a religious hopes that many of his admirers didn’t realize or remember that they had"), our lot is to preserve the letter, not the spirit, despite the changing times.
9
Mr. Douthat talks of the "appeal there might yet be in Catholic Christianity, if it found a way to slip the knots that the modern world has tied around its message."
With all due respect (I'm a high church Anglican) I would submit that the modern world has nothing to do with the knots in the (Roman) Catholic message: it is the Roman Catholic Church that has tied itself into knots rather than deal with modernity.
Jesus's message was that the old rules were to be overturned. Jesus proclaimed only two rules: love God and love your neighbor as yourself.
14
But it's the Law (10 Commandments) that defines what it means to love God and neighbor as our self. In Catholic numbering the first 3 define proper love for God and the remainder define love for self and neighbor. Jesus said none of the Law would pass away. One of the reasons we have such disagreement about morality today is that too many people want to define it by what THEY love, not by what God defines as love.
"Pope follows teaching of Jesus too closely." Film at Eleven.
Your idea of Christianity, Mr. Douthat, is the worship of an institution, the old-line conservative-to-reactionary Catholic Church. My idea is that it has something to do with the teachings of Jesus, which emphasize care for the poor, the sick, the hungry, the children. The worship of an institution is idolatry.
66
Indeed. I would categorize institutions and even the Catholic Church under the umbrella of “principalities and powers”
Catholic doctrine, like that of other churches, was invented and developed and polished by human beings. Why do conservative Christians insist on elevating man-made historic doctrine to a higher status than that of God and Jesus?
23
A simple explanation of Mr. Douthat's and other conservatives problems with Pope Francis: Francis understands the teaching and example of Jesus and the conservatives do not.
Jesus was a liberal. He came into a world that had all sorts of establishment positions on religion -- the Roman religions, the Greek religions, Temple Judaism, the Essences -- and he changed things. Liberals change, conservatives conserve.
Oh, and for the record, if you believe in God as the Creator of the Universe and if you accept what Einstein, Darwin, Hawking and virtually the entire rest of science teaches about he nature of creation...you know that God is a liberal because the universe and life are both fundamentally premised on the concept of change and evolution. Thus, God who could have established the universe on any basis, chose a liberal concept -- constant change -- as the most basic rule of the universe.
So the Catholic Church wedged itself into a tight corner back in 1200 when they bet the farm on obscure (and erroneous) pre-scientific commitments to Aristotelean logic as the premise for truth. As science has emerged, one logical idea after another has fallen victim to the facts or truth that emerged via science.
Francis wants to pull Catholics out of the corner and go back to Jesus. For Jesus, change is OK, even good. And mercy, not logic, was the central message of Jesus. He is right, Douthat is wrong.
40
How exactly does that idea mesh with Jesus's saying "I came not to abolish the law but to fulfill it. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.
"? Jesus may not have been strictly conservative but to claim he was a liberal would seem to be just a selective a reading of Gospel/history/theology.
2
Religions, the bible & koran are all man-made creations the same as ancient mythologies. Any changes made in doctrine etc. in religions is also man-made. So who are the conservatives or the ultra liberals practicing a religion to say what is right or wrong. Religion is like a big business and politics. The hand of man can taint anything it creates or touches. I personally hope the Pope opens even more doors & windows & creates a transparent church & religion.
I tend to take blind faith with a grain of salt & I became more akin to the late Vincent Bugliosi who wrote DIVINITY of DOUBT before he died a few years ago. I suppose I'm just a doubting Thomas, but I've lived long enough & worked close to many religions to see the dirt under the rug & the skeletons in the closets (and clergy in the closet). Maybe Pope Francis is just trying to sweep out the dirt & clean the closets of dirty secrets.
12
As an atheist and only occasional reader of issues concerning the Catholic Church I am not surprised by Mr. Douthat's flying to the right-wing of the pope. Unlike his ultra-conservative predecessors Francis has gone on a charm offensive and if he hasn't brought the faithful back to their knees, at least he has put lipstick on the pig of the child abuse scandals, but more importantly gives voice to many human rights concerns. In my view the Vatican is more like a University than a corporation. In other words, tenured 'cardinals' have the power to block or delay whatever reforms the senior managers have in mind. Frankly, I'll take someone like Francis and forget about the rest of the Church which will disappear soon enough unless they can convince a lot of Africans and Asians that their mumbo-jumbo has any relevance. I have nothing but respect for priests and sisters who are social justice warriors but as for the rest...well, we have seen what it leads to.
12
This is all very interesting, but the most important question about any Pope is also the simplest: Is he holy? The affirmative answer to this question about John Paul II is why he now sits among the saints, despite the many temporal failures and disappointments of his Papacy. How it is answered about Pope Francis will be, in the end, the only thing that matters.
1
I've always considered Pope Francis as having great PR and marketing skills. I never thought he will make any meaningful doctrinal changes. I did expect him to address the sexual abuse issues in the church. It turns out his PR skills are not enough to hide his utter failure in this area.
13
Stalin, told the Pope (Pius XII) did not approve of his actions, famously replied "How many Divisions does the pope have?"
Today how many people of faith, Catholic or other faiths, or struggling to find/refind faith, hear the message of Christ through the words and actions of this Pope than any other in centuries? He may not have Divisions, but Francis has his Bully Pulpit, and uses it. It is the Apostle's Mission to teach and spread The Word. Not to amass wealth and power, and be the Chief Pharisee, hectoring and excommunicating any who stray slightly from current doctrine.
Love God and Love Thy Neighbor as Thyself. From this the rest shall follow.
5
The Pope, whom I respect, the Church, and its dogma are all fallible. The Church wa wrong on the Crusades, Galileo, Christian religious wars, handling of pedofile priests, and continue to be wrong on birth control..
18
As a Protestant, I would like to point out that Christ's message, and that of the whole Christian Church is full of ambiguity; the one common thread is that the "greatest of these is love"
5
"But to choose a path that might have only two destinations — hero or heretic — is also an act of presumption..."
But isn't that precisely what Jesus did? In choosing the path of the cross, Jesus confounded his followers and critics alike.
The author also refers to "the consistency of Catholic doctrine and its fidelity to Jesus," as if it is a given, when in many cases, doctrine fails to live up to the grace and mercy offered by the founder of the faith.
6
Challenging article, makes this Anglican anxious to read Douthat’s book.
The dynamic of a leader beloved for style even as his leadership is ineffectual makes me think of a recent US president, awarded a Nobel Peace Prize before having accomplished anything, whose vaunted change ultimately turned out to be compromise with more of the same.
3
Oh Ross, dear God, man, this is the 21st century and unlike our follow Catholics in the Middle Ages and I. The 50's, we are better educated and can discern for ourselves with our God given free will what is best for us! I resent the hierarchy in their ivory tower dictating to us, sheep, what we will or will not do! How much suffering has the hierarchy inflicted on our world and their people?! Five hundred years of the Inquisition, countless children and women abused sexually! Enough, already! It's time to return to the Gospel of Christ, and leave behind all the man-made laws and regulations!
Francis, is wonderful but he can do much more to liberate the Catholics from the dysfunctional teachings that have caused so much pain.
3
I left the roman catholic church intentionally, not out of neglect. Actually, I am now an apostate since I am an atheist. A brave new world awaits us all. However, I do agree with Ross that if you are a catholic, then that entails adherence to doctrine and dogma. Francis is likely a heretic because his public statements contradict these things. Doctrine and dogma are not things that can change in the catholic religion since they issue from divine revelation. Of course a remarried couple without a finding of a nullity cannot receive communion; they are still married to their former spouses and thus are guilty of adultery, which is a mortal sin. The sexual morality of Jesus was quite narrow. If you read the gospels you will see that. That morality doesn't fit in our brave new world, which is ok, since we need to make a clean break from all that old stuff of an old world.
1
I believe the Catholic Church grows because it embraces the idea that it is a religion of people. The dates of our holy days (Easter, Christmas, et al) were created to be similar to dates celebrated by other religions. Jesus and his mother are portrayed in art work to look exactly like people from various cultures. The church says if necessary, ordinary Catholics can baptize. Our church compromises and melds and grows.
