Beyond the pro/anti-Francis paradigm *UNLOCKED*

notes on the Pope post-Fiducia Supplicans

Due to popular demand, and in honor of the 11th anniversary of Francis’s papacy, we unlocked the pope piece. Share widely (but you should still get a paid sub anyway!).

As expected, my lapsed Catholic family members approached me (the family’s token religious freak) at our Christmas celebration about the Pope’s alleged approval of gay unions. They were elated to hear the news, and were disturbed by what they perceived to be the intolerance and hate of those who expressed concerns about Fiducia Supplicans. “I don’t get it…why do some people not want to see others happy?” asked one family member. Another expressed fear that the Pope’s detractors would attempt to assassinate him.

Surely, those who only read the headlines are prone to misinterpreting the actual implications of the text. The fact that many people will respond as did my family members will serve as proof to the Pope’s detractors that he is sowing the seeds of division and confusion in the Church. I certainly do share some of their reservations about the text—less so about its lack of orthodoxy and more so about its lack of prudence (which I expounded on here, and which our friend Sebby explains in further detail here). 

And yet, when I look beyond my immediate reactions (as well as those of the media cycle), I realize that there’s much more going on beyond the surface.

For context, my conversations with family members about the Pope took place after attending Mass on Christmas Eve morning at our family’s parish in the “old neighborhood”—a tradition we’ve kept for many years. Few of us remembered the Mass responses (many were stuck on “and also with you…”). But several expressed being moved by the priest’s homily about the need to welcome the peace of Christ in our hearts on Christmas day, especially in the midst of war, violence, and political unrest. He pointed to Mary’s “yes” as a source of liberation and hope, which caught the attention of one of my family members who is in a same sex civil marriage. She told me that she never really heard much about Mary as a child when she attended Catholic schools. 

When I prompted her to tell me more about her experience, all she could remember was the cruelty, moralism, and coldness of the nuns who taught her. This seemed to be the norm amongst most of my family members who attended Catholic schools in the 1950-70s. The priest’s homily, she said, made her think of the Pope and his welcoming tone, and made her want to return to church so she could hear more from this alluring priest.

Her response was emblematic of the so-called “Francis Effect,” in all of its complexity.

Francis is calling us to make the Church more welcoming to those who feel alienated by it for whatever reasons. Though he never actually falls into heterodoxy, he speaks using vague and provocative language that gives some people hope that soon the Church will “change” its doctrines. I’ve met a number of people who are more open to God and the Church precisely because they think he’ll start ordaining women and sacramentalizing gay marriages. Surely, that’s not really a good reason to return—on top of the slim chances that that’s actually going to happen. 

But what I find even more disconcerting is that so many will hold up such examples as proof that Francis is deeply problematic, fueling their desire for a Pope who is much more definitive when it comes to doctrine—one who “defends” the Church’s position against an increasingly secularizing world. They feel the need to “correct” misguided liberalizers…to spell out for them why a same sex union cannot constitute a sacramental marriage and why women cannot be priests, etc. Such an anxious, small-minded attitude misses out on an opportunity that is much grander and exciting than nitpicking over theological coherence. 

What I saw in my family—beneath their theological confusion—was a flame, a burning desire for an existential hope that only God can provide…a hope that He makes present and concrete through the Church, and which mere “spirituality” without the objectivity of religion—of community, traditions, and rituals—cannot promise.

If I were to respond to their newfound curiosity with a theological discourse, I’d run the risk of dousing that flame. Rather, I wanted to stay with them, talk to them about their desire, their curiosity, which is to say to fan their flame, and to entrust it to the Holy Spirit in prayer. This is where we see the value of Francis’ language of “accompaniment”—I recognize that the salvation of this person’s soul is not in my capacity to offer them coherent theological discourses, but in walking with them toward He who can fully answer our shared desire for fulfillment.

Had I chosen to solely look at the Pope’s actions through the lens of my instinctive, immediate reaction, I wouldn’t have appreciated the way the Spirit was moving in my family members’ hearts. Unfortunately, most people only look at the papacy through such a limited, self-referential lens, reducing the pope to a sort of political figure whose support is merited only if he endorses our preferred causes and ideologies. Yet if this is all he is…if the Church is merely yet another human institution, then—in the words of Flannery O’Connor—“to hell with it.”

In this [super extensive] post, I’ll sketch out some of the ways my understanding of the papacy has developed over the years, in the hopes of offering some help to others who are unsure what to make of this “problematic” pope.

Filial Obedience

Rather than to presumptuously take up space in this post listing my [unimportant] opinions about the Francis papacy, I’ll leave them in the footnotes, in case you care to read them. 

