Ardently embraced by Catholics of all stripes, those of other faiths, and even some misugided atheists, Pope Francis, after assuring us all of his humility, is getting down to the usual Popery: buttressing the traditional stands of the Catholic Church. As CatholicCulture.org reports (and without irony), Francis met with bishops from Southern Africa to address the problems of their region. Here’s the whole report:
Pope Francis met on April 25 with the bishops of the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference, representing the nations of South Africa, Botswana, and Swaziland. The African prelates were making their ad limina visits.
In his prepared remarks, the Holy Father spoke of the heroic work of missionaries who brought the faith to southern Africa, and took note of the current vigor of the faith, pointing to the “flourishing parishes, thriving often against very great odds.” Although a small minority, and lacking in material resources, the Catholic community bears witness to the Gospel by living out the faith and helping those in need, the Pope said.
Turning to the challenges that confront the Church in southern Africa, the Pope spoke about the toll of abortion, saying that the practice “compounds the grief of many women who now carry within them deep physical and spiritual wounds after succumbing to the pressure of a secular culture which devalues God’s gift of sexuality and the right to life of the unborn.” He also spoke of the high divorce rate, the growing number of children living in broken homes, and the increase of violence against women and children. “All these realities threaten the sanctity of marriage, the stability of life in the home and consequently the life of society as a whole,” he said.
Pope Francis encouraged the African bishops to lead their people to a greater use of the sacrament of penance, noting that confession is “a fundamental dimension of the life of grace.” He urged strong support for marriage, and efforts to combat “illusory notions of sexual freedom.” And he spoke of the need for moral standards in public life, remarking that “corruption is theft from the poor.”
Nothing about AIDS, nothing about family planning, nothing about empowering women, nothing, of course, about condoms. Nope, just the usual railing about abortion, divorce, and sexual licentiousness. Not a word reported above will do anything to improve the lot of one of the poorest and most dysfunctional regions of the world. Penance is not going to cure poverty.
Move along, folks, nothing to see here. Francis is just another Catholic flack.
Your last paragraph is great. In fact, I just used it when sending this piece out into the Twittersphere.
…Same as the old Pope.
…an the one before him…
No, because the one before him is now a Saint.
Canonising people after they die of course has no connection whatsoever to deifying people after they die, as happened to Julius Caesar, Jesus and Tiberius.
Two of those last three were historical personages, but I’m not sure about JC… Julius, I mean.
But if a giant statue of Julius Caesar, erected as a memorial to Tiberius, collapsed and crushed members of a crowd celebrating the latter’s apotheosis, the Roman satirists would have had a field day (except they’d probably all been banished, or worse, by Little Clogs).
I thought these, among many others, were deified BEFORE they died.
…and the hypnotized never lie…
I heard a bit of an interview on BBC radio last Sunday with some RC spokesman talking about the canonisations. When the interviewer asked about child rape (except that she did not put it so bluntly) the smooth-talking [edited out] went on about how JP II had started to tackle the issue and how his successors were and are really sorting it out. I nearly puked. Unfortunately, the interviewer did not seem to know enough about the subject to challenge his nonsense.
You are right about Francis: just the same despicable concern for the image for his criminal organisation, and nothing constructive for the people about whom his Jesus was supposed to be so caring.
As discussed in the thread yesterday about atheists being mentally ill, a binary infinite reward/punishment system justifies anything that is finite. If the Church is supposed to sort things out internally, no amount of reasoning can justify anything else. Africa is essentially what North America was half a millennium ago, the only difference being that we now have a global society that can at least call out the bullshit, not that it does much on the ground in these places where superstition and ignorance dominates.
I heard an interview on NPR commenting that the reason for the “initial” lack of reaction on JPII’s part to the pedophile crisis was his “purity of thought” that made him almost unable to believe the reports (I turned the radio on too late to find out who the interviewee was, but he sounded like a Vatican insider).
This of course must be the lamest of excuses – after all, isn’t the Pope supposed to be the world’s foremost authority on sin?
That’s not just a lame excuse. That’s actively damaging, if you ask me.
“The pope is just too naive! He’s a helpless man-child who has no idea of the kinds of things people are capable of. But you must still respect his authority!”
This was the same excuse Joe Paterno’s defenders used. Joe was such a good man that it took him time to wrap his mind around the accusations against Sandusky!
PZ recently posted about the movement to canonize the past Popes, in a gala event sponsored by big corporations. The love of gold has not changed either.
“Move along, folks, nothing to see here. Francis is just another Catholic flack.”
Yeah, I have some liberal friends who are desperate to find any hint of moderation on the part of the conservatives, religious or otherwise, and they’ve been singing the praises of this new pope.
I’ve taken the view that bureaucracies are fundamentally unable to change themselves in any significant way, and so far the new Pope has done nothing to dispel that expectation. All smoke and mirrors.
White smoke and two-way mirrors.
(snicker)
Nothing (yet) about witches, nothing about criminalizing or killing gay people either.