This also means, we can be Catholic, without paying money to the Cathoic church! I think the real struggle in our church is between those who need to consolidate power and money in the Catholic Church (certain cardinals...) vs those who understand that true spirituality is in our hearts and expressed in our words and how we behave.
Our pope understands this. It's why he fired the financial board at the Vatican (how many times?). He is the first pope to excommunicate the Mafia in Italy. Why wasn't this done sooner? Our pope puts ordinary people over the Church's admininstrative (facist) need to control and be powerful.
He may already be a saint. Officials who are worried about amassing money and power in the church are too blind to see this.
Of course he tries to bring people to our lord. Jesus wasn't just talking about children when he said 'suffer the little children'. He never said, everyone but the Chinese! Everyone is valuable in the Catholic church. It is our moral obligation to find the path that shows love and respect for EVERYONE.
8
To the vast majority of Catholics worldwide, this Pope is someone they can identify with. He lives a simple life and like John 23, he is like-able. Unlike John, he has uttered a lot of words but very little action. Lets face it, the majority is only looking for a way to make it to the promised land and not cross the imaginary person in the sky. Maybe a "gift" here and there in this life. Sadly, Ross, your mumbo-jumbo means very little and will be read by very few Catholics even here in the US. Catholicism has become more a way of life than a strict following of some abstract teaching, for the masses. Lead a good life and you will get that visa to "heaven".
1
The historic arc of the Papacy, in the last 35 years, follows the arc of World politics.
With the selection of Pope John Paul II in 1978, Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister of Great Britain in 1979, and Ronald Reagan as President in 1980 the World embrace a right leaning answer to the problems of the World. The rigid ideological influence of these three world leaders has helped create the problems of radical nationalism, economic inequality. And, ironically, and maybe hopefully, these three World leaders have experienced a loss in stature and influence.
Mr. Douthat is a conservative. He liked Reagan, Thatcher and JPII.
He did not like Obama. He did not like the efforts to introduce balance and to fix what had gone wrong since Ronald Reagan. He constantly added his voice to the anti-Obama noise.
That he is now critical of a reformer Pope who is trying to swing the pendulum of the last 35 years back to center should come as no surprise, and his argument against the Pope is just a repeat of his attempts to discredit and malign a leader who leads with compassion rather narrowly defined and regressive doctrine.
Maybe should get a red baseball cap: Make the Church Great Again.
18
And Ross is showing what Pope Benedict calls "foolish prejudice. " It can obscure your view. https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2018/03/12/benedict-xvi-defends-po...
I don't know the biblical sources of Catholic doctrine on homosexuality and marriage. But, to an extent, they are based upon the natural law and theology in Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica. The core of Aquinas' thinking is the relationship of potency to actualization, aka fulfillment or perfection. For humans, one of these fulfillments or perfections is procreation through marriage, and, for raising and providing for chidren, the indissolubility of marriage. Oversimplifying, the inherent goodness of these makes them natural laws. Pope Francis has correctly pointed out that persons and relationships that don't hit these marks may also be good and deserving of the Church's respect. For (my) examples, some married couples don't procreate, don't have children -- so how is this different from homosexual couples? For those who would say that, unlike a heterosexual marriage, a homosexual relationship isn't "open" to having children. This is a bit petty in terms of the morality, and, factually wrong, as many homsexual couples raise children. And homosexual couples may have the emotional and financial means to raise healthy children. So how is this differnt from heterosexual couples -- many of whom do not? And if a hetersexual relationship is unhealthy, but the children are provided for in divorce, isn't the "natural" purpose of marriage carried out? In short, I believe Pope Francis' wise intuition is: the "perfect" (in some sense) should not be the enemy of the good.
6
Times change. Pope Francis is as was Barack Obama -- transformational.
There is an abundance of Light and Love with these men, obviously some are very uncomfortable with that.
15
The Pope is as Barack Obama, all talk and no action. Hope and Change a joke. This Pope loves and protects the pederasts, not the little children, as have all his predecessors. There are no heroes; all have feet of clay.
1
So many are enamored by Pope Francis and constantly exalt him.
It makes me sick. There is no discussion of birth control and the desperate need for it throughout the world. This be fruitful and multiply Catholic business is wrong in every way. Pay no attention to the celibate, old men wearing the long dresses and tall hats.
5
While not catholic I was under the impression the Church considered the Pope infallible and that his election was inspired and ordained by God. That being the case, how can the religious conservative Douthat question the Popes motives, practices, and plans?
All this column showed me is Douthat's belief the upper echelons of the Catholic Church are filled with politics, intrigue, and factions. That the Church is just a vehicle for men to gain power and position. To grow rich while pontificating on beliefs they do not believe, participate in a farce they will not admit is a farce, and who are committed, not to their religion or beliefs but to their power and wealth.
2
Douhat doesn't speak for me and many many Catholics. He speaks for a wizened minority of Catholics who seek not Christ but a sense of moral superiority - Pharisees of our day.
One consistent thread in the Gospels is Christs's disdain for those who use their religion has a weapon of malice are Pharisees of this day. The one who stands s at the foot of the altar and praises himself has a "true" Catholic and despises the sinner comes away unjustified. The one who who privately remains at the back of the Church and prays for mercy for the his sins is justified.
1
Why do conservative Catholics fight forward leaning change so much? The Old Testament god of anger and vengeance was supposed to be eclipsed by a son who preached love and the benefits of helping those who are less fortunate; that message is not heard in today’s gospel of enrichment. Yes, there is still a gargantuan problem with pedophile priests and the damage they’ve done, and although Francis has made strides in the right direction, he is light years ahead of his predecessors on the issue and still seen as protecting the guilty. With an organization as old as the Church, this issue will be around for a long time, but they have a ray of modern hope right now in their new pope-no matter what Ross thinks about it.
3
Nothing Vatican Inc. does matters till that organization begins respecting half the world's population that is female. No sane person will hold their breath on that one.
10
The moment a lay person such as Ross Douthat argues how the Pope should govern, the first step he takes toward being a non-believer.
There's a good reason why the Pope is defined as infallible. This well-argued review of Catholocism and the Popular Pope illustrates why the Pope must by definition be infallible. Otherwise, the whole Religious House of Cards falls.
Ethical, logical, and scientific people are increasingly realizing what a threat to personal safety and world peace religions are. Donald Trump was elected by God-fearing evangelicals and religious folks of all kinds. Religion is responsible for much of the horror of the world. Yet many people believe they cannot live or prosper without religion. 7 of our 9 Supreme Court Justices are Roman Catholics. That should be enough to scare anyone. Those who cannot live without religious believes should envision wiser gods, starting with the Pope. Could their be a science of religion - developing a set of religious myths which maximizes good results and minimizes bad ones? This could be enforced by a system of religious justice - administered on earth of course!
3
As a Catholic, I look to the church to support my efforts to live a good life in union with a higher power that centers around love and mercy. I look for community with others who seek the same. I see the church as an imperfect institution, with many sins of its own. I am inspired by Pope Francis focus on people, mercy, love, and the power of each person striving to grow closer to God and one another. Institutional change is slow, but for an institution that relies on member support to sustain itself, it will either change or die. Staying true to core values and acting in faith to spread love and mercy in the world is what will keep Catholicism alive, not the iron grip of power factions who want to play god standing in judgment over others.
4
The early church "fathers" didn't understand one thing: Men need to be supervised!
A married priest will have far fewer chances to succumb to the "pleasures of the flesh" then one who is single! Just ask married men!
5
This column misses the point. The Catholic Church can't spread the Gospel (which I don't believe in) if it loses to Muslims and atheists. Fighting the Muslims and the Chinese and their ilk is job 1.
What about the abuse that Christians suffer in the Middle East and China? I see no fire in the Pope's belly about that. Benedict would defend the faith. He even made a play against the Anglicans--well done. They deserved it because they're wimps. Catholics vs. the evangelicals would be a fairer fight.
Women, gays, and liberals are a sideshow. Big Christianity is about politics, power. Jesus is a distant third. We need a Pope who knows that, like a Pope of old.
