IS POPE FRANCIS DUPING LIBERALS ON MARRIAGE?

The Spectator ^ | November 21, 2014 | Paul Kengor

[NYer]

It’s no secret that liberals adore Pope Francis. The more secular the “progressive,” the greater the reverence for the new man in the Vatican. Liberals—which includes liberal Catholics and Protestants as well as secularists—see the pontiff as the long-awaited liberator of the reactionary Roman Catholic Church.

And yet, if you think about it, there aren’t many things they actually want from Francis. What kind of wish-list do they have in mind as they celebrate his arrival? Francis is not calling for women priests, for abortion-on-demand, or for clowns dancing at the altar during consecration of the Eucharist. Sure, they relish his comments on the environment, poor, “trickle-down” policies, and other things reported or misreported or questionably translated or not articulated by Francis with great exactness. What they most love about Pope Francis is gay stuff. Specifically, it’s their overwhelming conviction the new pope is not just pro-gay but soon will be recognizing gay marriage and (who knows) maybe even gay priests. For the modern liberal, with gaze fixed below the waist, there is literally nothing of higher importance for Francis and the life of the planet. Other than perhaps race, nothing transfixes the modern progressive mind quite like gay sex; it’s the new alpha and omega.

In turn, Francis’ stance on gay matters greatly concerns many conservatives (Catholic and non-Catholic). It worries many faithful, orthodox Roman Catholics, especially after the blow-up at the recent Vatican synod on the family, where a sloppily crafted and released interim “relatio” (report) created confusion and consternation over the Church’s position on homosexuality.

But should conservatives and orthodox Roman Catholics be alarmed? Is Francis poised to change the Church’s ancient position not just on homosexual behavior and same-sex marriage but on the very essence of natural-Biblical-traditional sexuality and marriage? No, he’s not, and for a number of reasons.

[NYer]

First of all, Pope Francis can’t do that. The Catholic Church’s understanding of sexuality and marriage is based not only on longtime immutable and undeniable truths but is embedded and integrated within the very fiber and fabric of its understanding of human relations and spiritual relations. That understanding has not only been consistent for 2,000 years but was advanced even further and deeper in recent decades by Pope John Paul II’s profound theology of the body. There’s not only a deeper biology undergirding the Church’s position on marriage but an extraordinarily rich theology that those ignorant of Church teaching could scarcely begin to imagine.

Catholic ping!

[GreyFriar]

I can agree with this statement -> “The priesthood of the future...celibate, male, gay and straight” - as I understand it.

& I understand it as a priesthood of happy, hetrosexual, celibrate men. Silly me prefers old definition of ‘gay’ to modern perversion as a euphemism for HOMOSEXUAL

[MNDude]

why dupe anyone? Why can’t he just be clear?

[Mrs. Don-o]

FTA:

He closed by urging prayer for those “who seek to support and strengthen the union of man and woman in marriage as a unique, natural, fundamental and beautiful good for persons, communities, and whole societies.”

That statement came just last weekend.

This has been and remains Pope Francis’ position on marriage and the family. So, why would the liberal world conclude anything else?

Interesting.

[SierraWasp]

Yeah... Wouldn’t that be DECEIT???

[Mrs. Don-o]

You might want to re-read the conclusion of the article at the link, in which Paul Kengor says that --- in the light of abundant evidence that Pope Francis has, and has always had, PUBLISHED, orthodox Catholic beliefs about marriage and sexuality --- it's not so much that Pope Francis is duping the Elton John types, but that some people are just so eager to be duped.

Some folks (right and left, inside and outside the Church), and despite abundant evidence, think Pope Francis wants to OK gay marriage. They'll be disappointed. I pity them. What they lack in intelligence, they make up for in stupidity.

[Salvation]

The homosexual part of that statement is probably incorrect. Pope Benedict sent emissaries to the U. S. to inspect all seminaries.

Seminarians now must undergo a two day psychology test, multiple interviews, have multiple recoomendations from several priests, the parents are interviewed, etc. etc.

And some are not even accepted.

[annalex]

What’s really happening is that liberals-progressives are misleading themselves, deluding themselves, naively setting up themselves for a big and severely disappointing surprise and sense of grave betrayal. And when it becomes painfully clear to them that Francis isn’t what they expect, he shouldn’t expect much charity from them.

Yes, I agree, both on the who misleads whom and what will come out of this in the end. The Church might, perhaps, institute a program or two for the divorced and remarried Catholics and for the gay Catholics, in the spirit of charity and that would be just fine. There will be no sexual revolution in the Church. With all his double-entendres, His Holiness never said anything that materially deviated from orthodoxy on the matter.

[NKP_Vet]

Good article, but the writer keeps referring to “gay marriage”. I agree with Cardinal Burke, who refuses to use the term “gay marriage”. He says word marriage means the union of one man and one woman and it is called “marriage”. He also refuses to use the term “Traditional marriage”. He said using that term is an acceptance that there are other forms of marriage, which there is not.

[Jeff Chandler]

I am quickly reaching Francis burnout.

[Lysandru]

This article articulates what I have expected from the start with this pope.

I also predicted when he was elected that he is going to honk off both the Left and the Right--because that's the Jesuit tradition.

I know too many people who can't grasp how I can love my homosexual brothers and sisters and yet still stand up for traditional marriage.

[RichInOC]

I think it’s more that the libs are duping themselves, believing their own press, getting high off their own supply, call it what you will.

[kearnyirish2]

The libs proclaiming love for Francis will be disappointed; if they think JPII (who had a disastrous papacy IMHO) was too conservative, they won’t get much more from Francis. If he deviated from God’s position on homosexuality, marriage, or a male priesthood (as revealed by God Himself and through Jesus Christ), he would be the last pope - there would be no more Church to speak of.

[kearnyirish2]

“I think it’s more that the libs are duping themselves, believing their own press, getting high off their own supply, call it what you will.”

The masters of the lie that own the media are ensuring that disappointed liberals will continue to leave the Church (after hinting at “reforms” that could in no way be reconciled with Christianity).

Good riddance.

[GreyFriar]

My Roman Catholic Deacon friend and former mentor at work was a seminarian in the 1960s and knew of homosexual seminarians and that they were NOT being kicked out based upon the more ‘modern’ view of things. I don’t know if this had any role in his decision to leave the seminary 6 months before being ordained, but may have.

[Salvation]

Pope Benedict acted on this either in the 90s of during this last decade.

[annalex]

Right, I was thinking of the John Paul II pontificate as well.

This is liberal thinking (or “thinking”) in a nutshell. Because they don’t believe in institutions, they don’t realize that institutions have personality and power all by themselves; the character of one pope simply cannot be a factor in how they change.

[SierraWasp]

Well, I certainly don’t want ANYBODY to do that, but it seems to me that as the infallible “vicar of Christ” he certainly could be a little more biblically adamant instead of leaving it so vague and open to conjecture by all levels of intelligence!!!

[Mrs. Don-o]

I do wonder whether he has a naive view of the media. The media people cetainly have their own agenda; and they certainly are not self-correcting. So if you help them out inadvertently with something ambiguous, something the least bit tentative or awkward, they will get their teeth into it and pull it into shreds in 5 directions, then sew it together in a different shape and make a headline out of it.

Yes, I do think he's naive about his own communication problems. And that can do real damage.