Another troubling irony is that those who usually attack Catholicism and the papacy seem to want to defend this Pope, and those who usually defend the papacy in general are troubled by him.
He is popular with the world, often the wrong elements of the world, and I’m not seeing people pouring into the Church and embracing Catholicism as a result of his worldly popularity.
One would think that obedience to the Pope would be a matter of faith to a Catholic. What's ironic is that it's not - or rather that it is, per specified subsection clauses and applicable interpretive definitions of what the meaning of "faith," is.
As opposed, say, to the Protestant attitude towards the Pope which, of course, is completely different.
Hey, you want to throw in a zing, don't be surprised when you get one back. All I did was support the Pope on this thread. That such a thing would irritate a Catholic - in the name of true Catholicsm, no less - is... ironic.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/washington-area-welcomes-a-record-number-of-catholic-converts-amid-falling-national-rates/2014/04/19/4776f510-c721-11e3-8b9a-8e0977a24aeb_story.html