[NYer]

William Doino Jr. is a contributor to Inside the Vatican magazine, among many other publications, and writes often about religion, history and politics. He contributed an extensive bibliography of works on Pius XII to The Pius War: Responses to the Critics of Pius XII.

[NYer]

He has been called an “improv pope,” a pope of many surprises, but the biggest surprise of all is that Francis continues to elude all efforts to classify him

Pope Francis greets the crowd of faithful from his popemobile in downtown Rio de Janeiro, July 22, 2013. Pope Francis touched down in Rio de Janeiro on Monday, starting his first foreign trip as pontiff and a weeklong series of events expected to attract more than a million people to a gathering of young faithful in Brazil, home to the world's largest Roman Catholic population. REUTERS/Sergio Moraes

Did anyone watch the arrival of Pope Francis in Rio, today? After a lengthy flight, he stepped into a small, silver, common car - rolled down the windows - got stuck in traffic - and eventually made his way to the above "popemobile" for a tour through the neighborhood. HUGE crowds of people grabbed his arm through the windows of both vehicles prompting Vatican security guards to intervene. What a security nightmare! Now he is riding around in an open jeep with a plexiglass cover to protect him from the elements.

The pope of the people, ping!

[Brian Kopp DPM]

He needs to deal with this decisively and unequivocally, or he's going to be called something else altogether.

Prelate of Vatican bank reportedly offers resignation

CWN - July 22, 2013

The newly appointed prelate of the Vatican bank, the Institute for Religious Works (IOR), has offered to resign, according to a Roman news agency.

I Media, a respected outlet specializing in Vatican affairs, has sent a Twitter message that Msgr. Battista Ricca, who is at the center of a report about the influence of the "gay lobby" at the Vatican, offered his resignation to the Pope on Saturday, July 20.

The Vatican has not commented on the I Media report, which came just before Pope Francis left Rome for Rio de Janeiro, where he will preside at World Youth Day observances. A day earlier, however, the Vatican press office had said that reports of Msgr. Ricca's homosexual alliances were "not credible."

Msgr. Ricca was appointed by the Pope in June to become prelate of the IOR, exercising supervisory control of an institution that has been troubled by charges of lax oversight. Last week Sandro Magister of L’Espresso charged that Msgr. Battista Ricca had engaged in homosexual misconduct while on an earlier assignment as a Vatican diplomat in Uruguay. Magister claimed that the cleric had been protected, and information about his scandalous conduct had been kept from the Pope, by sympathetic Vatican officials.

Additional sources for this story
Some links will take you to other sites, in a new window.

• Vatican denies report that Vatican bank prelate is involved with 'gay lobby' (CWN, 7/19)

[Biggirl]

Saw tonight on the replay of Pope Francis in Brazil him riding in a very simply white small car on the Brazilian highway going to Rio via presentation on EWTN.

[BlueDragon]

How come so many are so compelled to try their hand at explaining this guy?

Every word --- someone comes a long and tidies up afterwards --- oh, he didn't mean that, he meant this other thing.

It's like translators are not enough. There need be interpreters. And in this case...it's like a pre-loaded set of interpretations, before the guy even get's to talking (and tweeting, bwaahahah).