WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.080 --> 00:00:02.319 I woke up this morning to the text from my 2 00:00:02.359 --> 00:00:07.360 mom that Pope Francis had passed away, and I thought, well, 3 00:00:07.839 --> 00:00:11.199 who's going to comment on this in local media as 4 00:00:11.240 --> 00:00:18.480 much as I am, Probably not too many people. I'm 5 00:00:18.480 --> 00:00:20.879 not sure how many other local radio hosts or Catholics 6 00:00:20.960 --> 00:00:23.280 or anything or have thought about Pope Francis as much 7 00:00:23.280 --> 00:00:25.800 as I have. So I want to spend the first 8 00:00:25.800 --> 00:00:30.679 part of the show talking about him and talking about 9 00:00:30.760 --> 00:00:36.439 the legacy that Francis leaves behind, which is a complicated one, 10 00:00:36.920 --> 00:00:41.520 I would say, So I want to start. I'll try 11 00:00:41.560 --> 00:00:45.079 and go through, you know, the good, the bad, and 12 00:00:45.799 --> 00:00:51.079 the indifferent. Pope Francis was elected in twenty thirteen on 13 00:00:51.159 --> 00:00:55.640 the heels of Pope Benedict and Pope Benedict the sixteenth 14 00:00:55.679 --> 00:01:01.159 had a very odd papacy, a very odd ending. Benedict 15 00:01:01.240 --> 00:01:08.799 was a giant. Joseph Ratzinger Benedict the sixteenth was a giant. 16 00:01:09.400 --> 00:01:15.120 When John Paul the second died in two thousand and five, 17 00:01:17.959 --> 00:01:22.000 and this is reported from other cardinals sort of talked 18 00:01:22.000 --> 00:01:24.120 about that papal election, and by the way, for those 19 00:01:24.120 --> 00:01:26.400 who don't know the way it works in the Catholic churches, 20 00:01:26.879 --> 00:01:32.760 when a pope dies, this group of bishops, called the 21 00:01:32.799 --> 00:01:40.480 College of Cardinals, gets together. Cardinals are sort of form 22 00:01:41.040 --> 00:01:44.599 in name, they are the clergy of the city of Rome, 23 00:01:44.799 --> 00:01:48.799 and they are there to elect the new Bishop of Rome, 24 00:01:48.959 --> 00:01:55.719 the person who succeeds Saint Peter. Now, in practice, the 25 00:01:55.760 --> 00:02:00.319 cardinals are usually senior archbishops from big cities all over 26 00:02:00.319 --> 00:02:02.760 the world, and then a couple of archbishops who work 27 00:02:03.200 --> 00:02:06.400 directly in Rome and directly help the pope in the 28 00:02:06.439 --> 00:02:09.879 administration of the church. So you have cardinals in what's 29 00:02:09.919 --> 00:02:12.719 called the Roman Curia, cardinals who live in Rome and 30 00:02:12.759 --> 00:02:16.680 help the pope, and then cardinals who are bishop archbishops 31 00:02:16.680 --> 00:02:20.599 of big cities all over the world. Cardinal Dolan is 32 00:02:20.639 --> 00:02:24.599 the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Soupitch is the Archbishop 33 00:02:24.639 --> 00:02:34.639 of Chicago, Cardinal McElroy is the Archbishop of Washington, d c. Etc. So, 34 00:02:36.280 --> 00:02:39.520 And sometimes a pope will be picked from some random 35 00:02:39.560 --> 00:02:42.479 city where he's an archbishop. Pope Francis was like that. 36 00:02:42.599 --> 00:02:49.120 He had been the archbishop of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Pope Benedict, 37 00:02:49.199 --> 00:02:51.800 on the other hand, was a pope who worked in 38 00:02:51.840 --> 00:02:54.560 the Roman Curia and he directly assisted John Paul the 39 00:02:54.639 --> 00:02:57.080 Second for about twenty five years before he was Pope. 40 00:02:57.280 --> 00:03:02.240 Benedict was a giant. I think we can't understand sort 41 00:03:02.280 --> 00:03:07.039 of the the change of what Francis's papacy represented without 42 00:03:07.120 --> 00:03:10.280 understanding Pope Benedict and Pope John Paul the Second before him. 43 00:03:10.319 --> 00:03:18.439 Both John Paul and Benedict were intellectual giants. John Paul 44 00:03:18.479 --> 00:03:25.240 the Second was a giant in the fields, especially of 45 00:03:25.360 --> 00:03:34.919 moral theology and ethics. Pope Benedict was a giant of 46 00:03:35.680 --> 00:03:40.000 theology in general, systematic theology. The two men put together 47 00:03:40.199 --> 00:03:44.280 probably wrote like eighty books between each other. I don't 48 00:03:44.280 --> 00:03:49.159 think I'm exaggerating. I know Pope Benedict had written like 49 