[redleghunter]

As for Pope Francis, I could see that the Church might ignore the “civil union” issue, which is, after all, a creation of the state and deals with civil matters such as inheritance, insurance, etc., as long as the state didn’t start trying to impose it’s definition of “marriage” on the Church and start trying to force the Church to accept it and perform these faux “marriages.”

I believe a point I made up thread was "why even mention a secular practice at all." Meaning, why did the Pope address it? He could have put that 'baby' to rest right away by saying the Catholic church accepts only those unions defined by their doctrine. That would have put to rest the speculation. But he did not and left an open flank.

[livius]

I believe he was asked about it in the course of an interview.

However, one of the things I don’t like about Pope Francis is that I think he’s at least somewhat a statist, probably just because of his Argentinian background. Maybe he’ll correct, maybe not. He seems to avoid conflicts with the state, and while I agree that we shouldn’t go out and look for them or stir them up, we shouldn’t be so conciliatory that the state thinks we’re weak or vacillating. And I think that’s what’s happening with him.