Commonweal: Style & Substance - Francis seeks to reconcile factions within Catholicism

[UrbScotty]

Francis’s penchant for seemingly off-the-cuff remarks (“Who am I to judge?”) and his determination to shed much of the papacy’s regal trappings have made him a hero to many, while raising suspicion among some traditionalists. What seems increasingly clear, however, is that Francis has taken the reform mandate given him by the conclave that elected him and run with it. He also wants to place the mercy of the Gospel, rather than its strictures, front and center. This has made him immensely appealing to both Catholics and those outside the church, but it remains to be seen if this more conciliatory style of governance will help overcome the church’s internal divisions.

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In calling the synod, Francis has raised the expectation that the church will readmit divorced and remarried Catholics to Communion. This in turn has heightened the fears of some that Francis will alter church doctrine on the indissolubility of marriage. Certainly the pope’s call for “pastoral service” and “divine mercy” suggests that he thinks this is an issue where the church has erred on the side of legalism, and he ended his homily by characteristically urging the synod to embrace the “mystery” of God’s infinite forgiveness.

Francis is equally engaged on other fronts. Reform of the Vatican bank and the financial operations of the Curia are well underway. Preparations for the upcoming synod indicate that Francis hopes to make good on the Second Vatican Council’s promise of episcopal collegiality. Bishops are being encouraged to speak their minds and consult with the laity. Similarly, Francis’s appointments of cardinals and bishops have shown a preference for those with pastoral or diplomatic experience. He has famously remarked that he wants shepherds who smell of their sheep, and the sacking of the German Bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst, known as the “Bishop of Bling,” has sent an unmistakable message in that regard. Many are now wondering if Francis will move with similar dispatch against bishops who have covered up the sexual abuse of children.

Paul Vallely, the author of Pope Francis: Untying the Knots, and the Boston Globe’s John Allen were recently at the Ethics and Public Policy Center’s Faith Angle Forum to assess the first year of Francis’s pontificate. Both seasoned journalists dismissed the notion that Francis is pursuing fundamental doctrinal change. The pope’s real agenda, shaped by his experience as Jesuit provincial and archbishop in Argentina, is consonant with both the letter and the spirit of Vatican II. “One thing he’s concerned about,” Vallely explained, “is that the church doesn’t make decisions in the right way, and that is more important to him than what the decisions are.” Both Vallely and Allen agree that, with Francis, style is substance. “You can change the Catholic Church profoundly without changing a single comma in its official code of teaching,” Allen said. “These gestures are not just spontaneous, and they’re not one-off. They’re a program of governance in miniature.”

https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/style-substance

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

1. I strongly suggest reading the Ethics and Public Policy Center’s Forum

With Vallely and Allen at http://www.eppc.org/publications/john-l-allen-jr-paul-vallely-march-2014-faith-angle-forum/

If I had to sum it up in a single word, that would be "enlightening".