00:03:49.199 --> 00:03:54.280 forty books like before he was elected pope. He was 50 00:03:54.319 --> 00:03:57.240 one of the foremost theologians in the world. Pope Benedict 51 00:03:57.360 --> 00:04:01.800 was before he was elected pope. And when John Paul 52 00:04:01.800 --> 00:04:05.199 the Second died, the cardinals I think they were like, well, 53 00:04:05.479 --> 00:04:09.639 we have an obvious choice. Do we pick Ratzinger, Joseph 54 00:04:09.680 --> 00:04:12.960 Ratzinger Benedict the sixteenth, or do we pick somebody else? 55 00:04:14.879 --> 00:04:17.439 That was the obvious. It was the gorilla in the room. 56 00:04:17.759 --> 00:04:19.800 It was the elephant in the room. Okay, well, he 57 00:04:20.160 --> 00:04:26.000 is obviously the one singular person. Because Pope Benedict had 58 00:04:26.000 --> 00:04:28.319 worked directly with John Paul the Second, he had one 59 00:04:28.360 --> 00:04:33.319 of the most important roles within the Roman Curia, where 60 00:04:33.360 --> 00:04:39.480 he was overseeing doctrinal questions and helping continue to explain 61 00:04:39.600 --> 00:04:44.000 and defend the Catholic faith, including in very specific ethical 62 00:04:44.079 --> 00:04:47.680 questions that would come before the church dealing with disciplinary things. 63 00:04:47.720 --> 00:04:51.839 Pope Bennett. It was Pope Benedict, both as Joseph Ratzinger 64 00:04:51.879 --> 00:04:54.000 the Cardinal and then as Pope Benedict, that I think 65 00:04:54.759 --> 00:04:58.040 did every every good thing that the Catholic Church did 66 00:04:58.079 --> 00:05:01.480 in response to the revelations about sex abuse crisis, the 67 00:05:01.519 --> 00:05:05.279 crises in the church. All of that, much of that, anyway, 68 00:05:06.079 --> 00:05:09.680 was Joseph Ratzinger's work, both as a cardinal and then 69 00:05:09.759 --> 00:05:15.879 as Pope, including ways in which John Paul the Second 70 00:05:15.959 --> 00:05:23.639 I think failed to act. There's some evidence that John 71 00:05:23.680 --> 00:05:25.720 Paul the Second a lot of the sex abuse stuff 72 00:05:25.920 --> 00:05:28.680 broke when John Paul the Second was very, very elderly 73 00:05:28.800 --> 00:05:33.439 and had, you know, very advanced Parkinson's disease, and that 74 00:05:33.519 --> 00:05:38.040 he was slow to believe reports different kinds of reports 75 00:05:38.040 --> 00:05:41.680 of clergy sex abuse coming from the perspective of having 76 00:05:41.759 --> 00:05:46.480 grown up in communist controlled Poland, where the communist authorities, 77 00:05:46.560 --> 00:05:52.959 if they wanted to sort of detract from the moral 78 00:05:53.040 --> 00:05:56.279 authority of leaders in the church, would accuse them of 79 00:05:56.319 --> 00:05:59.399 various forms of sexual impropriety without any basis. They would 80 00:05:59.439 --> 00:06:02.800 just lie about church leaders sorted to undermine their standing 81 00:06:02.839 --> 00:06:06.800 with the people. So JP two, Saint John Paul the 82 00:06:06.800 --> 00:06:10.040 Second was kind of not always very swift, to believe it, 83 00:06:10.160 --> 00:06:14.279 and Benedict, when he came in in two thousand and five, 84 00:06:14.360 --> 00:06:18.279 immediately took swift action to correct all these things. Benedict 85 00:06:18.360 --> 00:06:21.279 was helping bring the Church out of really what was 86 00:06:21.319 --> 00:06:25.759 a very low point in the seventies. You had this 87 00:06:25.920 --> 00:06:30.000 very low point following what's called the Second Vatican Council. 88 00:06:30.079 --> 00:06:31.839 This was a gathering of all the world's bishops that 89 00:06:31.839 --> 00:06:34.480 happened in the nineteen sixties that resulted in a lot 90 00:06:34.519 --> 00:06:39.160 of changes in sort of the way in which the 91 00:06:39.240 --> 00:06:41.560 church worshiped, the way in which the Church was sort 92 00:06:41.560 --> 00:06:45.560 of presenting its teaching to the world, and a lot 93 00:06:45.560 --> 00:06:52.319 of bad outcomes came after the Second Vatican Council. People 94 00:06:52.560 --> 00:06:56.319 argue furiously about whether Vatican Two caused all the bad outcomes. 95 00:06:56.319 --> 00:06:58.720 But for example, we see in the United States a 96 00:06:58.759 --> 00:07:01.439 huge percentage of American athletics just stopped going to church. 