(Fortunately), there is much more to the petrine office than what we happen to agree or disagree with…what we like or dislike. No, the pope is not a politician, and the Church is not a democracy. Nor is the Church an institution that exists only to safeguard certain moral precepts, ideological values, or rituals and cultural practices. 

The Church, rather, is “the universal sacrament of salvation,” by which Christ is “at once manifesting and actualizing the mystery of God’s love for men.” This is to say that the Church is an ontological, metaphysical reality before it is a moral, political, or cultural one. 

My relationship with the papacy has been informed very much by the ecclesiology of Luigi Giussani. In his book Why the Church, Giussani indicates that ecclesiastical authority is an ontological reality whose nature is primarily paternal. Approaching the topic from his characteristic phenomenological, experience-based lens, Giussani claims that clerics are called primarily to “generate,” to foster the growth of those whose care is entrusted to them. If the Church is “the human reality, chosen by God, as the existential instrument of his self-communication,” then the Pope is the primary vessel through which Christ communicates Himself and His will to the community of believers. 

While his office, his capacity to communicate God’s will, is in part manifested through his teaching authority (on matters of faith and morals), it is also manifested “osmotically.” Our obedience to him is not solely a matter of rationally choosing to adhere to his teachings, but is in “affectively” choosing to adhere to him on an interior, spiritual level—to “abide in him”…it is to ask the Spirit to sanctify us, to help us grow in holiness and in deeper intimacy with Christ, through our closeness to the Pope.

I think of the numerous Francis critics who posted photos on the internet of Francis’ special Ubi et Orbi blessing on March 27th 2020 during the height of the Covid pandemic, expressing that despite their reservations about him, they recognized in that moment just how much they needed his fatherhood. They needed the consolation of the Holy Father on a very real, experiential level…their hearts ached for the presence of Christ that was mediated to them in that moment through Francis.

The Mosaic exhortation to honor our parents is not meant to be followed blindly or categorically, per se, but rather is a matter of affirming an ontological principle—it is a descriptive “is” before it is an exhortative “ought.” Our being is inextricably linked to the people who brought us into the world. Thus to affirm our own lives implies having reverence for our parents.

Sometimes our parents do things that are deeply immoral…perhaps they’re even abusive. Similarly, popes can be (and have been) pretty horrible [though Francis may have his flaws, I think placing him in the same category as the Borgia or Medici popes would be quite a reach]. Of course, we shouldn’t celebrate or emulate the errors of people in authority. At times, it may be necessary to distance ourselves from our earthly parents, and ecclesial authorities may merit fraternal correction. Yet we are called to never forsake our respect for them, to kill off the bond of charity with them in our hearts, or to cease willing their good. 

In the case of the pope, we must reckon with the fact that the Holy Spirit chose him as the vicar of Christ on earth. Without him, we lose our link to Christ…we lose the catalyst that generates our growth in intimacy with Him and our conversion of heart.

To say we owe him our obedience is not to say we must blindly celebrate every single thing he says or does (as some shockingly newfound Ultramontanist progressives might tell us). Obedience, rather, implies asking how the Spirit is using Peter to lead me closer to Christ…how It is bringing about my conversion of heart through him. Thus, the most essential matter is not one of static opinion or ideology—whether I agree or disagree, but instead is an open and dynamic question.

Putting opinions into perspective, accepting correction

Of course, we are all entitled to our opinions. Because of our particular temperament, personality, and set of life circumstances, we are prone to being partial to some things someone in power says and not to others. It’s completely natural. Yet, when facing the pope, we have to take a step back and remind ourselves that he isn’t a politician, he isn’t a representative of an electorate, nor is he a representative of a particular set of moral or ideological convictions. We don’t have to agree with or like everything he says. Even Jesus (despite being sinless) may have said or done things we don’t like or agree with. But our opinions need to be put into perspective. We need to learn to let them take a back seat at times in order to listen to what the Spirit is trying to say to us through the Pope.

Take the infamous Pope vs. Trump feud. Francis criticized Trump’s mission to “build a wall,” saying that “one who thinks only about walls rather than bridges is not a Christian.” Surely, CST teaches us to offer a preferential option for the poor and to be mindful of the plight of migrants and refugees. Francis has a duty to remind us of this. Yet, that doesn’t mean a faithful Catholic is in a state of mortal sin for voting for a candidate who enacts policies that fortifies borders and curbs illegal migration. Deciding who to vote for is a matter of prudential judgment. The pope does not have the authority to tell us who to vote for–only the values we need to take seriously when voting. 

And so while I don’t have to agree with the Pope’s personal opinion about Trump’s border policy, I still ought to take his critique of Trump seriously. If I am indeed someone who is fixated on building walls and cares little to build bridges, I need to allow myself to be corrected by the spirit, the principle of what Francis is saying. I don’t have to like the way he said it, but I need to consider how the Spirit is trying to foster my growth through it. 

