Posted on 12/17/2013 4:18:33 PM PST by Morgana
Tuesday’s Good Morning America simply didn’t have its facts straight in their rush to portray Pope Francis as a crypto-liberal.
Amy Robach hyped that the pontiff “removed an outspoken critic of abortion and same-sex marriage from a powerful post within the Church. Conservative Cardinal Raymond Burke…was head of the Vatican’s highest court.” Robach then asserted that “this move is seen as reinforcing the Pope’s vision for a more inclusive church.”
However, Cardinal Burke is still the prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura – the equivalent of the Supreme Court for the Catholic Church. The Pope actually declined to renew the Wisconsin native’s membership on a different consultative body at the Vatican – the Congregation for Bishops. [MP3 audio available here; video below the jump]
Robach’s news brief is in the same vein as Time magazine’s recent Person of the Year cover story about the Bishop of the Rome, where writers Howard Chua-Eoan and Elizabeth Dias. Chua-Eoan and Dias contended that supposedly, “in a matter of months, Francis has elevated the healing mission of the church…above the doctrinal police work so important to his recent predecessors.”
CBS This Morning – one of Good Morning America’s Big Three competitors – has also given wild, left-leaning spin about the pontiff. Correspondent Charlie D’Agata trumpeted that Francis was “one of the most progressive popes in modern times” during a September 13, 2013 report. Over a month earlier, his colleague Dean Reynolds bizarrely wondered if the Pope was “breaking with the Vatican” due to his widely-misrepresented “who am I to judge?” reply about people with homosexual attractions.
In a Monday post, Thomas Peters of CatholicVote.org’s “American Papist” blog took aim at the “hyperventilating speculation” about Pope Francis’ move with regard to Cardinal Burke. ABC’s misleading reporting about the change is just the latest example of what Peters called attention to.
The transcript of Amy Robach’s news brief from Tuesday’s Good Morning America on ABC:
AMY ROBACH: Well, a new shakeup at the Vatican – Pope Francis has removed an outspoken critic of abortion and same-sex marriage from a powerful post within the Church. Conservative Cardinal Raymond Burke, the former archbishop of St. Louis, was head of the Vatican’s highest court. Well, this move is seen as reinforcing the Pope’s vision for a more inclusive church. Today, he spent his 77th birthday visiting with the homeless.
Thank you.
“Pope Francis embraces it.”
Proof for this comment?
Thank you.
That's just the nature of the technology. It's why you might as well skip the "breaking" news --- not just religious news, but any news. It's exceedingly likely to have lots of huge inaccuracies in it, if not false clear through.
Please don’t miss the main point of OP article.
ABC, by stressing “Outspoken Critic of Abortion” tried to make it sound as if Pope Francis did not like Cardinal Burke’s strong pro-life stance, and that is simply not true.
I’m not saying you do, but many people seem to play into lib media’s hands.
I know that Franky "opposes" abortion in a formalistic way, but I'm not sure his heart's really in it. Either that, or he's pretty stupid and ignorant.
But I can't read minds, so it's an open question to me.
sitetest
Who is “Franky”?
Please don’t tell me that by “Franky” you are referring to Pope Francis.
Hey, I'm just trying to go with the flow of this pontificate. The new pope seems to like informality, spontaneity, shooting the breeze, making comments that folks shouldn't try too hard to make sense of every word (or, at least, so his spokesman has said to us).
A more informal pope needs a more informal name for casual conversation.
sitetest
I don’t agree.
1Peter 2:17
And that applies, most certainly, to the Pope.
You seem to confuse a casual approach with a lack of honor. You infer what is not implied. It is the pope, himself, who has embraced this informality. I only try to follow his lead.
For you to say otherwise is to question my motives. To paraphrase our Supreme Pontiff, “Who are you to judge?”
sitetest
Dear sitetest,
I assure you that I wasn’t judging your motives. And well I know that I am not permitted to judge anyone (as the Lord Jesus told us) not even myself (as St. Paul says).
I just told you that I don’t agree that it’s OK to make a “casual approach” in calling the Pope “Franky”.
