Is Francis a legitimate Pope?

[Obi-Wan Kenobi]

By the way, here's an encyclical on mercy from St. John Paul II.

[Doom]

I might also add that the theory of the "fundamental option" was very severely criticized in Veritatis Splendor by Pope St. John Paul II. It turns out that it's not very merciful to tell someone they're well when in fact they are not.

Isn't the chief problem of the fundamental option that it makes it virtually impossible for anyone to commit a mortal sin? I remember being told by a priest that skipping Mass wasn't a mortal sin unless it was done for the express purpose of rejecting God, i.e. unless it was done as a fundamental option against God, this kind of reasoning, if taken seriously, makes mortal sin pretty much nonexistent.

[Obi-Wan Kenobi]

Well. the chief problem is that it's false, but you have pointed out one of its consequences.

[Stella]

By the way, here's an encyclical on mercy from St. John Paul II.

Yes this is what I mean. Pope Francis’ initiatives are taken directly from the works of previous Popes regarding deeper engagement by the Church in mercy. JPII writes…

"The more the Church's mission is centered upon man-the more it is, so to speak, anthropocentric-the more it must be confirmed and actualized theocentrically, that is to say, be directed in Jesus Christ to the Father. While the various currents of human thought both in the past and at the present have tended and still tend to separate theocentrism and anthropocentrism, and even to set them in opposition to each other, the Church, following Christ, seeks to link them up in human history, in a deep and organic way. And this is also one of the basic principles, perhaps the most important one, of the teaching of the last Council. Since, therefore, in the present phase of the Church's history we put before ourselves as our primary task the implementation of the doctrine of the great Council, we must act upon this principle with faith, with an open mind and with all our heart. In the encyclical already referred to, I have tried to show that the deepening and the many-faceted enrichment of the Church's consciousness resulting from the Council must open our minds and our hearts more widely to Christ. Today I wish to say that openness to Christ, who as the Redeemer of the world fully reveals man himself," can only be achieved through an ever more mature reference to the Father and His love."

I read a clear direction in those words for the Church going forward and Cardinal Bergolio was always known for his ‘get it done’ style. If critics of Francis initiatives gave suggestions about how the Church should be going about this direction to become a Church more reflective of Jesus mercy, as per the Council and subsequent Popes, that would be great. That would be a truly synodal operation.

[Gandalf the Grey]

Well lets say 'marginalised' by the Church. Specifically thinking of the two prominent issues now ie the divorced/remarried and homosexuals.

Something needs to be made ridiculously clear, and it has to do with this absurdly dubious statement and the manipulation involved in the double-speak and sophistry being employed.

The only thing that the Church is "guilty" of "marginalising" is sin.

If there happens to be people who wish to call themselves "Catholic" while holding onto one or more sins which the Church has perennially so designated based on Divine Revelation and her Magisterial authority then the fault lies with those who hang onto their sin, not the Church who with the Savior asks, expects, and anticipates that they ought to repent and come to Christ.

It's traditional for the Church to not have addressed culpability for mortal sin and the psychological influences on that aspect....

What are you even talking about? Culpability for mortal sin isn't something that the Church is supposed to address? Where do you even get this nonsense from?

and to have had a very black and white attitude with regard to access to the Sacraments.

Well, yeah. Because sacrilege is an even more serious sin than adultery and homosexualism, however much that those of your ideological persuasion would like to believe otherwise.

Ever hear of the addage, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions.."?

So while VS makes it clear that nothing proposed should in effect "objectively change or cast doubt upon the traditional concept of mortal sin", there is room for deeper study into what constitutes a lack of culpability and how that can be treated by the Church for those who desire 'communion'.

If there are those who truly "desire communion" then they ought also desire the conditions that are required in order to receive it faithfully, fully, obediently and with utmost humility.

I've kept myself from receiving the Eucharist for almost a year while I was dealing with my own psychological and spiritual issues. I wouldn't dare in arrogance to even approach the altar and presume that my mere presence was sufficient enough for me to dare receive the Lord while my soul was laden with obstacles and sins.

If they want to have their sins and have God on their own terms instead of God having them on His terms, as far as I see it the culpability involved is rather clear, and it's not on the part of the Church and it's supposed "marginalising".

[Stella]

Well lets say 'marginalised' by the Church. Specifically thinking of the two prominent issues now ie the divorced/remarried and homosexuals.

Something needs to be made ridiculously clear, and it has to do with this absurdly dubious statement and the manipulation involved in the double-speak and sophistry being employed.

The only thing that the Church is "guilty" of "marginalising" is sin.

If there happens to be people who wish to call themselves "Catholic" while holding onto one or more sins which the Church has perennially so designated based on Divine Revelation and her Magisterial authority then the fault lies with those who hang onto their sin, not the Church who with the Savior asks, expects, and anticipates that they ought to repent and come to Christ.