97 00:07:02.879 --> 00:07:04.879 People did not like a lot of the things that 98 00:07:05.000 --> 00:07:07.480 changed in the church Following the Second Patican Council, Mass 99 00:07:07.480 --> 00:07:11.560 attendants dropped worldwide. Priestly ordinations, which is usually a pretty 100 00:07:11.600 --> 00:07:16.439 good indicator of the vitality of Catholicism, dropped enormously. And 101 00:07:16.480 --> 00:07:19.879 so John Paul the Second had this herculean task of, 102 00:07:20.319 --> 00:07:25.600 you know, cleaning out the stables of a church that 103 00:07:25.720 --> 00:07:31.519 was riddled with bishops who were extremely liberal, and he 104 00:07:31.600 --> 00:07:36.279 and Pote Benedict, I think helped with sort of this 105 00:07:36.399 --> 00:07:40.240 worldwide revitalization of the global body of bishops. I think 106 00:07:40.279 --> 00:07:44.160 bishops today and priests today are on the whole far 107 00:07:44.279 --> 00:07:50.879 better than they were thirty years ago. So you had 108 00:07:50.920 --> 00:07:56.000 these two men who were giants, intellectual giants. Benedict, who 109 00:07:56.160 --> 00:07:59.600 was always had this sort of reputation in the media 110 00:08:00.199 --> 00:08:04.240 God's Rottweiler, and because he was German, no he was, 111 00:08:05.600 --> 00:08:10.879 But in reality Pope Benedict was actually this bookish, very 112 00:08:11.000 --> 00:08:17.199 gentle man who was very kind and went about his 113 00:08:17.279 --> 00:08:21.040 work as pope with enormous genuine humility, I would say 114 00:08:21.480 --> 00:08:24.959 so so much humility that Benedict in twenty thirteen becomes 115 00:08:25.040 --> 00:08:30.040 the first pope in like four hundred years to resign 116 00:08:30.439 --> 00:08:37.120 the office. He just resigned. Almost every pope prior to 117 00:08:37.159 --> 00:08:45.559 Pope Benedict died in office. Now a lot of that is, 118 00:08:45.600 --> 00:08:47.960 you know, people didn't live as long in the you know, 119 00:08:48.039 --> 00:08:52.279 prior to I don't know twentieth century, twenty first century medicine. 120 00:08:53.120 --> 00:08:57.120 But Pope Benedict just decided he was going to resign. 121 00:08:57.840 --> 00:09:00.840 And I think part of it was he under John 122 00:09:00.879 --> 00:09:06.960 Paul the second the way that you know, JP two 123 00:09:07.039 --> 00:09:11.679 had this very long, extended period of convalesce of illness 124 00:09:11.960 --> 00:09:14.840 with his Parkinson's and I think Paul Benedict thought it 125 00:09:14.879 --> 00:09:17.440 wasn't good for the governance of the church to have 126 00:09:17.480 --> 00:09:20.480 a pope who was you know, was he at a commission? 127 00:09:20.720 --> 00:09:23.480 Was he completely out of commission? And I think Benedict 128 00:09:23.480 --> 00:09:28.039 just didn't want that. So in twenty thirteen he just 129 00:09:28.399 --> 00:09:32.559 resigned and a very different pope got elected after him, 130 00:09:32.919 --> 00:09:39.559 Pope Francis Jorge Mario Bergoglio. Uh. There's apparently a Roman 131 00:09:39.639 --> 00:09:44.159 saying after a fat pope a thin pope, which it's 132 00:09:44.200 --> 00:09:49.240 not literal necessarily, it just means every pope's different. You 133 00:09:49.320 --> 00:09:52.440 know what, You get something very different every time you 134 00:09:52.480 --> 00:09:58.360 elect a new pope, and Cardinal Bergoglio was certainly different. 135 00:09:59.559 --> 00:10:04.759 He didn't have the kind of intellectual standing that Pope 136 00:10:04.799 --> 00:10:09.960 Benedict had. I don't think even he would argue. He 137 00:10:10.000 --> 00:10:12.720 wouldn't argue that. I think even he would acknowledge Pope 138 00:10:12.720 --> 00:10:16.039 Benedict was was a far more important thinker and a 139 00:10:16.080 --> 00:10:23.799 more a far more important theologian, et cetera. And he 140 00:10:24.000 --> 00:10:27.159 clearly had certain things he really wanted to do that 141 00:10:27.320 --> 00:10:31.159 I think were quite unsuccessful and led to sort of 142 00:10:31.320 --> 00:10:37.200 a muddled magisterium. As we call it in the Catholic Church. 143 00:10:37.279 --> 00:10:43.639 The magisterium means the teaching, the deposit of what you taught. Okay, 144 00:10:44.759 --> 00:10:49.679 comes from the Latin word magister, which means teacher or maestro. 