We differ about that and that is not a judgment call on your character.
But....is it a judgment call on the Pope’s character?
Just asking.
In that you quoted 1 Peter about giving honor, it seems to suggest that you thought I was not giving honor to Pope Frank. Far be it! I'm merely trying to emulate his breezy, informal, spontaneous style that isn't all hung up in trying to hew to actual doctrine, etc., etc.
When it comes to picking bishops, folks who are supposed to govern their dioceses and to enforce discipline therein, let's get rid of the cardinal who says mean things about bishops letting pro-aborts receive communion, and let's promote the cardinal who punishes priests who aren't inclined to give the Blessed Sacrament to lesbian Buddhists.
Let's criticize all those nasty (priests? bishops? layfolks? I'm not sure who ACTUALLY does this) folks who talk too much about contraception, abortion, and homosexuality (oh, dear, I mean, “gay” issues).
Let's criticize all those mean pro-lifers who spend all their time screeching about laws, but no time helping women in crisis pregnancies (Again, about whom is he speaking? Every serious pro-lifer I know spends much more time working to mitigate the circumstances of women in crisis pregnancies than they do playing abortion politics. It's been this way for at least the last 20 years.).
Let's give interviews that require multiple translations and re-translations and interpretations, and finally statements not to take the pope's words too literally, because, after all, he was just speaking informally.
I do that sort of thing, too. With my buddies at the bowling alley. We solve all the world's problems every Wednesday night. And then we forget everything we said by the following Wednesday. Which is pretty much what our conversations deserve. But none of us think our words should be printed in 12 Jesuit periodicals around the world simultaneously, with press embargoes & everything.
Although we're not going to judge “gay” people, let's judge priests based on what CARS they drive, and let's CHECK THE VATICAN PARKING LOT to see who is driving an evil, decadent FANCY-SCHMANCY car! Because, after all, we CAN judge someone’s soul by seeing what car they drive!
Let's say mean things about a form of capitalism that doesn't actually exist in the real world in the current era, when really, what we're describing is actually corporatism - the collusion of big business and government - which is actually the antithesis of free markets. Let's take the No. 1 economic insult from the 1980s - “trickle down” - and apply it , without understanding, in ways that are entirely inappropriate, showing a basic lack of understanding of the fundamentals of economics.
I'm sorry, Running On Empty, but for me, I see this pope as either malicious, or unserious, and/or stupid and ignorant of the real world in which I live. I believe it is most charitable to think that he is not malicious.
I think he's unserious, and I also think that he is the ultimate exemplar of the Peter Principle (pun intended). So, to show that I don't think he's evil, and I don't think he's a formal heretic, I honor him by pointing out his love of informality and spontaneity.
The Church needs popes, but the Church always manages to survive bad popes. My faith in the Jesus Christ and His Bride, the Catholic Church, are not especially tied up in whether a particular pope is a brilliant saint (Blessed John Paul II or Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI), or a dull mediocrity.
The great popes don't do much to prove the divine institution of the Church. The not-so-great ones do. Only divine institution and continued divine providence explain the survival by the Church of her papal (and other hierarchical) not-so-greats.
sitetest
Archbishop Jorge Mario Bergoglio
Does your priest/bishop speak about such filth? Does your mother or father speak about such filth?
Could it be Papa Tango or Humble Jorge?
You should not be disrespectful regarding the Pope.
It appears liberal media got what they wanted from you, and others.
As I previously wrote, I'm not disrespecting anyone. I'm just trying to go with the flow as the new pope seems to wish (although discerning specifically what he thinks or feels about any particular topic isn't always easy - but I'm trying!).
Pope Frank is, apparently, a very informal fellow who doesn't want all the stuffy trappings of the papacy to get in the way of..., well,..., I'm not sure what all those stuffy trappings get in the way of, but they appear to get in the way of SOMETHING that the pope desires! So, my form of address for the new pontiff is one that attempts to make things more informal, less stiff and stuffy. I believe that he would approve.
sitetest
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