Think I'm cynical? Not really. Just see the world as it was, is, and shall be. Not as the deluded would like it to be.
First of all, the Church is constituted by people who usually make mistake as the people outside the church.
Francis is acting to obtain important improvement for embracing who had thought incorrectly, to be out of the church. This is working very well.
Prior to judging his way to manage an organization so complex as the church is, we should pay more attention to the actual situation and not rely on each word he said to discuss the matter.
Today we have Mc 10,46-52 where the blnd guy "Egli, gettato via il suo mantello, balzò in piedi e venne da Gesù".
We should ask ourselves if we are ready to do that " throw our cloak" for being free to embrace the faith.
Discussing any Francis's statement as judging a football/basketball match or a company as the article is attempting to do it seems to me an incorrect approach.
1
Heretic?!!! Go back to the 16th century Douthat, you'll be much happier there.
NO one wants the old style rigid and unforgiving Catholic church. The world is moving on, and if the church doesn't move on with it and embrace science, worker's rights, human rights, women's rights and women's right to control their own body the church is destined to either shrink into irrelevance or become like the Russian church an arm of repression for a despotic regime.
12
Why are conservative writers so regularly being given a platform as prominent as the Op-Ed page of the N Y Times? The opinions of Douthat, Stephens, and Brooks deliver a predictably passionate reaction from their largely liberal audience, but at what cost to our public discourse?
These conservative voices are being given the power to set our conversational agenda, but is the fate of the Catholic church really a pressing public matter? I understand that many believers think so, but since he is a regular columnist we’re repeatedly being lured into discussions that are largely irrelevant to a modern, secular society.
Worse, those who would like to reimagine religious faith for the 21st century must do so, at least in these pages, within the intellectual straightjacket of Ross Douthat’s nostalgia for the medieval church. My question is genuine. Is Douthat’s tortured hand wringing over modernity’s place in the church merely an easy way to garner more clicks? Is that the extent of the NY Times’ commitment to its stewardship of our public discourse?
3
Hopefully, Mr. Douthat, you no longer feel awkward when asked what reservations you have about The Pope. The least 'Christian' people I have met are sometimes Roman Catholics.
If you have some spare time, you might want to read 'The Catholics' by Brian Moore, or his 'Statement' condemning The Vatican. What I like about Brother Francis is his humanity; the might of the man, his brightness and vision are compelling.
His, is the only photo I carry in my wallet, along with that of a devout Muslim and nothing is accidental in life. There is a reason for the above that Reason cannot understand.
But what about The Papacy! It was all over for this person when the former Pope announced that Bob Dylan was a false prophet. Should I ever return to the Catholic Church, a strong believer, it will be my faith in Pope Francis.
2
Orthodox ideology — the letter of the law rather than the spirit of the law, is always elevated in importance above the actual lives of the people by conservatives. Conversely, liberals adhere to the spirit of laws and regard the suffering and wellbeing of people as the point of all of it.
I left the Church when Pope Paul II declared that as a gay man I was intrinsically evil. At a time when the Pope could have expressed Catholic teaching in a way that could’ve brought healing in thousands of Catholic families he raised a sword and causing families to make the choice between sons and daughters and Catholic law, while condemning those sons and daughters as intrinsically evil, evil at the core of who they are.
I cried when Pope Francis answered a question about homosexuality by asking, “Who am I to judge?”
5
A real leader responds to the desires his constituents have expressed for years and by doing so makes the institution he leads stronger. God bless the Pope.
1
Forget about religion and dogma and divisiveness and all that is human and come with wholly empty hands unto your God. He is within our minds and is waiting for us to hear Him. No need for an intermediary.
1
I highly value RD's incisive analysis. Therefore,I am supremely disappointed that the Canadian Bishops' document Douthat references leaves the impression that the Bishops do not take a decisive stand on the wrongness of sick people choosing physician assisted suicide. Here is the actual statement of the Bishops:
“In the case of a person who is contemplating a request for medical assistance in committing suicide or for euthanasia, but has not yet determined to do so, the grace of the sacrament of anointing is not to be denied,” the bishops say. But just before that the Bishops said:
“If the person, however, remains obstinate, the anointing cannot be celebrated,”
In other words the Catholic teaching stands but is nuanced, not explained away. It's a very responsible pastoral approach without compromising in the least Catholic dogma.
3
Why does the Church insist on clutching on to the prohibition against contraception? If the Pope liberated the Catholic women of the world to use birth control, the only sound heard would be a huge sigh of relief.
Allowing women to prevent pregnancies would make the Church's stand on abortion look more like a life-affirming principle, and less like simple spite against women.
20
The hierarchy may teach against contraception, but let's be honest, we in the developed nations have been using contraceptives regardless of the church's teachings. This is one of the areas that really riles me up, that these men in their ivory tower insist that women have as many children as possible, totally disregarding women's health.
3
I'm fairly certain that there are millions of catholic women who use birth control; not the ridiculous "rythym" method, but actual birth control. If they didn't, there would be a gazillion Catholics walking around out there!
The notion of “heresy” being a concern to an educated person in the 21st century is astonishing. Heresy was an issue in the Middle Ages.
19
I imagine that the new virulent strain of "evangelical" Catholics will lap up Douthat's book, just to help build a rationale for their resistance to Pope Francis, Vatican II, tolerance, social justice, etc. Steve Bannon, Mike Pence, and Paul Ryan might even order advanced copies. Yet I cannot imagine how anyone raised learning about the life of Christ could not see Francis's symbolic actions as more meaningful than anything coming out of Rome in several generations, much less the work of fundamentalist "Catholics" eager to make America a much nastier place.
3
Basically Ross, it boils down to this. Do you value a static organization that adheres to rules that are man-made and unyielding, never mind that Jesus had very little to nothing to say about liturgical practices, sexual morality and that leadership must be patriarchal or do you value an organization that treats every human as an individual with intrinsic worth, just as Jesus did? I'll take the latter every time.
From a relevancy point of view, I actually approve of your assessment that the Catholic Church become a confederation of regional/national organizations that adapt to the lives of their populations. From an attendance point of view, it certainly makes the Catholic Church more relevant to the masses (pun intended) and I believe the church's influence would be increased. It seems that for too long, the Pharisees have been running the Vatican and that is a huge turn off to free thinking people. Despite the fact that I could never abandon the religion of my lifetime, we fail to attract the younger generations because "They will know we are Christians by our love" has not been the message for at least 30 years. Instead, the Catholic Church has sent the message that Thou Shalt Not, unless it involved covering up the rape of children.
Pope Francis makes me proud to be Catholic again and has captured the imagination of many non-Catholics. He is inspirational as a figure who wants us to live as Jesus did. I don't recall Ratzinger having that effect.
9
"hero or heretic" It always comes down to whose ox is being gored, doesn't it...
I suspect that if the participants of the Last Supper were to have a reunion and discuss the current state of affairs, they would be appalled. Beatitudes?
6
This is the first pope from the Southern Hemisphere. Much like Obama, there is a strong, visceral revulsion by conservative white men when faced with “others” participating in “their” world. Much of the criticism of
Pope Francis should be viewed with awareness by these critics of the lens through which he is viewed.
12
The church has survived popes murderous, corrupt, and hypocritical beyond anything seen of late, and Francis is just one of a parade of elevated priests passing before us through the decades. The church has bigger challenges.
The core problem is purpose. One could argue that the church formally nullified its own theology upon recognition of Evolution because that effectively nullifies Genesis with its occupants Adam and Eve and the Serpent. Without that cast of characters the theology of redemption for Original Sin with Jesus as the bloody debt payment is rendered meaningless. The entire edifice collapses.
Sorry for the tedious theology lesson, Mr. Ross, but you need to work on your sales pitch on behalf the church's very existence. Francis is just a temporary figurehead and he will be replaced soon enough.
1
I'm having fun imagining Ross Douthat writing during the time of Herod, bitterly complaining about an upstart rabbi named Jesus whose message of inclusiveness and disregard of doctrine was an affront and a danger to the established bureaucracy and threatened to cause problems for the money lenders at the temple.