145 00:10:49.960 --> 00:10:55.759 You know, maestro comes from magister or master. Pope Francis's 146 00:10:55.919 --> 00:11:04.240 magisterium was complicated and not sitting very comfortably within the 147 00:11:04.279 --> 00:11:07.840 broader body of Catholic tradition, particularly in the area of 148 00:11:07.879 --> 00:11:12.159 sexual ethics. In the area of sexual ethics, Pope Francis 149 00:11:12.159 --> 00:11:18.919 had a document called Amoris Letitia the Joy of love 150 00:11:19.559 --> 00:11:24.759 is what it means. Some people rudely joke that as 151 00:11:25.240 --> 00:11:28.679 so the way that when a pope issues a teaching document, 152 00:11:29.159 --> 00:11:31.120 the title of the document is always just like the 153 00:11:31.159 --> 00:11:36.879 first few words of the document. So amoris leticia means 154 00:11:36.919 --> 00:11:39.840 the joy of love. However, there are different ways of 155 00:11:39.840 --> 00:11:46.279 translating amour and leatiticia. Some rude commenters said, oh, doesn't 156 00:11:46.320 --> 00:11:51.519 mean the pleasure of sex. Okay, Now, that was basically 157 00:11:51.519 --> 00:11:54.159 what this document did. It was talking about the situation 158 00:11:54.240 --> 00:11:58.639 of people who are divorced and remarried. In Catholicism, our 159 00:11:58.919 --> 00:12:01.360 teaching is that marriage is life long and we don't 160 00:12:01.519 --> 00:12:05.879 respect divorce and remarriage. The only way one can get 161 00:12:05.879 --> 00:12:09.799 divorced within the Catholic concept is if there's a determination 162 00:12:09.879 --> 00:12:12.679 that your original marriage was never valid to begin with. 163 00:12:12.759 --> 00:12:17.000 If one can have a declaration of nullity that your 164 00:12:17.080 --> 00:12:22.200 original marriage was null and void. For some reason, there 165 00:12:22.200 --> 00:12:24.080 were a lot of people agitating for the idea that 166 00:12:24.159 --> 00:12:27.879 people who are divorced and remarried and never had any 167 00:12:27.879 --> 00:12:32.240 sort of declaration that their first marriage was null, that 168 00:12:32.240 --> 00:12:36.000 they should be allowed to receive Holy communion. Holy communion 169 00:12:36.039 --> 00:12:38.639 the Catholic sacrament of the Eucharist, which we believe is 170 00:12:38.679 --> 00:12:42.080 the body and blood of Christ. Pope Francis, in this 171 00:12:42.200 --> 00:12:48.039 document Memoris Letitia gave this sort of ambiguous footnote saying, 172 00:12:48.279 --> 00:12:52.360 maybe there are circumstances where people can receive Holy Communion 173 00:12:52.399 --> 00:12:56.720 if they're divorced and remarried, and it just doesn't sit 174 00:12:57.039 --> 00:13:00.960 very well within the broader body of Catholic moral theology, 175 00:13:01.000 --> 00:13:04.559 particularly the moral theology of John Paul the Second. And 176 00:13:04.600 --> 00:13:07.240 it's clear with something that very liberal bishops were pushing 177 00:13:07.320 --> 00:13:10.799 him to allow, pushing, pushing, pushing him to allow, and 178 00:13:11.200 --> 00:13:13.639 it just sort of sat there like this sort of 179 00:13:13.759 --> 00:13:22.120 awkward It's a square peg in a round hole. Similarly, 180 00:13:24.000 --> 00:13:26.919 in the area of church discipline, Pope Francis very famously 181 00:13:27.639 --> 00:13:34.799 decided in twenty twenty one to undo the various permissions 182 00:13:34.799 --> 00:13:41.000 that Pope Benedict had provided for priests to offer the 183 00:13:41.120 --> 00:13:46.039 older right of the Catholic Mass, the traditional Latin Mass. 184 00:13:46.799 --> 00:13:50.320 Now you can so, Pope Benedict had said, every priest 185 00:13:50.399 --> 00:13:52.600 in the world can offer this older form of mass, 186 00:13:52.679 --> 00:13:55.799 the form of Mass that existed prior to the nineteen sixties. 187 00:13:55.960 --> 00:13:58.960 There's nothing harmful about it. A lot of people like it. 188 00:13:58.960 --> 00:14:01.120 It allowed to have it continued to be a part 189 00:14:01.159 --> 00:14:03.240 of the Church's life, allows us to have a connection 190 00:14:03.360 --> 00:14:06.600 with our history. There's nothing harmful about it. And Pope 191 00:14:06.600 --> 00:14:10.320 Francis said, no, we're not doing that, and he very 192 00:14:10.440 --> 00:14:15.480 largely restricted how and when and who could offer this 193 00:14:16.039 --> 00:14:20.000 form of the Catholic Mass in a way that was 194 00:14:20.159 --> 00:14:23.320 very unpopular I think with many many bishops throughout the world. 