Is Pope Francis lost?

9 thoughts on “Is Pope Francis lost?”

1. Maybe some day I’ll take the effort need to read the real document. Of course, any document he puts out you can’t trust what either the right or left say about it.

   And, the papal supremacists tell us that we need a pope who can speak clearly to doctrinal matters…and yet every time he opens his mouth or computer, he muddies the waters.

   You have to ask yourself what dirt Zelensky or Netenyahu have on him? (That part’s in jest…but you know the RWNJs will be saying shit like that.

   1. That’s exactly the point of the “Frank the Hippie Pope” video. He says things that can be technically defended as not necessarily heresy, but the effect is to confuse things.

2. https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/it/bollettino/pubblico/2023/12/18/0901/01963.html#en

   1. I get lost. My heart’s not in it to parse it.

      I looked at one footnote, thinking maybe he’s quoting some saint…nope. Quoting his own document…not that he even wrote this but that someone else wrote it and he signed off on it. You’d think a document would cite the tradition of the church…but most of the quotes here are his own in previous documents.

      Love how they lump the homosexuals and irregular marriages together…. Probably only the lavender mafia capo that wrote this for Francis could envision that.

3. The news media has completely misrepresented what is in this document (as well as the preceding ones). Not once in any of these documents does Pope Francis suggest a priest can bless the *union* of a gay couple. In fact, quite the contrary. He states it explicitly in paragraph 5 “the Church does not have the power to impart blessings on unions of persons of the same sex.”

   The matter under discussion is whether there are any opportunities to bless gay people when they ask for a blessing when they present themselves as a couple, despite the fact that they are “in situations that are morally unacceptable from an objective point of view” (paragraph 26). And the Pope’s answer is:

   Yes when they are part of “elderly, the sick, participants in a catechetical or prayer meeting, pilgrims, those embarking on a journey, volunteer groups and associations and more” (see paragraph 28). He further states in paragraph 40, “Such a blessing may instead find its place in other contexts, such as a visit to a shrine, a meeting with a priest, a prayer recited in a group, or during a pilgrimage.”

   But he is very clear in paragraph 39: “this blessing should never be imparted in concurrence with the ceremonies of a civil union, and not even in connection with them. Nor can it be performed with any clothing, gestures, or words that are proper to a wedding.”

   In other words, Pope Francis is arguing that sinful people can receive blessings even when they are persisting in grave moral sin, even when they are presenting themselves in that state (by presenting themselves as a couple) as long as the nature of the blessing being requested is for something that the Church would otherwise be willing to bless. It has nothing to do with blessing gay unions.

   One can debate whether Francis is doing a poor job of communicating (there are those who go so far to say it’s even intentional) or whether the press is purposely misrepresenting him, but it’s very clear that what is in this document (and it’s predecessors) is nothing like what is being reported.

   1. It goes without saying that the press is misrepresenting the Pope. It’s still possible (likely, imo) that the Pope is being intentionally vague and trying to change things incrementally.

   2. Why even bother saying it…

      In your second paragraph, sentence 1, the first phrase of yours ends with “presents themselves as a couple”. That is a big difference than a plain “presents themselves” or even a bigger difference than “presents themselves individually”. One could argue that “presents themselves as a couple” and then receive a blessing is some kind of blessing of the union… IDK.

      Like, I said, why even should Francis/lavender mafia bother saying this unless there is an agenda somewhere.

      An example from the Orthodox church and therefore it’s also the custom of the Eastern Catholic churches…

      After the consecration and then during the following Theotokion, the priest takes the baskets of bread that were not consecrated (I know, a fucking foreign concept to RCs)… the priest takes the leftover bread not consecrated and blesses it. Before that, the leftover pieces are bread. After the blessing, the leftover pieces are blessed bread. When the faithful go up for communion, they will grab a piece of blessed bread for themselves and often for a visitor near them. At the end of the service, the priest hands out the blessed bread to all the people attending–no conditions.

      I can see where that blessed bread practice is open to everybody. When Jesus multiplied the loaves, there is no record of him saying, “only pass it out to the good people” (or only Jews or only orthodox Jews …). Everyone in attendance seemed to receive and in some manner participate in the miracle/blessing.

      It’s a fine piece of communication when one half thinks the pope approved their status and the other half thinks he’s committed heresy.

4. Matt Walsh’s commentary on this seems exactly right. Ep. 1281

   His point is that Francis is doing exactly what he’s done throughout his papacy, which is to blur and confuse things to give cover for liberals.

5. Seems as if this is following a semantic trend in RC circles. Just as annulment isn’t “really” divorce…blessing same sex “couples” isn’t “really” giving consent to same sex marriage.

   That said, I agree with the point that if it creates more confusion than it resolves why say it? ISTM, there is some agenda motivating the need to issue this statement.

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