What I fail to understand about Douthat--and other conservative thinkers like him who are neither stupid nor bigoted--is what kind of world is it that they want to see? Is a world of ordained women priests and gay Catholic unions so horrible to consider? Is such a prospect really a disaster? Does it any way change your own relationship with god?
18
Well said!
2
The pope has tried to bring mercy and social justice for the poor to the forefront of Church teaching. This is not new teaching. What is upsetting to people like Ross is that they want the Church to focus on what they think other people are doing wrong, not what they themselves could improve upon.
9
As a former Catholic, almost a priest, now an atheist of some 50+ years, I applaud much of what Pope Francis is doing. He is human, fallible, and errs. But he is trying to move the church a wee bit closer to the Christ of the New Testament, a figure I will always revere as portrayed there, despite my atheism. And despite the grotesque abandonment of the Christ of the New Testament by conservative so-called “Christians” of all denominations.
I hope he holds office a long time, and makes the church more human, more humane, and truer to its origins. He is the best Pope in my lifetime since John XXIII. He makes me prouder of the cultural Catholicism that will always be a part of me, due in no small measure that in my sometimes horrific childhood, the church was often my sole refuge and haven, for which I owe it my gratitude and respect, despite having abandoned all religion as toxic fantasy.
8
Well said! I too, left the church. Though I am not an atheist, I can understand why many of us former Catholics are. Peace.
What "sexual ethics of the New Testament?" They don't exist. The sexual ethics of the Catholic Church evolved long after Golgotha.
3
Bravo, Ross! Finally someone is writing about how hollow the pope's efforts are with regards to sexual abuse. His reign is a perfect illustration of the "The King Has No Clothes." The more people praised him -- for what, I don't know -- the more people thought he was worthy of praise. He has actively stood in the way of justice for sexual abuse victims and he has kept priests in parishes who are pedophiles. If the Pope wants to bring back lapse Catholics, he can start by giving justice to those who suffered at the hands of catholic priests and protection to those now who will suffer.
1
As a Catholic who did volunteer work in the ghetto and does volunteer work with the elderly and gives money to multiple charities and does indulgence work for murder victims, I don't like the last three Popes who are identical in their mutual dissent from centuries of tradition and scripture affirming the death penalty....whose absence in Brazil is getting tens of thousands killed per year...see UN data. Laity dissented on birth control which has maybe one Bible verse involved....one maybe. These three Popes dissented on affirming the death penalty which has about forty supportive scripture verses...clear as a bell....no maybes. All three were biblical modernists without realizing it because it's the whole clerical atmosphere in their education. I don't talk to clergy. Sixty percent of the Bible makes them hurl.
1
If Jesus Christ expected and wanted perfection in his Church he would not have built it upon a denying doubting flawed follower whose name means rock aka Peter. Any notion of disaster in the papacy of Pope Francis has to ignore the rise of Islam, the Orthodox schism and the Protestant Reformation.
3
I haven't seen anything about birth control. Yet this is one of the major problems of our time, especially in Africa. It's time for the Catholic Church to stop its policy of trying to create more Catholics by restricting the use any devices that interfere with conception.
3
"the struggle over whether the sexual ethics of the New Testament need to be revised or abandoned in the face of post-sexual revolution realities."
Oh please, Church teaching on sex has nothing to do with the New Testament and everything to do with Thomas Aquinas's undying love for Aristotlean thought and with ideologues in the College of Cardinals. Maybe Ross should go do a bit of research.
11
Francis merely puts a smiling face and a faux open demeanor on the same misogynistic, patriarchal, controlling mediaeval dogma of the Catholic Church. He has recalled a sex abusing priest to the Vatican to protect him from being tried by the country he presided in. He has punished female religious orders, made no moves to welcome gay catholics as non-sinning equal members of the society, continued to hoard the vast fortune of the Church, etc. The same old, same old delivered by a smiling face instead of a dour, stern cold man like the last pope. Nothing to see here.
4
Sickening. But accurate.
Beloved by whom? Secular liberals love church liberals. Big deal.
1
Christ was never all that popular in the Temple.
254
Jesus's ideas are still not popular in the Catholic Church, with the exemption of the Jesuits.
2
This Pope seems to understand and honor the true words and actions of a man named Jesus far more than any recent occupants of the role, and perhaps a bit more honestly than Ross Douthat, even if the Pope does not use so many obscure and arcane vocabulary words. That is something worth celebrating.
6
The American Catholic Church is unique in how it has been politically influenced by the Christian Evangelical movement, and its particular political views. Beliefs, for example, that God favours certain political candidates, that God cares more about “belief” than action, that God will give you whatever you want if you just believe, that God doesn’t want you to sacrifice for the poor, that God condemns certain people, especially those with different beliefs.
I’ve actually read some homilies coming out of the US recently, and one tried to say that what Jesus was actually saying when he whipped the moneychangers out of the temple was that people should offer fair prices, and if they had been giving better prices the temple market would have been ok!
Jesus was “liberal” by American standards. He wanted us to give everything to the poor, serve them every day, even if it meant giving up our last two coins. He wanted us to help other people, turn the other cheek if we were struck and not hit back, forgive, be gentle, kind, and friendly. He told us to visit the prisons, help the sick, respect the elderly. He told us to accept everyone, whether Samaritan, tax collector, Roman, Jew, leper, or prostitute (literally everyone in his society).
Are those such “liberal” values now that the American church can’t deal with them?
374
Good point, the Catholic Church in the US, for example, like the evangelicals, seemed to turn the faith into being anti catholic and anti gay, while remaining mum on the Ayn Rand inspired ideals of the right in the US, that the poor are poor because they are lazy and don't want to work, and that we should be cutting taxes on the well off while slashing social services (and for you faithfull saying that isn't true, when was the last time you heard a catholic bishop tell a politician like Paul Ryan that gutting the social safety net is against Church teaching as is demonizing the poor and powerless and tell them they may not be able to take communion because they are in violation of church teaching...I defy you to find that). The US Church, the leadership, was appointed by JPII and that is exactly what they have turned the church into, another cog in the religious right base, in the US the crisis is that the people in the church are so our of line with the leaders that JPII put in, and Benedict has not done what JPII did and force the reactionary right types to resign, like Dolan here in NYC).
6
"Are those such “liberal” values now that the American church can’t deal with them?"
Yes, the church is all about power. nothing else matters.
I reject your premise. Giving to the poor is not only a part of Liberal ideology, it's party of Conservative idiology as well. The difference is the mechanism. Liberals think the government should be the primary mechanism by which the fortunately help the unfortunate; Conservatives believe that people should help people before the government helps people. Both are compatible with Christ's teachings and it's makes mad when Liberals misinterpret what we Conservatives believe.
1
When judging others, as you're doing, you should first lay out your expectations. To me, this is an article berating a fish because he can't climb a tree. Maybe a better example would be judging the Queen of England based on Great Britain's GDP. Maybe I didn't realize the Pope was supposed to be just another back-room bureaucrat.
6
A disaster in the opinion of a pre-Vatican II reactionary.
I'll take my Pope Paco, St. Mother Teresa, Benedictine form of Catholicism.
Enjoy your version of RC, along with Paul Ayn Rand Ryan, and the other mammon-driver believers.
9
Earlier this year, the Vatican barred former President of Ireland, Mary McAleese, from taking part in a conference to mark International Women’s Day, which was originally due to take place in the Holy See.
The list of speakers required approval from a cardinal, and MM's inclusion was opposed by Cardinal Kevin Farrell, previously Bishop of Dallas, and now prefect of the Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life. The aim of the conference was to convince the Vatican that women have the expertise and skills to play a full leadership role in the church; but a celibate man, with Vatican responsibility for 'family and life', decreed that Mary—whose personal history is testimony to her devotion to Catholicism—was unsuitable.
Pope Francis has still not replied to a letter she wrote to him after the Vatican decision, despite it being sent by diplomatic bag. She has since challenged Francis to be a reforming pope, committed to real, practical action on behalf of women. She described opposition to women priests as 'misogynist codology dressed up as theology', and criticised 'the patronising platitudes that women have heard from a succession of popes and cardinals'.