195 00:14:23.399 --> 00:14:25.639 In fact, many many bishops throughout the world just basically 196 00:14:26.480 --> 00:14:32.440 sort of ignored it and thought it was an unworkable 197 00:14:32.559 --> 00:14:37.360 micromanaging system, Like priests had to personally write to Rome 198 00:14:37.399 --> 00:14:39.360 to ask if they could have permission off from Mass 199 00:14:39.399 --> 00:14:43.159 once or something. Bishops would have to write Rome, hey, 200 00:14:43.200 --> 00:14:46.000 can we allow one Latin Mass to happen at Saint 201 00:14:46.039 --> 00:14:49.600 Peter's parish in Valparaiso, Indiana, or you know, something like that, 202 00:14:51.720 --> 00:14:53.519 And again it seemed like it was something that was 203 00:14:53.600 --> 00:14:57.240 driven by left wing ideologues within the Vatican who hated 204 00:14:57.360 --> 00:15:01.879 the old Mass who I don't know why. I guess 205 00:15:01.879 --> 00:15:04.399 they wanted the modern right of Mass to be this 206 00:15:04.480 --> 00:15:07.840 sort of whole theological revolution that completely changes what we 207 00:15:07.879 --> 00:15:13.720 believe as Catholics, which is not what the modern right 208 00:15:13.799 --> 00:15:17.799 of Mass should be. I would hope that the Catholic 209 00:15:17.879 --> 00:15:21.320 faith is the same today as it was one hundred 210 00:15:21.360 --> 00:15:23.080 years ago, as it once two hundred years ago, as 211 00:15:23.120 --> 00:15:24.559 it was three hundred years ago, as it was two 212 00:15:24.600 --> 00:15:27.200 thousand years ago. I mean, that's genuinely what I believe. 213 00:15:32.120 --> 00:15:37.039 So he has also, in various ways antagonized different groups. 214 00:15:37.360 --> 00:15:41.039 One of the big ways in which one of the 215 00:15:41.039 --> 00:15:43.360 big reasons Pope Francis was elected was this idea that 216 00:15:43.399 --> 00:15:49.120 he would reform the Roman Curia, that basically the apparatus 217 00:15:49.200 --> 00:15:52.960 of bishops and priests who help the Pope in the Vatican, 218 00:15:53.720 --> 00:15:55.960 to reform the way in which that works. There had 219 00:15:55.960 --> 00:15:59.159 been a scandal of someone leaking the pope's private documents 220 00:15:59.240 --> 00:16:04.159 under Pope Benedict, and I think it's a mixed bag 221 00:16:04.200 --> 00:16:06.879 of whether people think Pote Francis actually accomplished that there 222 00:16:06.919 --> 00:16:10.399 was this desire to reform the financial state of the Vatican. 223 00:16:10.639 --> 00:16:13.840 At first, Pote Francis appointed Cardinal George Pell from Australia 224 00:16:13.919 --> 00:16:18.039 to do all kinds of auditing work. Cardinal Pell was 225 00:16:18.039 --> 00:16:22.879 getting somewhere, and then Cardinal Pell gets sidelined. Cardinal Pell 226 00:16:23.000 --> 00:16:26.480 was hit with one of the most patently ridiculous claims 227 00:16:26.519 --> 00:16:28.960 of sex abuse, and I genuinely mean that. I think 228 00:16:29.000 --> 00:16:32.159 his claim was ridiculous, and he was ultimately vindicated in 229 00:16:32.200 --> 00:16:35.000 court and the court found that unanimously. No, he did 230 00:16:35.080 --> 00:16:37.840 not engage in that, but it derailed his I think 231 00:16:37.879 --> 00:16:41.960 really excellent efforts to help with an audit of Vatican finances, 232 00:16:42.759 --> 00:16:45.240 and the Vatican is in terrible financial shape right now. 233 00:16:48.639 --> 00:16:52.080 But Francis also did some good things. He issued an 234 00:16:52.399 --> 00:16:58.360 excellent document that was very clear, called Dignitas Infinita, which 235 00:17:00.120 --> 00:17:03.919 very clearly and concisely condemned gender ideology and all of 236 00:17:03.960 --> 00:17:10.440 its expressions, transgenderism, gener is, transgender, all the whole panoply 237 00:17:10.480 --> 00:17:15.240 of transgender issues. However, about six months prior to that, 238 00:17:16.279 --> 00:17:19.599 he had ordered one of his new cardinal appointees, an 239 00:17:19.640 --> 00:17:22.000 appointee that a lot of people, a lot of bishops, 240 00:17:22.160 --> 00:17:25.680 were not thrilled about, to issue some document about the 241 00:17:25.759 --> 00:17:32.880 possibility of blessing gay persons, blessing gay couples, not not 242 00:17:33.000 --> 00:17:38.359 their union, but the couple, the two of gay people together, 243 00:17:38.920 --> 00:17:42.079 which seemed like it was an attempt again by left 244 00:17:42.079 --> 00:17:45.200 wing theologians who want gay marriage to be recognized by 245 00:17:45.200 --> 00:17:48.160 the Church and want some sort of halfway house in 246 00:17:48.480 --> 00:17:51.799 to say, oh, well, priests can give blessings to gay couples. 