It's traditional for the Church to not have addressed culpability for mortal sin and the psychological influences on that aspect....

What are you even talking about? Culpability for mortal sin isn't something that the Church is supposed to address? Where do you even get this nonsense from?

and to have had a very black and white attitude with regard to access to the Sacraments.

Well, yeah. Because sacrilege is an even more serious sin than adultery and homosexualism, however much that those of your ideological persuasion would like to believe otherwise.

Ever hear of the addage, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions.."?

So while VS makes it clear that nothing proposed should in effect "objectively change or cast doubt upon the traditional concept of mortal sin", there is room for deeper study into what constitutes a lack of culpability and how that can be treated by the Church for those who desire 'communion'.

If there are those who truly "desire communion" then they ought also desire the conditions that are required in order to receive it faithfully, fully, obediently and with utmost humility.

I've kept myself from receiving the Eucharist for almost a year while I was dealing with my own psychological and spiritual issues. I wouldn't dare in arrogance to even approach the altar and presume that my mere presence was sufficient enough for me to dare receive the Lord while my soul was laden with obstacles and sins.

If they want to have their sins and have God on their own terms instead of God having them on His terms, as far as I see it the culpability involved is rather clear, and it's not on the part of the Church and it's supposed "marginalising".

Did you know that large numbers of returned soldiers from WWI and WW2 committed suicide but that wasn’t acknowledged in their records because it was seen as weakness and/or sin? They would have been denied Catholic funeral rites and Catholic burial.

Did you also realise that since Vatican II, the Church has changed her attitude towards these severe mental traumas, and even afford them access to the sacrament of the sick?

These people weren’t maliciously marginalized by the Church but they were marginalized and left to their own fates.

The Church has always striven to both guard the deposit of faith but also find ways to be merciful according to how we understand the human condition. What sort of model of Jesus would we be if we didn’t want to improve on how we manifest the merciful Father?

[peregrinator]

Did you know that large numbers of returned soldiers from WWI and WW2 committed suicide but that wasn’t acknowledged in their records because it was seen as weakness and/or sin? They would have been denied Catholic funeral rites and Catholic burial.

Whether they should have been denied funeral rites is one thing, but suicide is objectively a sin.

Anyway, I view much of the talk about reaching out to the marginalized as cant since Francis and his apparat are doing plenty of marginalizing themselves.

[Gandalf the Grey]

Did you know that large numbers of returned soldiers from WWI and WW2 committed suicide but that wasn’t acknowledged in their records because it was seen as weakness and/or sin? They would have been denied Catholic funeral rites and Catholic burial.

So the problem isn't with suicide-wilfull self-murder- or with officials lying on official documents, but only whether or not they adequately receive the subjectively desired rites of the Church? So your justification is that it's ok to deceive Church officials so they can be duped into giving rites that are illicit under canon law?

Did you also realise that since Vatican II, the Church has changed her attitude towards these severe mental traumas, and even afford them access to the sacrament of the sick?

You're conflating two different things. The Church has never condemned people for suffering mental trauma. That's not the problem. It's what someone wilfully does in response to that trauma that is the issue. Suffering trauma doesn't grant you license to inflict more trauma onto yourself or others.

These people weren’t maliciously marginalized by the Church but they were marginalized and left to their own fates.

The whole thing about the sin of despair(like it's opposite the sin of presumption) is that no one "marginalises" you, you "marginalise" yourself; either in presumption where you so excessively and inordinately single yourself out as being so exceptionally "good" and sinless that you expect God to give you something you've done nothing to merit, or you look at yourself as so despicably unworthy that you deny that you're even capable of God's assistance. Both are gross acts of self-centeredness and thus sins of pride. Both are invariably those "sins against the Holy Spirit" that Christ spoke about which are unforgivable precisely because they deny any and all efficacy in regards to Divine Assistance. Both are based on unhealthy and inordinate views regarding the virtue of hope.

I know the psychology of depression, despair, and self-hatred intimately. I also know how pathological narcissism is used as a means of covering those neurotic tendencies over. Regardless of how those pathologies are used by some to lie to and fool themselves or others you're not going to manipulate or fool God.

The Church has always striven to both guard the deposit of faith but also find ways to be merciful according to how we understand the human condition.

The human condition isn't any different now than it was when Adam and Eve left the Garden.

Also "mercy" looks drastically different depending on both the person and the seriousness of the sin they're attached to.

Sometimes mercy is feeding a starving person.

Other times mercy is getting a 2x4 wood stud smacked upside your head because you refused to wear a hard hat or a drink driver crashing his car into a brick wall.

One of the greatest mercies God gives us is to allow catastrophes into our lives in order to shatter the litany of lies we tell ourselves about our own goodness and prosperity.

That means that some of the greater mercies He ordains necessarily involves Him being entirely un-empathetic from the perspective of the one suffering.