And she's right: the man-made 'toxins' within the Vatican—the misogyny, homophobia, and exclusion of women—are a far cry from the early church and Christ's message of healing and love. Francis is a kind and decent man, but that kindness and decency exists only on the surface. He has no desire to effect any real change.
265
How do you know what the early Church was like?
Agreed. He's great window dressing for the Catholic Church with no aim to make any meaningful changes. What a shame.
The seriousness with which Ross writes would merely be sad and pathetic (and a little bit funny) were it not for the fact that the Catholic Church has done, and continues to do, great damage in the world. It has supported genocide and the oppression of women, among other horrors. It even canonized a pope, John Paul II, who at a minimum tolerated and probably facilitated the systematic rape of thousands upon thousands of children. When Jesus said "let the little children come to me" I don't think he had in mind "for the purposes of sexual abuse." To continue to take this institution seriously, as Ross clearly does, is to be complicit in what the Church itself calls an "objective moral evil."
2
This article is the most thoughtful piece, independent of whether one agrees or disagrees with his positions, I've ever read by Douthat. It is far deeper than his many political screeds.It would serve his career and his readers well to continue to devote his attention to the ecclesiastical arena and remove himself from the latter.
Isn't the Pope chosen with the help of the Holy Spirit through divine assistance?
Maybe G-d is trying to tell you something, Mr. Douthat.
6
It think it is safe to say that the Catholic Church "ceded" its moral authority a long time ago. Pope Francis could never be as bad as Benedict, who reinstated four bishops who denied the Holocaust. And then there's the whole sex scandal, which the church has never really owned up to. But here's the way the church has always handled major changes in doctrine: "As the Church has always taught . . . ." We can fill that in with "same-sex marriage is holy" or "abortion" or "contraception," beliefs well-grounded in scripture.
2
The Pope is infallible. Church teachings are absolute. No room for "cafeteria Catholics".
Until, of course, when I disagree.
4
Theology is faith based and not fact based. So as a person's faith changes so can his theology. The same holds for organizations.
The real problem the catholic church faces today is educated, literate societies is that it is rightly perceived as a corruption organization.
From the cover up of the pedophilia, the hypocrisy of homophobia when many clerics are gay, misogyny hidden by a cloak of false biology declaring the only purpose of sex is procreation and finally the indifference and abuse of its most faithful servants nuns and teachers.
Just this week the bishop of La Crosse announced that for decades it had not funded the retirement plans of its school employees from teachers to janitors and kept that a secret. A fine example of christian charity.
There are more empty pews, donations are drying up and catholic gay men can have a life outside of the priesthood so vocations are near nil.
These are the problems the church faces, not a somewhat feeble attempt at change by the current pope.
2
So Ross, if Jesus were to return in the next few weeks, perform a few miracles to get everybody's attention and maybe get a shout out from God (maybe divide the moon into a celestial pair of moons to keep our attention) just who do you think he'd hang out with? What do you think his message would be? What would Jesus do?
7
As long as Mr Douthat continues to refer to "lapsed Catholics", he has little creditability. The correct term is "Recovering Catholics".
2
“Let the one without sin cast the first stone,” said Jesus. Ross???
No one is perfect. That’s the bottom line. And who are you, Ross, to presume you stand in judgment over this Pope?
Jesus wanted “servants” not people who lord it over others. And this Pope’s humility, care for the poor, insistence on living a life of poverty and frugality is a lesson for us all.
Of course conservatives like Ross are annoyed with the Pope. Who, to my mind, is doing a terrific job, even though he may not say or do everything I wish he would. But all leaders must make decisions. We have to respect that.
My spouse, who is not a faithful Catholic by any means, wept when this Pope was elected. Just his character - standing there in silence before the crowds. Then asking first for their Blessing!
We love the Pope! God Bless Him!
6
Pope Francis, Jorge Bergoglio, was a retired Cardenal who spent his time visiting the slums of Buenos Aires traveling in public transportation (this means standing in a bus most of the time) to preach to the poor and the meek, many times one-on-one. He is not a phony. He was never an administrator, and is unfortunately learning on-the-job.
He is as close as one can get to Jesus in modern times (if Jesus indeed existed).
Ross Douthat claims to be Catholic, but is just a Christian Pharisee. When Francis lists the modern Woes of the Pharisees, Mr Douthat, he is talking about you.
3
I was baptized and raised a "Roman catholic." It's not the pope or the "papacy" that's a disaster. It the "holy" Roman catholic church that's a disaster. Since it's founding, no institution is more full of hypocrisy, killing millions in the interest of lining its own pockets throughout time, to more recently endorsing (by not punishing or prosecuting the offenders) the raping of children by its own leaders. Are you kidding me? If the US were Muslim, we'd treat the catholic church like ISIS. It is an institution that claims to be the defender of the poor while at the same time being one of the top 3 wealthiest institutions in the world. It needs to be dismantled and its assets sold to care for the people it claims to protect.
Compassion, mercy and forgiveness aren't good for order, discipline, and conformity. St. Francis of Assisi, the Pope's namesake, wasn't much for wealth, power and life in the big city where fame and social acceptance could be found. Jesus had the same approach to spirituality, too. I mean, how far can you go in society if your born in a feedbox for the family cow? The Pope wants his priests to smell like the poor they are meant serve. Hummmm.... now who does Pope Francis remind me of?
3
Peace, brotherhood and respect for the poor. Works for me.
4
In 30 years, how many bishops have been summarily fired for harboring priests despite their child abuse activity? How many have been fired for foisting off such priests on unsuspecting parishes, again and again? The Roman Catholic Church prefers to study the matter until all the miscreants have died. Then it closes the book. And it wonders why respect for the church is collapsing?
1
It's incredibly heroic of Ross to compare himself to George Orwell.
You wish, buddy.
3
funny this accusation being leveled, in the same month the leaders of the Vatican bank - pals of Ratzinger, the previous harshly conservative pope who really was a disaster - are being finally indicted. There seem to be banknotes in this writers religion!
1
There is an undercurrent of those opposed to this Pope including Bannon and the Alt-Right. Francis is trying to change the Church for the better, but to do so needs Cardinals to be on board. And that’s not happening.
2
Pope Francis is very much cut from the same cloth of President Obama. They have both ridden on a wave of hope and optimism but time will tell whether they are the change or just the small beginning of it.
1
Ross, thank you for this insightful and thought-provoking column. It's likely that atheists and anti-Catholic bigots will fill the comments section with their irreverence and ignorance, so please know that I (and many other readers) appreciate hearing your analysis. Such a complex topic calls for thoughtful comments, which aren't easy to produce in the course of a busy workday.
In service to one, in service to all.
Pete
1
"... operates in a media environment in which traditional religion generally, and Roman Catholicism especially, are often covered with a mix of cluelessness and malice": I'm glad you said this as you did because I've long felt that traditional religion generally and Roman Catholicism especially often cover me with a mix of cluelessness and malice.
"...whether the struggle over whether the sexual ethics of the New Testament need to be revised or abandoned in the face of post-sexual revolution realities."
Imagine taking this question seriously in 2018
Francis has a blatant history of protecting pederast priests and quietly welcoming defrocked clergy back into the church following their sex scandals. I’m very unclear as to what about his papacy makes him any different than previous popes who protected the sexual assault establishment. I feel acknowledging the endemic system of abuse that continues to exist is more important than celebrating some new guy who likes to wash feet and rub shoulders with the riff-raff. His penchant for dressing down opulent cardinals and bishops along with ruffling a few feathers of the entrenched establishment shouldn’t distract from the resistance to reform he exhibits when considering the primary problems of the church, being the continued apathy and acquiescence to sodomy and abuse. I guarantee a tightening of the purse strings with regard to tithing from the flock might be a good way to get the attention of someone willing to address the continuing brazenness and blasphemous attitude of child exploitation amongst the men of the cloth. Until then, I guess we’ll have to settle for pretending that the current pope is somehow fundamentally different than any of those before him. Just don’t let your children out of your sight.
1
The widespread love of Francis (and of Sally Hawkins, for that matter) is a heartening sign of residual goodness somewhere down in the depths of the human race beneath the daily headlines of very real human vileness.