247 00:17:52.319 --> 00:17:56.680 And after that document was issued by the Vatican, there 248 00:17:56.759 --> 00:18:01.240 was a total uproar. The bishops of Africa said, abso 249 00:18:02.039 --> 00:18:05.000 flippin' we're not even sure what this is saying, but 250 00:18:05.079 --> 00:18:08.079 we are absolutely not doing this, and both Francis pretty 251 00:18:08.160 --> 00:18:14.160 much totally backed down. And I think that this might 252 00:18:14.200 --> 00:18:17.359 be the legacy that I don't know how successful to 253 00:18:17.400 --> 00:18:24.640 France's papacy was. I think in comparison to the giants 254 00:18:24.640 --> 00:18:27.599 that were John Paul the Second and Benedict the sixteenth, 255 00:18:27.680 --> 00:18:31.759 I don't know that Francis will stand at their levels. 256 00:18:33.640 --> 00:18:37.000 It's not to say he's a terrible person. I think 257 00:18:37.000 --> 00:18:40.559 he wanted to reach out to people he viewed his marginalized, 258 00:18:40.599 --> 00:18:43.000 divorced and remarried people, to have them feel like they're 259 00:18:43.039 --> 00:18:47.400 part of the church in some way, people who have 260 00:18:47.480 --> 00:18:49.839 same sex attraction but want to be part of the church. 261 00:18:49.839 --> 00:18:53.000 He wanted them to people he viewed as put upon, 262 00:18:53.079 --> 00:18:57.240 like migrants. He wanted to express care for them. But 263 00:18:57.359 --> 00:19:01.279 in so doing, I think he just wasn't the clearest 264 00:19:01.559 --> 00:19:07.960 kind of moral theology, ethics thinker, and so I think 265 00:19:08.000 --> 00:19:14.720 his papacy sits in this very awkward place historically, and 266 00:19:14.799 --> 00:19:16.680 a lot will be determined by the next pote when 267 00:19:16.680 --> 00:19:18.519 we return. More thoughts on Pope Francis. This is the 268 00:19:18.599 --> 00:19:22.720 John Gerardy show on Power Talk. You know. One last 269 00:19:22.720 --> 00:19:25.599 thought on Pope Francis. One of the big aspects of 270 00:19:25.640 --> 00:19:29.119 his papacy that he pushed and again is a thing 271 00:19:29.160 --> 00:19:35.000 where it's unclear how stable this will be, was his 272 00:19:35.119 --> 00:19:40.119 idea of quote synodality. Throughout the Francis papacy, he would 273 00:19:40.200 --> 00:19:46.799 hold these things called synods s yno d synod, which 274 00:19:46.880 --> 00:19:49.440 was basically a gathering of a group of the world's 275 00:19:49.440 --> 00:19:54.759 bishops to discuss something or other. Pope Benedict had done these, 276 00:19:54.799 --> 00:19:57.000 but John Paul the Second had done these synods every 277 00:19:57.039 --> 00:19:59.799 couple of years. That was basically a gathering of bishops 278 00:19:59.799 --> 00:20:03.480 to talk about some specific topic. They would meet, they 279 00:20:03.480 --> 00:20:06.519 would talk, they would issue some document, and the Pope 280 00:20:06.519 --> 00:20:10.480 would have a document that he wrote after the fact, 281 00:20:11.640 --> 00:20:13.920 and it was usually very low stakes. You know, no 282 00:20:13.960 --> 00:20:19.000 one was really too hyped up about them. Francis's synods were, 283 00:20:20.279 --> 00:20:23.319 especially early in his papacy, the subject of huge scrutiny, 284 00:20:23.400 --> 00:20:25.759 huge media attention, he had a whole senate about this 285 00:20:25.920 --> 00:20:31.079 idea of persons who are divorced and remarried and whether 286 00:20:31.079 --> 00:20:33.400 they should receive communion, and people yelling at each other 287 00:20:33.480 --> 00:20:36.880 during the Senate, and manipulation of the process to make 288 00:20:36.960 --> 00:20:40.359 sure that talk about divorce and remarried people was in 289 00:20:40.359 --> 00:20:42.759 the final document, and changing the rules of the last 290 00:20:42.839 --> 00:20:45.599 all kinds of intrigue and stuff like