Now I've made this comment at several Catholic blogs today. I want to post it here so that I can share with my readers and preserve it for myself.
"The last few days have made it apparent that B16′s strengths were intellectual at the expense of human contact. Given what I’ve seen of Francis’s human contact approach to his ministry, human contact is much more important than intellectual pontificating, pardon the pun. The intellectual underpinnings of Catholicism are there in the magisterium. Whatever updating B16 did to it is marginal, and non-Catholics weren’t listening anyway. I like what I’ve seen Pope Francis. This contact ministry is the human contact that I’ve argued brings Christ to everyone. Through human contact is where Christ is revealed. Pope Francis is a shot in the arm!"
What a gift this man has become. God bless Pope Francis!
B16 was a sweet but shy man and perhaps not so comfortable with the kind of contact that Pope Francis enjoys, as did Bl JPII. It was also not within his culture as a Bavarian to seek and enjoy physical contact in the way that seems to come so easily to Pope Francis who, though he hails from Argentina, is the son of Italian immigrants. Each pope brings their own gifts and I think it's treading into dangerous territory to compare them and declare that one papacy was worth more than another. I believe it is most effective when you reach out to people where they are, but as soon as the "social justice" crowd gets wind of the fact that Francis isn't going to water down the moral authority of the Church, they, too, will tune out. Just as the beauty that Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI restored to the sacred liturgy brought many Anglicans and others into the fold of Holy Mother Church, so will Pope Francis attract converts, I do believe that. But I would hesitate to compare the worth of one pontificate with another. Christ is revealed in many places, and as Bl Mother Teresa said, if we can't see Him in the distressing disguise of the poor, we will not be able to see Him in the Eucharist, and vice versa.
ReplyDeleteTrue, true, true. I didn't mean to short change B16. I love him too.
DeleteI love Pope Francis, the Italian media is in love with him, even most non-believers are. But I'm a little worried about his safety! Should we trust in God alone?
ReplyDeleteA few people have brought up that safety concern. I hope he's more cautious now that the celebratory events have passed.
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