1
Pope Francis, hero or heretic? I have not the slightest doubt that, were Ross writing his ultra conservative column in the late 1950s and early 60s, he would have written in much the same vein about Pope St. John XXIII, who bravely — or rashly — called the Second Vatican Council, a gathering that radically reformed liturgy, ecumenism, dialogue with atheists, doctrine about the Jewish faith, and numerous laws and traditions Catholics like me considered sacrosanct and untouchable. The document "The Church In the Modern World," unanimously approved by the Council bishops, would make our columnist's hair stand on end.
Ross would be more straightforward if he simply stated that the Catholic Church has two prominent wings, those who loved the work of Vatican II and wish its spirit to continue and develop along the path toward which it pushed our Church, and those who were content with the Tridentine Church, with its hoary Latin rituals, crass clericalism, medieval garb for religious, and distance from the gospel mandate to preserve the Kingdom of God for the poor.
William F. Buckley, Ross's avatar, felt his Catholic faith was uprooted by Vatican II, and he used his considerable influence to retain what vestiges he could of the medieval ritual and practice he so deeply adored. This is Ross's heritage. Mine is the Gospel according to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. I feel that Vatican II began a journey back to those roots, roots I call my own.
5
Most important religious figure of our time? Steve Jobs. Or Jeff Bezos. Or Warren Buffett. Those prophets actually create water from the rocks they strike. The Pope is just an increasingly desperate salesman headed downmarket as the world's educated abandon religion.
I don't (really) mind that they are still waving magic wafers and talk about being kind to people they don't know, I mean who could object? (Must we also forgive their bypass of hypocrisy, lies, sexism, homophobia, and willingness to tolerate perverts? And the rest??) Evocative ritual does indeed invite people _to feel deeply_ and deeper feelings can provide a gateway to serious contemplation and thoughtful argument (aka reasoning about evidence). But when feeling is used to disinvite us to think seriously and _believe_, we become far less human. Everything humans _know_ about the world is incomplete, provisional, and unfinished. That The Church (add some capital letters for irony) believes its knowledge Divine is an anachronism we must somehow tolerate because humans apparently take its "teachings" seriously? Let's go further, because Douthat goes here: can't we admit that the social and political influence of The Church is a con job that aims to manipulate choices in this world by claiming power over eternity? That's quite the work if you can get it. (Not even Trump claims eternity over you.) Of course there is nothing new here except that we're still stuck talking about it. Human beings are that desperate to deal with their lives. This Pope, like every Pope, can't be but another disaster, and that's something Douthat will never admit because he's a "believer." Thinking is truly optional.
The 21st Century the rise of the autocratic strongmen....we are all worse off.
“Like his namesake of Assisi, the present pope has a great gift for gestures that offer a public imitatio Christi, an imitation of Christ.” I’m unaware of developments in St. Francis’s reputation since the Catholic schooling of my childhood ended; am I to understand from Mr. Douthat’s description that St. Francis is now considered a poseur?
1
"All of this makes for interesting copy for those of us who write about the church."
Yes, fascinating, like arguing over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
The Church never was, and never will be, a democracy. Like the Republican Party has now become, it always has been all about gaining and holding power.
Maintaining membership in the Pedophile Protection Society is as respectable today as maintaining membership in the Republican Party and the NRA.
All you need to know about Douthit can be found by comparing his views on Pope Francis to his views on William F. Buckley. Buckley was an outspoken advocate of Jim Crow in the 1960s, South African apartheid in the 1970s, and forcibly tattooing Gay men with AIDS. He had a creepy propensity for luring his much younger male acolytes, including Douthat, into skinny dipping with him. He was a smug elitist and apologist for every right-wing military dictatorship, death squad or torture state convenient to US global hegemony. But Douthat has nothing but praise for Buckley, who he wrongly imagines belongs in a different moral category than Trump.
Pope Francis, by contrast, has revived the moribund moral authority of the Catholic Church by emphasizing the Christian virtues of forgiveness and commitment to the poor. Douthat doesn’t care any more about the poor than Donald Trump and laments the possible passing of a church that shamed and condemns gays, lesbians and divorcées.
It is hardly surprising that Francis has encountered limits to his efforts at reform or that he has sought to advance his liberalization of the church in those countries where he is least likely to encounter resistance first. It’s not a simple matter to turn a 2000 year old aircraft carrier. That Douthat has taken on the task of undermining Francis’s efforts should similarly surprise no one. Douthit will always be a scold for the persecuted and a champion of the privileged.
2
I am one of those who find Russ a bit odd as he deplores Pope Francis in the manner of those who deplored the Christ.
1
I don't know why the NY Times devotes so much opinion space to Ross Douthat's ramblings...
There is absolutely nothing that Pope Francis can do to bring back Roman Catholicism in the Western World. It's over. Francis is mannaging the going out of business process for Local parishes in the North America and Europe.
The idea of lapsed parishioners returning to the church is ludicrous. It is not going to happen.
I lost my RC faith to scientific reasoning and the results of scientific research more than half a century ago at about age 10 and have seen nothing in the past six decades to make me believe that Ross's reactionary prescriptions for the future of the church are in any way realistic. Since there is in my opinion no deity or afterlife there is nothing to recommend the continued existence of the temporal organization or its teachings.
Most American Catholics HATE Francis and LOVE Donald Trump. I know these American Catholics. They think Trump is a Jesus figure.
And anyway, the Roman Catholic under Francis continues to protect pedophile priests and continues to oppose equal rights for women and gays.
So Pope Francis is "Much to Do About Nothing."
Totally wrong and unfair.
Russ, Russ, Russ... You are always so incredibly predictable. As a fellow Roman Catholic, I would say the only ones for whom Pope Francis might be a disaster are apologists, like you, for the truly disastrous Pope Benedict (nee Ratzinger) and the "Saint" Pope John Paul II. Between them, they did absolutely everything they could to roll back the reforms of the second Vatican Council and take the Church running back into the 19th century. For women, gay Catholics, poor people, the environment and victims of clergy abuse (not just sexual, but spiritual), Pope Francis has been a light at the end of a decades-long ecclesiastical nightmare.
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"The cardinals who chose Jorge Bergoglio envisioned him as the austere outsider."
How does Mr. Douthat know this? The envisioning that goes on in conclave is supposed to be private. Did a cardinal break his vow and reveal his thinking to Douthat? If so, both the cardinal's soul and Douthat's soul are at risk of eternal damnation. Why did Douthat take this risk?
Alternatively, did Mr. Douthat just make this up?
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I'm one of those new birds , the "spiritual but not religious". The label could have been designed for me 50 years ago.
How do you read history and come off with any idea that organized , and especially dictated religions are a good thing ?
The Catholics, though , are painted into a corner from which there is no escape. For centuries you teach that there is one , perfect , universal church , headed by a emissary of God on earth who is infallible. I'm pretty sure it was a pope who coined the phrase "my way or the highway".
Then , there arise obvious areas where this church fails horribly (sodomy , anyone ?) , correction is needed.
But how do you correct something you have executed people, in heinous manner, for claiming it non-perfect ?
They've set it up where they have to admit the Church is a flawed vessel , as imperfect as humans can be. The pope is just a guy. Biblical justifications for behemoth entities like the Vatican do not exist. Or , blindly follow the superstitious malarkey that has got them to this point. Tough times , indeed.
Ah, the word heretical and what it represents is a favorite of conservative Catholics like Douthat. It a word they throw against ideas and people they don’t like to see if it can stick. Challenge the rigidity of church dogma, you must be a heretic. Oppose bigotry based upon cherry picked biblical passages then your not a “true” believer. The past two popes were reactions to Vatican 2 and the liberation of the church from regressive conservative domination. That this mildly less conservative pope should prompt such dislike bordering on hatred shows how threatening Douthat and others find modernity and a pope who is receptive to change. It should be remembered how much conservative dogma is about domination, not about Christ teachings. Most evolved along side the church’s growth into a political and economic power and are about worldly things disguised as spiritual. They don’t burn heretics anymore, they just write books about them. The intellectual inquisition is alive and well doing everything possible to undermine even the most modest liberalization of the Catholic Church. Oh & don’t even get me started about mammon and corruption within the church leadership.
