BENEDICT XVI: NEWS, PAPAL TEXTS, PHOTOS AND COMMENTARY

Universal enthusiasm for the best of all possible Popes in the best of all possible situations for the Church in modern times has now created a new genre of journalism - an exegetic, justificatory kind of secular apologetics for what Pope Francis really means, or means to say but hasn't said, about the subjects that he chooses not to address head-on, the way he preaches daily - and rightly - against the routine sins and failings that all human beings, but most especially Catholics who ought to know better, are prey to.

Luigi Accattoli, veteran Vaticanista who has otherwise been fairly sober and objective as a commentator, adds his voice to the chorus of Francis exegetes-apologists. The article is typical of the new Francescophiliac journalism, in which perceived failings or shortcomings for which Benedict XVI would have been mercilessly pilloried are instead explained away in the best possible light for Pope Francis. and thus end up being virtues that must be praised rather than deficiencies to criticize. He walks on water! - how could he possibly be less than perfect? We've been through this before with Obamamania.

Pro-life politics - and why
Pope Francis is staying out of it
by Luigi Accattoli
Translated from

June 17, 2013

Francis does not cry out against laws that violate 'non-negotiable principles': this is one of the novelties in his way of being Pope. [Ooops! Did you mean 'being Bishop of Rome'?, since he apparently finds the title 'Pope' pompous and inappropriate! After all, no one ever called St. Peter 'Pope'!]

He shares the need to protest these laws but leaves the task to the bishops of each nation who know best the specifics of the law(s)_ to be protested. This was evident again yesterday (June 16) by what he said at the Mass to celebrate the Gospel of Life in St. Peter's Square.

"Let us say Yes to love and No to selfishness, Yes to life and No to death, Yes to freedom and No to slavery to so many idols in our time", he told a piazza that was as usual packed.

His message was so clear that the news agencies and Internet postings immediately used headlines like "The Pope says No to abortion and euthanasia". It is true he meant to say that, but he did not mention either abortion or euthanasia. [Fine, but where was the reproof from a media that always vituperated against the most general statements made by Benedict XVI as if he had delivered unpardonable screeds against the most cherished of liberal causes! Why do they find it right, and even laudable, this time, and not then?][/DIM

"Often man does not choose life," he continued. "He does not accept the Gospel of Life, but allows himself to be led by ideologies and logics that place obstacles to life, that do not respect life, because they are dictated by selfishness, by special interests, by profit, by power, by pleasure, and not by love."

Thus he has overturned the entire argumentation used in Catholic pedagogy on this subject without ever venturing into the area of laws [against life, presumably]. [How exactly did he 'overturn' Catholic teaching in this respect??? What did he say in that citation that Popes before him have not said and almost in identical words? And in the case of John Paul II and Benedict XVI, going farther as to be specific about the laws they consider a violation not just of Catholic teaching but of natural law?]

He did the same on May 12, also in St. Peter's Square, when he greeted participants in the annual Italian March for Life which had taken place that day through the streets of Rome. There was disappointment among some of those marchers who had expected a more direct statement about specific laws as both Papa Wojtyla and Papa Ratzinger generally did. [In this case, the laws being protested are those in some European countries in which human embryos are used for research, the whole point of the march being the slogan 'Uno di noi' - one of us - referring to each of those research embryos which are necessarily killed in the process]

In more militant Catholic circles, there is an even greater disappointment [Is that really the right term for their sentiment? If it had been Benedict XVI, the term used would have been 'outrage'!] at the silence of the Pope over the continuing fight of French Catholics against homosexual 'marriages' which have been recognized under a recently passed law [called the Taubira law after the person who sponsored the bill].

Francis has never spoken about the issue, nor did he even refer to it when he met on June 15 with a group of French parliamentarians who belong to the France-Holy See Friendship Group. [An egregiously deafening silence that affected even MSM, which hardly even reported on the meeting!] He did remind them that among their duties as lawmakers was to abrogate laws, but he did not say that Catholic legislators in France should do all they can to abrogate the Taubira law.

This attitude of the new Pope is being disputed among Catholics who are engaged in politics. Most insist that 'one day, he will speak clearly' and cite what he said about homosexual marriage on a couple of occasions when he was Archbishop of Buenos Aires. Others doubt that he will ever say anything directly about any specific national law.