The ‘witches’ remark isn’t snark — it is a very serious problem. Although the impetus seems to be coming from a toxic combination of traditional African religion and Pentacostalism, the Catholic Church is not completely uninvolved, nor are they without influence.
Has any significant voice said publicly: “There is no such thing as a witch” ?
Yes, the last Pope.
But the “there’s no such thing as a witch” message seemed to be translated into “Christ has triumphed over death and all those occult powers.” That’s not skepticism. It’s an accusation of heresy. Faith vs. faith:
Really, how skeptical can a Catholic be?
Hmmm, it’s not clear from that article exactly what the Pope was saying about witches and spirits. The Catholic Church clearly believes in demons, but only objects to children being falsely accused of being possessed.
I met a witch once. She turned me into a newt. I got better.
Did she weigh the same as a duck?
Yes, that to me is even stranger. I would not expect a Pope to come out in favor of condom use, but opposing the killing of gays and so-called witches would be far less of a stretch. He is clearly playing politics here, wanting the African Bishops’ good will and willing to ignore the plight of the people under them to get it.
“…wanting the African parishioners’ money…”
FIFY
The Catholic Church has a strange relationship with the occult. In many ways it has been co-creator of the occult; what remains today is a mishmash of old-time Christianity and local ethnic religions (this holds true for Europe as much as it does the other continents). And for all the many Catholics who believe in witches as much as we do, there are plenty among the laity and the priesthood who really do believe it. So the Church straddles both positions, simultaneously telling its more enlightened members that they don’t have to believe in it and in the same breathe putting exorcists into every diocese on the planet.
Basically, fostering a belief in the supernatural works to their advantage on several levels. Disavowing it would be a big step towards saving the lives of innocents, but then it runs the risk of having to face incredulity and uncomfortable questions from its supporters.
In all cases, the Catholic Church votes in favor of the safety of its coffers and weeps into its teacup when horrors are unleashed on innocents in the name of “fighting evil”.
Yes. Coming from Catholics (and theists in general) the phrase “I don’t believe in the occult” is a deepity which requires translation. Sometimes it means “the paranormal does not exist.” Sometimes it means “the paranormal exists but I don’t “believe” in using it.”
And more often than not the Powers That Be are, as you point out, perfectly content to allow it to mean both or either, whatever suits the believer. I suspect that a proprietary need to keep and control the flock is coupled with a sensitive concern that no “faith” should ever be rudely dismissed.
But the new pope has created a new patron saint to be invoked by pedophiles who seek protection from secular punishment!
Hopefully he will next emphasize that Saint Charles Lwanga is the perfect patron saint for those who want protection from pedophiles. This will probably come in time, but of course his first priority had to be a saint to help pedophiles avoid prosecution.
P.S. According to Wikipedia, you can go venerate a vertebra from Charles Lwanga in Westminster Cathedral, London. Not gruesome at all.
You must be careful to not confuse a “patron saint” and a saint who is “invoked” (as protection or whatever) against some common but nasty occurrences (migraines, lung disease, full parking garages, etc.)
agree. But more dangerous? He presents such a kindly, compassionate, poverty-focussed demeanor, it leads to forgetfulness about his same old same old beliefs.
“Although a small minority, and lacking in material resources, the Catholic community”
Since when does the catholic community lack resources? No one even knows how much money, land, priceless treasures they have.
They just aren’t willing to send it to Africa (or India, or China, or anywhere else), but the Pope gets a golden scepter and a diamond ring for everyone to kiss.
According to the right wing in America, we are a Christian nation, fighting the destructive secular influence. These African countries are also Christian but there’s little secular influence to be found. Kind of throws a wrench into this theocratic worldview. I wonder what the difference between these two places could be…oh, must be Satan on the loose there, yeah that’s it…
The current pope may sincerely and truly be the nicest pope ever, I wouldn’t know, I haven’t met him or researched his life. But none of that matters.
He is now in a position to change a lot of damaging policies that the RCC propagates that currently do little more than kill people and condemn entire communities to poverty. Cute little soundbites for the Western media are not sufficient.
My jaundiced hunch is that he will ultimately do nothing more than occasionally make ambiguous-sounding sounding statements; and no real change will be implemented. I hope I am proved to be wrong, because people die because of his institution’s doctrines. But I doubt I will be.
The only genuinely good thing he has done as far as I can see is reform and eliminate corruption from the Vatican bank. This is simply an issue of the ethical use of money, and he can do this without offending the sensibilities of any of the faithful.
http://www.religionnews.com/2014/04/07/pope-approves-reforms-scandal-plagued-vatican-bank/
Even here there was some speculation he would just close the bank and many were disappointed when he did not do so.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/07/vatican-bank-reprieve-pope-francis-scandals-reform
But his hands are tied when dealing with deeper issues that impend on Catholic doctrine, and the problems with the Vatican bank don’t entail acknowledging a world-wide coverup of clergy sexual molestation scandals.