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Ross,
Read a book about Cephas (Peter). Paul of Tarsus, also. The time for Francis should have been a hundred years ago. Thank God, we have him now.
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Ross maybe you should read a little church history. Most of what you complain about as changes are not "originalist" but appeared somewhere in the long 2000 year political history of the church. Bishop Odo half brother of William the Conquerer was not like a modern bishop for example and I doubt that the current theoretically celibate ones will be like their successors in a few hundred years. At least the church has only one pope now unlike long periods of its history. All churches are creations of men not gods.
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So Mr. Douthat, how do you think the Church should treat homosexuality? Continue to call it objectively disordered? Do you really think the US & western Europe are going to return to that manner of thinking?
Yes I know it's not impossible but it certainly looks extremely unlikely. So you imagine a church could call itself catholic while promoting beliefs that the vast majority of people clearly see as evil? The church tries to proclaim its love of homosexuals while condemning homosexual conduct.
No it's not like condemning say, adultery. Committing adultery is not an intrinsic part of anyone's makeup. Being homosexual is.
What is your vision of the future?
Sex abuse scandal aside, Francis is not much of a leader. His personal habits and personal character have endeared him to many, but he has done essentially nothing to steer the larger church into alignment with his personal values. For example: eschewing the luxurious palace, he lives very simply in a humble apartment. That's nice and all, but the legendary and un-Christ-like opulence of the Vatican still rages unabated all around him, while poor people and sick people continue to starve and die elsewhere.
Francis has not gotten the memo that he's in charge, that he's a leader, that it's his job to change the church and the world. Unless he figures this out soon, even the very minor changes he's brought to the Vatican will simply snap back to normal when he dies, and it'll be back to business as usual. History will remember him as a gentle soul who was not fit to be in charge of anything.
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Francis is neither hero nor heretic. Change and continuity are inherently entangled in a living Catholicism that must necessarily engage in ongoing conversation between doctrinal ideas and Catholics' (and others') secular realities.
This I what I argue in my new book, Postsecular Catholicism,
https://global.oup.com/academic/product/postsecular-catholicism-97801906...
Jesus was a disaster. He got it wrong - thinking he came only for the Jews, for example, and cursing fig trees - and learned and loved.
Ross, you are in the strategic, calculating weeds, while Francis is both fallible and deeply moved by God's Love flowing through him. Thanks God for such disasters.
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In his otherwise quite interesting analysis, Ross Dothan begins with a straw man, the idea that criticizing the Pope is an act of bravery because no one wants to understand your lonely cause.
I also find his essay ahistorical. If the Church could survive a Borgia Pope or one, now canonized, who temporized with the Nazis, it sure can survive one who calls upon us to observe the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount.
"Feed myLambs . . ."
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It is fascinating how the embrace of a group of self-righteous, Catholic right wingers of their Church's outdated, regressive, and personally damaging policies so closely tracks their similar adherence to the antiquated, extremist, and exclusionary policies of their political party of choice. Oh wait, these are the same faithful ideologues, aiming their gospel of elitist control and populist contempt at the pews and at the electorate! Amen.
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Whenever I read about the elements of Catholicism which are unchanging I know the writer is either shallow or a cafeteria historian.
In the 19th century official Catholic dogma approved execution when conducted by the civil magistrate. The proof is in a large antique book I bought at used goods store. It has the nihil obstat and imprimatur. The title is something along the lines of, "The One Catholic Church, the True Church of Christ." I don't have the book handy and so can't quote the exact title.
It is an explanation of Catholic dogma, including explanations of the Ten Commandments. The allowance for execution by civil magistrates (terms used in the book) is in the commentary about the commandment "Thou Shalt Not Kill." Apparently there are times when killing is fine. If a judge says die then you die.
A comical section is about Americanism says its terrible!
Perhaps Francis is actually helping the rest of the world see the reality of the emperor's new (very old clothes). Many cardinals and bishops wrap themselves in finery. They carry scepters. Cardinals call themselves Princes of the Church. They even have their own castles. Some even with marble thrones.
But they are just another group of people who enjoy power like any powerful religious they wrap their lust for power with pretty clothes.
If Jesus walked upon the Earth today he would see much good done in his name on the street. But when he walked into bishop's castles he would overthrow every pew and table.
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Perhaps Francis isn't "risking" the Church's "fidelity to Jesus" ... it is more likely that he is actually _increasing it_.
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After thousands of years of oppression and violence caused by the Catholic Church, I don’t much care if the current Pope is a nice guy. All of the splits and ruptures within the ranks of the faithful expose the Church for what it really is, a sham. If God ever revealed truth to man, the thread was lost long ago amidst bloody power struggles. None of them have any idea what’s going on. They wield invented authority and tailor their god’s supposedly inerrant word as necessary to ensure the collection plate doesn’t run empty.
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And hope that the future will be better for all. If he gives Catholic congregants hope that is s good start
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Wow. This sounds like a mess. Glad I don't darken the doors of these places.
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Pope Francis has indeed brought hope to millions throughout the world. Unfortunately, he inherits a group of right wing Cardinals from the ones in Philadelphia and New York to those in Italy itself. Hopefully he will appoint enough of his own Cardinals so that his successor can continue his work. Meanwhile, the faithful should make their voices heard to those Cardinals obstructing progress. His biggest failure is in the area of Sex Abuse. The Commission is chaired by a passive Cardinal whom few take seriously and consequently has done little to nothing. Bishops have not been held responsible. Bernard Law got a send off fit for a good man which was very painful to most Catholics in the USA. We need to pray for Pope Francis that he has a long life and survives the conspiracies in the Vatican.
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Pope Francis is having a helping hand in Miami and Houston, from the Evangelicals in these two cities. Republicans are using that segment of the Christianity to recommend politicians that don't support comprehensive immigration reform - Jesus was an immigrant - or don't want the Dreamers's achieving a path to citizenship - Jesus is a dreamer, because he wants our salvation - or this guy, what's his name? Ah Joel Osteen, who did not provide instant refuge to thousands affected by Hurricane Harvey in Houston - Jesus preached that we have to love and help our brothers, specially in dire situations -
Slowly but steadily, former Latino Catholics are coming back to their former parroquias. For example Our Lady of Lourdes here in Miami. We are following up those situations to help the great Pope Francis. Amén.
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Those Catholics (and others) who wish to know the true teachings of Christ, might want to look at Richard Rohr and his insights into heart rather than law (head) teaching. Pope Francis in my opinion is aiming his church in Rohr's direction as subtlety, but as surely as he can without unduly upsetting the extreme conservative wing of the belief system called Catholicism.
I am an outsider looking in, but I think I have a good idea of what is really going on.
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My, your critics do wax on...As a graduate of two excellent Jesuit universities and Sacred Heart nuns, I found this piece to be excellent and provoking. I may have to lapse my lapsed Catholicism after all.
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I really do like this pope. He seems to be more about kindness and inclusion, in other words more about modeling Jesus, than just about wearing the funny hats and robes.
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You put Jesus on the wrong side in your formulation. Should have read:
“in one case, the consistency of Catholic doctrine; in another, the clarity of Catholic witness for human dignity and its fidelity to Jesus.”
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What does it say about the primacy of dogma in defining one’s faith that Renascence popes with the heart of a Nero were less of a threat than a leader who chooses Saint Francis as his model?
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As said in the piece Francis is “the imitation of Christ” why isn’t that enough said? Thank you Larry Eisenberg for your simple perfect poem on this beauty of a man of faith and insight.
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Not being a Roman Catholic, I view Pope Francis as
(1) a leftist radical;
(2) one who is paying no attention to the defense of the Holy See and Papal lands against a possible terrorist attack from outside;
(3) one who perpetuates the discrimination of women and pays no attention to the transition from the Trinity to Quadrinity, the latter including Mary.
My goodness I am so glad I grew up a heathen! No questions about god here,I just see a bunch of manipulative men striving for an unobtainable amount of power. Some are better than others,but all are tainted.
