Agreed. I have no goal — and for that matter, no motive — to defend Pope Francis. What I do know is it is unavoidable that Pope Francis must trust his local leaders, in this case the archbishop who invited Kim Davis, to implement many things. That's the same at the upper levels of politics and business: people really **ARE** policy.
I am more inclined to trust the “Inside the Vatican” magazine on issues like this than a former student of the Pope from long ago, simply because the reporter has been covering the Vatican for a very long time, he is in a position to know what is happening behind the scenes, and (for people who are not naive about ecclesiastical politics) he has a great deal more to lose than most people in this situation if his article is wrong: http://insidethevatican.com/news/letter-38-2015-kim-and-francis
Maybe what we have is a politically naive pope who just wants to be “pastoral” and is being used by others. Maybe we have something worse. Maybe we have something better, i.e., someone who is cunningly wise and has an end-game much bigger than we know on the outside. After all, the Catholic world does not revolve around the United States and the Pope does have bigger problems than worrying what Americans think of him.
We'll know much more when we see what happens to the Archbishop who invited Kim Davis. What the Pope knew about Kim Davis and when he knew it may never be known to the outside world. What is important is what actions the Pope takes next, now that he knows of the uproar.
As much as I would LIKE to believe this, I simply cannot reconcile much of what he does with Church teaching.
The Pope is the leader of the Catholic Church and based on the sheer size of the Church he is the most significant religious leader in the world. His DUTY is to publicly uphold orthodox Christian beliefs and I am of the opinion that this will sometimes require refusing to publicly meet with certain individuals. The most loving thing we can ever do for someone is to warn them when their soul is in peril, it is cruelty to pretend that homosexuality is acceptable and the Pope knows this. I understand him wanting to see an old friend; however, this should have been done privately and away from media scrutiny.
That being said, I do realize that as Americans we have a tendency to want to apply conservative/liberal labels to everything and Christianity doesn't always fit into a given category as neatly as we want it to.
This is what the MSM should have published.
BTW, I meant the InsideTheVatican article. Also, I assume the Pope is cunningly wise.