that, And eventually 291 00:20:45.759 --> 00:20:49.759 Pope Francis kept doing these synods where every basically every 292 00:20:49.759 --> 00:20:52.359 liberal in the Church was trying to use these synods 293 00:20:52.400 --> 00:20:58.359 as some forum for instituting some new liberal desired outcome, 294 00:20:59.680 --> 00:21:02.559 to the point where Pope Francis had a I'm not 295 00:21:02.640 --> 00:21:09.519 making this up a synod on synodality where we were 296 00:21:09.559 --> 00:21:12.640 talking about the process of having synods in the church 297 00:21:12.680 --> 00:21:15.119 and how important it is this thing that is is 298 00:21:15.160 --> 00:21:18.559 not really an essential thing, that we Catholics don't even 299 00:21:18.599 --> 00:21:25.319 think it's an essential thing. So and I think the 300 00:21:25.359 --> 00:21:28.079 response of a lot of bishops throughout the world to 301 00:21:28.160 --> 00:21:34.480 it has been not a ton of enthusiasm that this 302 00:21:34.559 --> 00:21:38.680 is the greatest idea in the world. So it's another 303 00:21:38.960 --> 00:21:42.640 thing where if a new pope is elected who is 304 00:21:42.920 --> 00:21:49.000 not crazy about such an idea does it all go away? 305 00:21:49.039 --> 00:21:52.839 I mean, it was this huge cornerstone project of Francis's 306 00:21:53.039 --> 00:21:58.039 entire papacy, but it's not clear to me how popular 307 00:21:58.119 --> 00:22:02.480 it really is among the broader body of bishops. And ultimately, 308 00:22:02.519 --> 00:22:05.200 over time the synods became more and more sort of 309 00:22:05.279 --> 00:22:08.519 moderating because well, you have to have African bishops there, 310 00:22:08.519 --> 00:22:11.119 and god knows they're they're all a bunch of right wingers. 311 00:22:12.880 --> 00:22:18.839 They don't want any big changes. So anyway, I thought 312 00:22:18.880 --> 00:22:22.799 it was it's interesting the way in which you have 313 00:22:22.920 --> 00:22:25.920 these cardinals. While Francis is alive, you have these cardinals. Oh, 314 00:22:26.119 --> 00:22:29.599 the citidelity is an essential feature of the Catholic Church, 315 00:22:29.640 --> 00:22:32.599 and it's here. Well, you know, one pope dies and 316 00:22:32.640 --> 00:22:36.279 that can change, and it will be very interesting to see. 317 00:22:36.279 --> 00:22:38.039 All Right, when we return, I'm going to talk about 318 00:22:38.119 --> 00:22:41.200 some of the guys who might be elected the next pope. 319 00:22:41.319 --> 00:22:46.400 We'll see that's next on the John Girardi Show. All right, 320 00:22:46.519 --> 00:22:52.319 I'm going to go through a list of cardinals who 321 00:22:52.400 --> 00:22:55.440 might be elected the next pope. All right, Now, there 322 00:22:55.519 --> 00:22:59.039 is no guarantee that anyone on this list is in 323 00:22:59.119 --> 00:23:07.799 fact going to be elected pope. One of the funny 324 00:23:07.799 --> 00:23:10.440 things about the process of papal elections. So the way 325 00:23:10.480 --> 00:23:18.559 it works, the cardinals are, for the most part, senior 326 00:23:18.680 --> 00:23:22.960 bishops who run big cities. Who are the bishops administering 327 00:23:23.079 --> 00:23:27.480 a large diocese as we call it, basically the unit 328 00:23:27.480 --> 00:23:30.440 of organization that oversees all the churches of a city 329 00:23:30.559 --> 00:23:33.079 or a region. So for example, Bishop Brennan is the 330 00:23:33.079 --> 00:23:36.960 Bishop of Fresno, which includes everything from Livingston up north 331 00:23:37.039 --> 00:23:42.240 to Bishop in the South, Okay and Barstow. So you 332 00:23:42.279 --> 00:23:44.240 have two kinds of cardinals. You have cardinals who are 333 00:23:44.279 --> 00:23:48.640 senior archbishops in big cities around the world. So for example, 334 00:23:48.680 --> 00:23:51.119 the Archbishop of New York is a cardinal. The Archbishop 335 00:23:51.160 --> 00:23:53.480 of Chicago is a cardinal. The Archbishop of Washington, d C. 336 00:23:53.680 --> 00:23:57.720 Is a cardinal. I think Houston has a cardinal. Los 337 00:23:57.759 --> 00:23:59.759 Angeles had a cardinal for years, but for some reason 338 00:24:00.079 --> 00:24:06.000 Francis never made Archbishop Gomez a cardinal. And then you 339 00:24:06.079 --> 00:24:09.400 have some cardinals who work directly in the Vatican, live 340 00:24:09.440 --> 00:24:13.160 in Rome and they assist the pope. So there are 341 00:24:13.160 --> 00:24:15.599 two hundred and fifty two cardinals in the Catholic Church. 