While the Pope’s political comments didn’t rile me up too much, there are plenty of other things Francis has said that I’m not a big fan of (there were also plenty of things Benny and JP2 said that I didn’t like, for the record). And though I still stand by some of my critiques, I’ve seen how his words were a necessary correction for me…a call for my conversion, to open my eyes and “see the light.”

Because I can be pretty spergy and get attached to my pristine theoretical frameworks, I get extremely irritated by cognitive dissonance and heterodoxy. I feel safe in nice and neat structures that uphold doctrinal consistency…but the Pope’s warnings about pharisaism and his exhortation to rely more on witnessing through the joy of the gospel than by explaining concepts and rules to people—to act as physicians in a “field hospital,” accompanying people in their suffering; going out to the existential and social peripheries; recognizing glints of holiness wherever we find them—has helped me to let go of my false idols and to see how God is calling me to find Him at work in people who I’d least expect to see him working through. It’s helped me get closer to family members, friends, and coworkers whose beliefs don’t align with mine, and to not only share my faith with them, but to allow them to help me grow in faith. As he said in his first encyclical, we do not possess the Truth, but the Truth possesses us. 

The paradigm shift and the signs of the times

This shift from the Benedict to the Francis papacy is symbolic of a greater paradigm shift happening beyond the confines of the Church. Some speak of a transition from the age of Pisces to the age of Aquarius. One friend said that with the transition from Pope Benedict to Pope Francis, the Church has transitioned from the age of St. Benedict to the age of St. Francis, which is to say from an era of institutional stability and dropping our anchors to a missionary era that risks leaving stable structures behind in order to go out on mission to the peripheries. 

While in the past we may have placed more value on doctrinal coherence—of clearly delineating orthodox teachings and condemning heterodoxy, we are now being asked to (without trivializing or abandoning orthodoxy) affirm hints of truth within error, the good within the sinful…to be like the Prodigal’s father and stoop over to embrace the good that exists within the mess. 

Some argue that to do so is to cave into the relativistic spirit of the age. But others recognize that this method is a more effective means to meet people of this age where they’re at, to speak its language without changing the actual substance of our words. This is the mission of the “field hospital,” of witnessing first through the “evangelii gaudium”—which has the capacity to win more people over in our subjectivist age than does explaining coherent theological frameworks.

There is another important insight that fuels this field hospital logic, of the value of speaking the language of the age: most people live in sin not because of willful rebellion or disobedience, but because they are deeply wounded. Moralistic theological discourses (correction) when divorced from the embrace of God’s (fraternal) love will not be likely to incentivize anyone to abandon their sins.

Jesus himself demonstrates this when encountering people stuck in sinful patterns. While he doesn’t lie to them and tell them that their sin is a-ok, who also doesn’t just tell them to stop sinning. The invitation to embark on the path of sanctity is embedded within a loving, healing embrace. It is within such an experience of healing that one is energized to give themselves fully to a life of love, of charity, according to the call of the Father.

When the pope speaks of the centrality of the “encounter,” he’s not “watering down” the value of doctrine. Rather, he’s pointing to a fundamental truth about Christianity: it’s point of departure in the the Law, but a Person who claims to fulfill the Law. It’s also worth noting how the emphasis on the primacy of the encounter with the person of Christ over doctrine was a point emphasized numerous time by Pope Benedict, who once said, “Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.”

The line between speaking the language of the age and caving into the age is exceedingly fine. Sometimes Francis and those who follow his cues dip their toes into dangerous waters. But we must seriously ask ourselves if we’d be better off taking no risks at all. Sure, we would avoid errors, but we would also be missing out on the Spirit’s invitation to reach more and more people who deeply desire hope in the nihilistic abyss of today’s society. Besides, do we really believe that the future of the Church is completely in our hands…that if we make mistakes, that God is incapable of cleaning them up and using them to manifest his mercy and glory?

When I look at my family and friends who are drawn to Francis because they think he’s going to “modernize” the Church with gay marriages, lady priests, and whatever else they have their hopes set on, I realize that what the Spirit is asking from me is not to tell them why they’re wrong, not to give them a theological discourse, but to engage with their newfound receptivity to all things Church related.

Surely, some have only a tangential interest. But others have a genuine desire to draw closer to Jesus because they know that they need the peace, love, and hope that only He can offer. The fact that they feel more free to be involved in the Church–even under false pretenses–is a net positive. Thus why I place more emphasis in taking an interest in their desire for spiritual growth than in correcting their erroneous readings of the Pope’s public statements (though perhaps a time for that may certainly come).