This pope presides, with his predecessor bizarrely lurking in the attic and issuing the occasional demurral, over a church in ruin. There's the bottom line.
No religion is blessed with immortality any more than its constituents. Archeologists uncover the remnants of past religions all the time. So will it be with the Roman Catholic Church.
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My understanding - the Pope God's representative and voice on earth for his followers. If this is true, then why is it so hard to just listen?
The Genesis story - False.
The virgin birth - False.
Unexplained events are miracles - False
Human identity (soul) is supernatural - False.
Consciousness survives brain death - False.
Dead people are alive somewhere else - False.
The Apostolic Succession confers moral authority - False.
Scripture trumps science (e.g., Galileo and Darwin) - False.
No matter how well intentioned the Bishop of Rome may be, perpetuating so many falsehoods against all evidence and reason is detrimental to humanity and reprehensible.
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“Francis will have ceded the moral authority earned by persecuted generations...”
I hate to tell you but no such moral authority exists. The brutal, violent torture of “heretics” and egregious rape and sexual abuse of children over the ages provide plenty of evidence alone that this religion is a force of evil that should have died with the dark ages much less masquerade as an example of moral insight or leadership in the 21st century. It is time to wake up.
Well, well, well Ross so the Pope doesn't meet your criteria of "visionary and heroic." Remember, you've always got Ronald Reagan.
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Sorry Ross how you can write a column on the pope without mentioning Laudato si, the most significant and powerful encyclical ever written by a pope is completely beyond me. That will stay--the rest is, well, Vatican Politics as usual. If you want a Church beyond politics, impervious to change, you'd have to go back to... who?? Pius IX tried to create an absolutely uniform reactionary Church, one that would never change, and he created one that was both intensely political and yet completely irrelevant to the rush of modernity.
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Ross is the only person I can think of who has made a career out of tilting at windmills. It is truly surreal.
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This is the analysis I've been seeking from you on the American Conservative power structure. I've learned more about you today than your upcoming book. A lapsed Catholic you say? Enough to finally stop trying to understand if your viewpoint is 'fair and balanced'.
I meant to write "Without making deeper, more contextual mention of Vatican II."
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Ross, it's not so much the Pope that's a disaster, it's the Catholic Church. It's a wreck. Furthermore, who are you to judge?
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to Madeline Conant,Tracy, Kate Baptista, Mary, below:
Asked in 2015 if he thought a woman might sometime head a Vatican department, Bergoglio said,"Priests often end up under the sway of their housekeepers." (evidently reading JF Powers at the time.)
“They are the strawberries on the cake,” dixit Franciscus.
I deconstruct: "Nos sunt crustulam. Venite puellas sedens super faciem nostram"
Above and beyond the mysogyny still reigning blessedly supreme in the Church (the brave resistance of some American sisters to Vatican-encouraged attempts to silence them a couple years ago notwithstanding), there are still many things to be addressed concerning Bergoglio's role as superior of the Society of Jesus in Argentina during the late-70's.
The official hagiographic revision currently reads as follows:
No one "did enough" back then. Bergoglio himself admitted as much, but he (Bergoglio) did more "enough" than others. The two young priests, Yorio & Jalics, for example, were likely "loose cannons" whose activities may have been above and beyond their official charge, undertaken with clear understanding of the risks involved. Think: a couple of Jesuit Ollie Norths. Besides, Bergoglio's intercession on their behalf with the dictator Videla 'may have saved their lives.' Videla, that "manifestation of state terrorism," in the words of the judge presiding over his trial in 2010.
All that's missing in this revision is a sly invocation of that old chestnut, "plausible deniability."
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Are you a Roman Catholic with depth and breadth to your theological education? The Church will be here longer than any pope or critic. Changes Francis seeks are decades in the making. He is playing chess, not tic tac toe. The Church thinks in centuries, and will work, hold together and evolve as it should.
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Bravo, Ann. We've become kaleidoscopic human beings. Yesterday's news is already passe, flimflam digested by the media and political correctness. Political slogans are passed off as personal conviction by those who have never figured out what personal conviction means.
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Ann ,your comments are spot on. I am far past caring what other people think at 3 am when the sound of the wind comes at the window.I live close to a Benedictine monastery in Vermont. I can hear the bells from my house. The last service of the day is at 8 pm. ( the Carthusian monks in Manchester VT 1AM !). It does strike me how much anger there is in this paper about the church but I'll move on.We all live and die- find your path and do good.
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The Church "thinks?" Who is the Church? And when did we all "think"our way to faith?
I really appreciate the link to Orwell's essay on Gandhi. Very interesting reading. I think Orwell didn't fully understand the implications of being "unattached" in the spiritual sense, but his essay is the opposite of faint praise: criticism that's actually a compliment, and a strong and well-reasoned one.
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Ross has a thing for authoritarians, so it's completely understandable that he would regard Francis as the anti-pope.
However, I did have to laugh when Ross bemoaned Francis ceding moral authority in China. As if Benedict and John Paul didn't cede moral authority by allowing child sexual abuse free reign around the world. As if Pius XI didn't cede moral authority by providing tacit approval to the Nazi takeover of Europe and the extermination of Jewish and Gypsy populations.
And of course Ross would give Francis no credit at all for trying to refocus the Roman church on the things Jesus focused on - the needs of the poor, compassion and welcome for all -- trying to disengage from political ulture Wars. That is what the New Testament seems to be about, but I'll grant Ross that this has not been the direction of the Church for most of its history.
Maybe when Francis is gone, the cardinals can elect another fire-breathing conservative and bring back the Inquisition, and Ross will be happy.
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Mr. Douthat raises an important question. In an era of Enlightenment emphasis on the individual, is the essence of the Church that it adheres to a universal (i.e., catholic) doctrine? For those who think that adaption to the modern is preferable, how exactly should the Catholic Church differ from the Anglican communion? This question is at least as worthy of our attention as Douthat's personal thoughts about the answer.
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Ross, you should consider probably the 5 most profound words ever uttered by a pope (or anyone else for that matter):
Who am I to judge?
The admiration of Francis is completely at odds with an antiquated papacy and may be the best hope for dragging the Church into the modern world.
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Neither a Catholic nor a Christian, I'm frequently bored to tears by Douthat's teasing of doctrinal details and his persistently retrograde reading of Church authority. This piece seems to me much more interesting, read as an account of contemporary world struggles in which a church that would be world relevant would remain relevant.
Still, if the world faces a struggle between rich and poor, authoritarianism and democracy, globalism and nationalism Pope Francis has a much more profound sense of what is important for both the world and the Catholic Church than Douthat can imagine.
It will be messy everywhere; let us foster compassion and care over doctrine and authority.
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That's part of the messiness. We struggle over differences in compassion and authority. My point is that it won't be easy. Slogans are a way to pretend it is.
Behind all the talk about dogma, the real motivation for the Catholic Church is money. The competition for converts, the quest to win the Chinese, it all has to do with grabbing cash and expanding the empire, not with saving souls. The rigidity of the dogma has more to do with getting more money: tweek or liberalize the old rules and you lose the base and maybe turn off "emerging markets." So the Catholic church is trying to have it both ways: appease liberal markets with leniency, but keep the dogma rigid to woo the rest. When the Big Leaders of the Catholic Church get behind closed doors they talk about money, and how to keep it, and how to get more. Just look at the opulence of their clothes, the gilded churches, the real estate, the schools. They like that, want more, and plan to use dogma as a tool to get more. Once it is a GLOBAL good investment to change dogma about gays, divorce, women priests, euthanasia watch that old school dogma switch real quick.
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It is easy to criticize the man in office, Ross, as Americans know well. However, any such criticism should consider both the actions of the predecessors and what the successors might do. I have criticism of Obama, but then consider W and Trump. It is easy to say that Francis has not done enough about the sex, financial and power scandals, but what was done by popes in the previous century since WWI? How would returning to a more conservative pope like Benedict fix any of that faster?
If Francis chooses to lead by consensus-building, not merely by behaving imitatio Christi, then expect him to move slowly and in small steps as he seeks to reach the ears of those who can hear and the eyes of those who can see. He chose as his symbolic role model Francis of Assisi, not Lenin.
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