Just as Christ cried from the cross, "Oh God, oh God, why hast thou forsaken me?"

Are the servants greater than the Master?

What sort of model of Jesus would we be if we didn’t want to improve on how we manifest the merciful Father?

Jesus already gave a perfectly legitimate and sufficient enough model demonstration of how to manifest the Father. We need no other.

We definitely don't need novel, modernist, and erroneous variations of Freudian psychoanalysis to use as substitute or act like such novelties are "better" than the original.

[Gandalf the Grey]

Did you know that large numbers of returned soldiers from WWI and WW2 committed suicide but that wasn’t acknowledged in their records because it was seen as weakness and/or sin? They would have been denied Catholic funeral rites and Catholic burial.

Whether they should have been denied funeral rites is one thing, but suicide is objectively a sin.

Anyway, I view much of the talk about reaching out to the marginalized as cant since Francis and his apparat are doing plenty of marginalizing themselves.

That's the Ironclad Law of Relativist Projection....it never misses.

[Doom]

Francis is the least popular Pope in several centuries, and frankly, I am inclined to think that it is almost a good thing, there has been an unhealthy cult of personality around the Pope, especially in the post Vatican II era. So, I am inclined to think we have been sent a historically bad Pope as a form of punishment to remind us that Catholicism is not supposed to be Pope-centric, we need to stop looking to the Pope for everything and start looking at the local level, for the vast majority of Church history the Pope was a minor figure in the daily lives of Catholics, indeed, most Catholics probably could not have even named the Pope. This is more the way it should be than what we've had the last few decades and if we could get back to it, it would be better for everyone.

[peregrinator]

I am inclined to think we have been sent a historically bad Pope as a form of punishment to remind us that Catholicism is not supposed to be Pope-centric

That's generally how I respond when people say "the Holy Spirit chose Francis" - well, at least the part about punishment. I'm not sure the Papal cult of personality is the reason for the punishment!

[Stella]

Francis is the least popular Pope in several centuries, and frankly, I am inclined to think that it is almost a good thing, there has been an unhealthy cult of personality around the Pope, especially in the post Vatican II era. So, I am inclined to think we have been sent a historically bad Pope as a form of punishment to remind us that Catholicism is not supposed to be Pope-centric, we need to stop looking to the Pope for everything and start looking at the local level, for the vast majority of Church history the Pope was a minor figure in the daily lives of Catholics, indeed, most Catholics probably could not have even named the Pope. This is more the way it should be than what we've had the last few decades and if we could get back to it, it would be better for everyone.

I have to disagree with the statement that Popes have been minor figures in peoples daily lives in the past. Catholic houses and Churches had pictures of Popes in pride of place. Similar to how English immigrants had pictures of the King in pride of place. They were regarded with the highest esteem and whatever came out of the Vatican was accepted without question by ordinary people. The papacy was regarded as Jesus voice on earth.

Also the disdain for Pope Francis is confined to the US. He isn’t considered a ‘bad’ Pope by the majority of the worlds Catholics. I’d argue that the distain is really where the cult of personality comes into it. When you ask someone why they don’t like the Pope, it’s always a litany of personality traits.

[Doom]

I am inclined to think we have been sent a historically bad Pope as a form of punishment to remind us that Catholicism is not supposed to be Pope-centric

That's generally how I respond when people say "The Holy Spirit chose Francis" - well, at least the part about punishment. I'm not sure the Papal cult of personality is the reason for the punishment!

Oh, I think that is definitely part of it. I saw on Facebook yesterday someone saying that Catholics are required to "love and respect the Pope"... respect yes, love, no. Let's get real, you can't command a feeling, you can only demand behavior.

[Vern Humphrey]

Francis is the least popular Pope in several centuries, and frankly, I am inclined to think that it is almost a good thing, there has been an unhealthy cult of personality around the Pope, especially in the post Vatican II era. So, I am inclined to think we have been sent a historically bad Pope as a form of punishment to remind us that Catholicism is not supposed to be Pope-centric, we need to stop looking to the Pope for everything and start looking at the local level, for the vast majority of Church history the Pope was a minor figure in the daily lives of Catholics, indeed, most Catholics probably could not have even named the Pope. This is more the way it should be than what we've had the last few decades and if we could get back to it, it would be better for everyone.

I have to disagree with the statement that Popes have been minor figures in peoples daily lives in the past. Catholic houses and Churches had pictures of Popes in pride of place. Similar to how English immigrants had pictures of the King in pride of place. They were regarded with the highest esteem and whatever came out of the Vatican was accepted without question by ordinary people. The papacy was regarded as Jesus voice on earth.

Also the disdain for Pope Francis is confined to the US. He isn’t considered a ‘bad’ Pope by the majority of the worlds Catholics. I’d argue that the distain is really where the cult of personality comes into it. When you ask someone why they don’t like the Pope, it’s always a litany of personality traits.