The thing about the rather sordid banking scandals is that it affected a small handful of people, many of whom should have known better than to get involved in the first place.
So reforming it is of little benefit to anyone other than those whose futures are tied to the reputation of the Vatican. So color me unimpressed.
As far as Catholic doctrine goes, his hands are as tied as he chooses them to be. Sweeping reforms were made with so-called “Vatican 2” in the 1960s, so it can be done if there is a genuine desire to undertake big changes.
I doubt there is such desire for change.
The main reforms of Vatican II were a radical re-alignment of the church’s attitude to both Protestants and Jews (and English translations of the Bible). All references to Jews killing Jesus were removed from the liturgy, and the liturgy was both put into English and heavily modernized and rewritten.
However, Vatican II did nothing to change the church’s attitudes to women or homosexuals, only to other religions or churches. Although the church more blatantly proclaimed that non-believers might go to heaven, many problematic areas of church teaching and behavior went unexamined. The reforms were in some sense sweeping but they only swept one wing of the house!! (Also Vatican II carried some weight because all the bishops were involved.)
I tend to think that all this was because (either consciously or not) at that point in history Catholics felt more embattled by secularism than by other religions and the Nazi era & the Holocaust forced Catholics to radically re-examine their attitudes to Jews. Regrettably, the AIDS crisis hasn’t had a comparable effect re their attitude to LGBT.
The limited reforms of V2 did spark a backlash among the more traditionalist Catholics, many of whom now distrust the current church while more progressive Catholics are disappointed V2 did not go further. I suspect the resulting polarization motivates the leaders to lie a bit fallow before trying anything like that again.
I agree with you more than this post may indicate.
Yaksenyuk also meets the Pope: Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yaksenyuk of multimillionaire Yulia “nuke the Russians” Tymoshenko’s Fatherland party also went to Rome for an audience with Pope Francisco. Yaksenyuk is Jewish, so the audience was likely in deference to his ultra-nationalist Christian backers (http://news.msn.com/world/pope-promises-to-help-ukraine). Even Pope Francisco seemed IMHO to be ashamed of being seen with this fascist slime (video of meeting on Youtube).
These are Yaksenyuk’s Christian friends (http://justice4germans.com/2013/08/23/ukrainians-honour-the-service-and-sacrifices-of-the-waffen-ss-galicia-division/). Their spiritual guidance derives from the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) of Galacia (Lviv). [I beg pardon for linking to a Nazi apologist site and do so only to show that no spin or white-wash can hide the perversity of the Nazi mind.] In 1944 the Galacian (Lviv) 14th Waffen SS Grenadier Division was formed, with Church blessings, by 80,000 west Ukrainians who volunteered to fight for Nazi Germany, after witnessing and apparently approving the local Holocaust.
The Vatican, through its UGCC subsidiary, is also accused of acting quite subversively during the Kiev riots (http://vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/en/world-news/detail/articolo/ucraina-ukraine-ucrania-31245/), but that is another story.
“succumbing to the pressure of a secular culture which devalues God’s gift of sexuality and the right to life of the unborn”
That’s always been my first thought when looking at the problems in Africa, too much secularism. At least that would be my opinion if I didn’t have a clue what Africa or secularism were.
No matter which pope is currently in, Tim Minchim’s words still ring true….. ‘Fuck the pope’.
sub
Since more than 2 billion people love Pope Francis, does that prove the following:
“The quantity of Intelligence on earth is constant, only the population grows.”
Ah, more people without vaginas telling the women what to do. So Africa is a Good Christian Continent because it still promotes dangerous sexual practices, relegates women to mere toys, denies the reality of AIDS, but I guess most importantly still believes any old superstition. I guess being ass-backwards is a Good Thing. It’s strange that what’s good for Mohammed is good for Jesus; ignorance must be a wonderful thing.
Oh no, Women are not toys, they are baby-making farms.
Do get it right.
😉
Reblogged this on Dreamkid and commented:
Jerry Coyne is right to highlight this. His last sentence is ‘move along, business as usual’, but we need to remind ourselves what the Catholic Church doesn’t do – move with the times and embrace modern morality (from the last 500 years) – rather than being stuck in the Middle Ages. Africa really doesn’t need more Bibles. Nor does Haiti, and all other deprived places in the world. They need to be brought into the modern 21st century not indoctrinated into the 15th century.
Reblogged this on The Road and commented:
Same as the old Pope(s)
When Pope Frankie was first elected, I gave him some time, and of course, he is a 1940’s Catholic, who has a ‘humble’ exterior. That he is talking about abortion, and not apologising for the lies about AIDS in Africa, is repugnant. I gave up on him a after a few months. Thanks for this Jerry – shall share it.
If he wouldn’t have been willing and anticipated to “buttressing the traditional stands of the Catholic Church” they never would have made him pope. Surely you’re not looking for a reform candidate in the College of Cardinals?