In support of the latter view, one might cite what he has done so far with respecf to the Church in Italy [of which the Bishop of Rome is Primate]. When he first met with Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco in a private audience on April 27, the president of the Italian bishops' conference told newsmen that the Pope had told him that "our episcopate should continue with the protection and promotion of non=negotiable values" and that the Pope shared the themes of the opening remarks he was preparing for the CEI general assembly that followed thereafter.

In his opening remarks, Bagnasco described the legitimization of homosexual unions as "a progressive vulnus (wound) to the specific identity of the family". But when the Pope met the bishops in assembly on May 23, he said not a word about this topic.

His silence must be interpreted in the light of the extemporaneous remarks he made at the start of his address to them that "dialog with cultural, social and political institutions 'in Italy' is your business to undertake".

Everyone interpreted this to mean an override of the so-called 'lodo Bertone' [Bertone boast], namely the letter that Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone sent Cardinal Bagnasco when he was first named CEI president in 2007 by Benedict XVI, in which he said that the Secretariat of State, not the CEI, would exercise competence over political questions affecting the Church in Italy. [/This is a gross misrepresentation of fact. At the time, Cardinal Bagnasco simply ignored the letter and has continued to run the CEI as it had been during 16 years by Cardinal Camillo Ruini, considered by many to have been an activist by mobilizing the Catholics of Italy, under both John Paul II and Benedict XVI, to oppose laws against Catholic teaching at the polls. Accattoli is well aware that Bertone was completely out of line in even claiming any competence at all over the Church in Italy, which is defined by the Lateran pacts as the dialog partner for the state of Italy on all matters pertaining to Church and State relations in Italy. Not the Vatican, which represents the universal Church.

The Pope has competence in the Church of Italy because he is its ex- officio Primate, but this particular function of the Pope is exercised through the CEI, not through the Vatican at all. That Benedict XVI allowed Cardinal Bagnasco full rein to do as Ruini did - the Church in Italy mounted a massive protest against the Prodi government's plan to legislate gay 'marriage' in Italy - shows he stood by the CEI about its specific competence in Italy, not by his impetuous Secretary of State. If anyone overrode Bertone at all on this, it was Benedict XVI six years ago, and Cardinal Bagnasco himself.]

The interpretation is correct but partial. He may have sideiined the 'Bertone boast' [which was never more than that, so there was nothing to sideline in fact!] but Francis did more than that. He said, in effect, that not just the Secretary of State, but not even the Pope, can from now on have anything to say about our public life in Italy, but that such interventions are for the bishops to do.

WHOA! The Bishop of Rome, by virtue of being Bishop of Rome, is Primate of Italy. As Italy's first bishop, what happens to the Church of Italy is just as much his concern as that of the CEI. John Paul II and Benedict XVI were 'activist' Primates of Italy, i.e., they led their 'troops', because they spoke out when and as often as they needed to, against political developments in Italy which threatened or continue to threaten what Benedict XVI always called 'non=negotiable principles', in no uncertain terms.

And as for that business that a Pope must not speak out against any specific national law, it does not apply to Italy, where he is the Primate of the national Church, and it is his duty to speak out.

More importantly, however, Popes cannot always leave it up to the local bishops to speak out and do something about even the most pernicious problem such as the sex abuses committed by priests. We saw what happened when bishops were left to their own devices before 2001 - when many deliberately ignored specific canon law already existing at the time to deal with 'serious offenses' by priests. John Paul II had to confer the CDF with the jurisdiction to act on cases not acted upon by the local bishops.

Isn't it paradoxical that a Pope who has been praised to high heavens - and rightly - for being so direct and colloquially frank in his language when calling a spade a spade, is equally praised for choosing to keep silent so far about non-negotiable principles? With Benedict XVI, the attitude of the media - and the public perception they shaped - was and is 'damned if he does, damned if he doesn't". With Pope Francis, it is "all praise and glory to him whatever he says and does or does not say or do".

Our only consolation is that it is God's judgment on Benedict XVI that matters, not that of the media and their gullible following.

[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 23/06/2013 12:36]