On the other hand, Pope Francis certainly has disdain for the United States -- look at the number of negative comments he has made about us, compared with other nations.

[Doom]

I have to disagree with the statement that Popes have been minor figures in peoples daily lives in the past. Catholic houses and Churches had pictures of Popes in pride of place.

Only after 1870, which is also the beginning of the modern Papal cult of personality, let's get real, there were no "pictures of the Pope" anywhere before the invention of photography. And there certainly weren't pictures of the Pope back in the days when there could be 3 or 4 Popes in the space of 10 years. If you asked the average Catholic in 1300 to name the Pope, I doubt many could do it. Certainly, there was no great interest in the Pope when it could take 2 or 3 years for a person to even learn that a new Pope had been elected, and by that time the Pope they just heard about being elected could have already died.

[peregrinator]

Let's get real, you can't command a feeling, you can only demand behavior.

Love isn't a feeling, it's an act of the will. So yes, one is required to love the Pope in the sense that one wills the good for him.

[Doom]

You can't command somebody to will something either, either it is their will or it isn't.

[Doom]

At any rate, they only sense in which "love" could be commanded is that one is required to give the benefit of the doubt, and the fact is that a lot of the "heresy" charges against Francis are based on deliberate lies. And the claim one often hears that Francis has a deliberate agenda or plan to destroy the Catholic faith, this kind of talk is the exact opposite of giving the benefit of the doubt. So while Francis admirers (all 3 or 4 of them) may think I am being mean when I say that I don't Francis knows much about theology and that frankly I don't think he is very bright or at least a very lazy and unnuanced thinker who tends to say incredibly stupid things because he lacks the self-discipline to think before he speaks, but this is actually me trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. Actually, in his tendency to speak without thinking, he is a lot a man Francis loathes, Donald Trump, who also lacks self-discipline and is inclined to be incredibly thin-skinned responding to every minor criticism with savage insults, the same way Francis does. And that is probably why they don't get along, they have exactly the same personality.

One of the most pernicious is the "Pachamama" claim, I have researched this extensively and what I have discovered is that the alleged statue of Pachamama, was, according to the guy sculpted it, supposed to be a statue of Mary, specifically, "Our Lord of the Amazon", who is the patron saint of the Pan-Amazon region, and any claim to the contrary is a blatant lie. Unfortunately, those promote this lie, such as Taylor Marshall, have absolutely no apparent concern for the truth. I am convinced that people like Marshall know that what they say is false, but they don't care because to them a lie as good as the truth.

[Gandalf the Grey]

Francis is the least popular Pope in several centuries, and frankly, I am inclined to think that it is almost a good thing, there has been an unhealthy cult of personality around the Pope, especially in the post Vatican II era. So, I am inclined to think we have been sent a historically bad Pope as a form of punishment to remind us that Catholicism is not supposed to be Pope-centric, we need to stop looking to the Pope for everything and start looking at the local level, for the vast majority of Church history the Pope was a minor figure in the daily lives of Catholics, indeed, most Catholics probably could not have even named the Pope. This is more the way it should be than what we've had the last few decades and if we could get back to it, it would be better for everyone.

I have to disagree with the statement that Popes have been minor figures in peoples daily lives in the past. Catholic houses and Churches had pictures of Popes in pride of place. Similar to how English immigrants had pictures of the King in pride of place. They were regarded with the highest esteem and whatever came out of the Vatican was accepted without question by ordinary people. The papacy was regarded as Jesus voice on earth.

Also the disdain for Pope Francis is confined to the US. He isn’t considered a ‘bad’ Pope by the majority of the worlds Catholics. I’d argue that the distain is really where the cult of personality comes into it. When you ask someone why they don’t like the Pope, it’s always a litany of personality traits.

On the other hand, Pope Francis certainly has disdain for the United States -- look at the number of negative comments he has made about us, compared with other nations.

I happen to believe that it's precisely due to the naive ignorance of around the world of Pope Francis and his proclivities that other countries around the world see him only in a superficially positive light.

And that contrarily the reason for the disdain of Francis here in the US is precisely because we've come to know him so well through his acute attention and his abusive antics.

[peregrinator]

One of the most pernicious is the "Pachamama" claim, I have researched this extensively and what I have discovered is that the alleged statue of Pachamama, was, according to the guy sculpted it, supposed to be a statue of Mary, specifically, "Our Lord of the Amazon", who is the patron saint of the Pan-Amazon region, and any claim to the contrary is a blatant lie.

It was not "Our Lady of the Amazon" which looks like this:

ourladyoftheamazon.png

Also there isn't (or wasn't) a patron saint of the pan-Amazon region, in Brazil for example they venerate Our Lady of Nazareth and Our Lady of Aparecida.