And ultimately, this is why Catholics need to spend less time picking apart the Pope’s pitfalls, and need to pay closer attention to how the Spirit is using Him to bring about the salvation of souls…and how we are being called to participate in this work. You can have your reservations about him, but you’re not exempt from needing to get with the program.

The freedom of belonging to a father

A few weeks ago, I attended the Pope’s Wednesday audience. I was with a group of people who were not particularly religious. It’s safe to say that all of us had our own opinions about the pope—especially about Fiducia Supplicans—for better or worse. But all of those opinions went out the window as the Pope passed by us. Several of us broke down in tears. One of the people in our groups described it as one of the most “healing” moments in her life.

I recognized in this moment that the Pope is, above all, a father. He is one of the most tangible signs of Christ’s promise to reconcile our relationship with the Father. As if “osmotically,” the Pope’s presence mediates the love and mercy of God who always accompanies us and desires our holiness and happiness.

We’re surely entitled to our opinions. But it must be really hard to see him solely through this narrow lens, and to miss out on the great gift that the papacy offers us: the possibility of knowing and experiencing the embrace of a benevolent Father.

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Also check out our pieces on Pope Benedict as PoMo Camp Icon, Francis and our disenchanted social imaginary, and my friendship with Francis.

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graphic by @wafers3d

-Laudato Si was a deeply important critique of modernism (perhaps too critical, though), that insightfully brought environmentalist concerns into dialogue with Catholic Social Teaching and the broader postliberal theological discourse.

-Querida Amazonia very deftly addressed the issue of women’s ordination, relying on a rather compelling “new feminist” argument that highlighted the risks of collapsing the feminine genius into a monolithic, egalitarian utopianism.

-Amoris Laetitia attempted to address the real need to accompany families of divorce, but did so in a rather sloppy, confusing way. One could read it in either an orthodox or heterodox way. But I’m thankful that he’s trying to address the need in the first place, a need which could be better addressed on the ground by individual pastors. On the other hand, I found reading it to be particularly healing, as it helped me understand my own broken family, as well as helping me better accompany my aging grandparents.

-Traditionis Custodes seemed kind of counterintuitive to me…and hypocritical. First of all, it brought us back to a policy similar to that of John Paul II…it was nothing novel. And I agree with the sentiment that these rad trads need to be reeled in. But did he really think directly targeting them was going to make them more likely to calm down? Why not use the same logic you use with people in irregular relationships? He seems to understand that telling people that gay sex is bad is not likely to make them want to draw closer to the Church…so why would you think that putting stringent restrictions on TLM would make trads want to draw closer? 

-Similar to Gaudete et Exsultate (which I personally found to be one of the most helpful documents on a spiritual level)--he loves calling our trads for being judgmental, all the while not seeming to realize how judgmental he sounds in the process. A simple case of cognitive dissonance, or intentional hypocrisy?

-The Document on Human Fraternity was a tricky one. While Pope Benedict’s words about Islam in the Regensburg lecture may have been “true,” it was deeply imprudent of him and deeply damaged the Church’s relationship with the Muslim world. The Pope’s joint document with the Grand Imam of the UAE was theologically rather naive, and sounded like something coming out of France during the Enlightenment, yet it accomplished something deeply important. Another moment of cognitive dissonance perhaps…

-His off the cuff style (ie airplane interviews) is cute, but comes off as a bit egotistical and presumptuous, and creates much unnecessary confusion. And his insistence on speaking freely about his political opinions–that is, those that lie outside his petrine ministry of speaking authoritatively about matters of faith and morals–is kind of annoying. For someone who loves warning about the Church supplanting people’s freedom of conscience, it’s pretty enervating for hum to presume to think we want to hear his personal political opinions. Sure, he’s a human, he’s a political animal, but his job isn’t to tell us what to think about political issues–which is to say, which political conclusions to come, but to help form our consciences so that we can properly discern which conclusions are most prudent.

-It’s no secret by now that he’s extremely authoritarian, and that clerics who criticize him aren’t likely to keep their jobs for long. Not that JP2 and Benedict didn’t dismiss plenty of clerics and theologians, but it was usually due to doctrinal matters, and not about ad hominems against them. At least Francis is aware of his Peronistic tendencies, having admitted to be “like a dictator” when he was back in Argentina. Old habits die hard, I guess…

Similarly, Pope Francis has criticized populism on numerous occasions because, in his eyes, it is a slippery slope toward nationalism, authoritarianism, and xenophobia. I don’t necessarily have to agree with him, and can still support populist candidates and policies. But I do have to take his criticism seriously, and especially have to ask if my political decisions directly contradict the wisdom of the Church and the will of Christ.