342 00:24:17.960 --> 00:24:20.519 You only get to vote if you're under age eighty. 343 00:24:21.079 --> 00:24:22.960 I forget if the line is when you turn eighty 344 00:24:23.000 --> 00:24:26.039 you become ineligible or when you turn eighty one. But anyway, 345 00:24:26.319 --> 00:24:27.880 of the two hundred and fifty two cardinals in the 346 00:24:27.920 --> 00:24:29.880 Catholic Church, one hundred and thirty five of them are 347 00:24:29.920 --> 00:24:39.000 eligible to vote. So the Pope is almost certainly going 348 00:24:39.079 --> 00:24:41.160 to be picked from that group of one hundred and 349 00:24:41.160 --> 00:24:45.079 thirty five cardinals who are of voting age. Presumably you 350 00:24:45.079 --> 00:24:47.359 don't want to elect a pope who's over the age 351 00:24:47.359 --> 00:24:54.119 of eighty, So that's the group. So how old is 352 00:24:54.160 --> 00:25:00.680 the pope going to be? Probably about seventy that's my guess. 353 00:25:01.200 --> 00:25:06.839 Maybe late sixties, early seventies. The last two popes have 354 00:25:06.960 --> 00:25:09.920 been actually a good bit older than that. Pope Benedict 355 00:25:10.000 --> 00:25:12.279 was seventy eight when he was elected Pope. Pope Francis 356 00:25:12.359 --> 00:25:15.880 was seventy seven when he was elected. Pope. Popes live 357 00:25:15.880 --> 00:25:20.680 a lot longer now than they used to, So you 358 00:25:20.759 --> 00:25:22.519 might have a pope then I might be a little 359 00:25:22.519 --> 00:25:29.720 too early, maybe a pope around age seventy five. So 360 00:25:30.839 --> 00:25:32.319 and part of that is I don't know that the 361 00:25:32.359 --> 00:25:34.400 cardinals are crazy about the idea of a twenty eight 362 00:25:34.480 --> 00:25:37.680 year long a thirty year long papacy. John Paul the 363 00:25:37.720 --> 00:25:40.319 Second was a real outlier. He was only I think 364 00:25:40.319 --> 00:25:42.400 he was like fifty eight or fifty nine when he 365 00:25:42.440 --> 00:25:45.559 was elected pope, and you know, consequently he wound up 366 00:25:45.599 --> 00:25:48.599 serving nineteen seventy eight to two thousand and five, so 367 00:25:48.599 --> 00:25:55.039 I think about twenty seven years. It's not clear that 368 00:25:55.079 --> 00:25:57.519 the pope that the cardinals want another pope who's going 369 00:25:57.599 --> 00:26:00.720 to live that long, So probably you'll get a pope 370 00:26:00.720 --> 00:26:04.039 a little older. The funny thing is that literally any 371 00:26:04.720 --> 00:26:09.279 single Catholic man can be elected pope, and it's happened 372 00:26:09.279 --> 00:26:12.480 before that someone who wasn't even a priest got elected pope. 373 00:26:12.480 --> 00:26:14.920 Mostly that happened in like you know, the Middle Ages 374 00:26:14.960 --> 00:26:17.880 and stuff, and then the guy would be ordained a priest, 375 00:26:17.920 --> 00:26:20.640 and then ordained a bishop and then made a pope. 376 00:26:20.880 --> 00:26:24.720 But in all likelihood, one of the one hundred and 377 00:26:24.720 --> 00:26:27.440 thirty five cardinals who are picked to elect the pope 378 00:26:27.599 --> 00:26:31.160 will be chosen as the next pope. So I have 379 00:26:31.279 --> 00:26:34.960 here a list. I don't know who published this stupid thing, 380 00:26:35.200 --> 00:26:39.000 but it's there's one name on it that's completely stupid, 381 00:26:39.759 --> 00:26:41.720 but the others make sense. So I'm going to use 382 00:26:41.759 --> 00:26:45.880 this list as sort of who do people think are 383 00:26:45.920 --> 00:26:51.079 the leading candidates to be the next Pope. I'll give 384 00:26:51.079 --> 00:26:52.519 you some of their names and a little bit of 385 00:26:52.559 --> 00:26:56.240 their backgrounds. So the first name on the list is stupid. 386 00:26:56.680 --> 00:27:00.759 It's Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco, whom I really like. He's the 387 00:27:00.799 --> 00:27:04.720 former Archbishop of Genoa, Italy. He's a great man and 388 00:27:04.839 --> 00:27:06.920 it would I think would have been a great pope 389 00:27:07.519 --> 00:27:09.839 in prior years. The problem is he's eighty two years old. 390 00:27:10.000 --> 00:27:12.000 I don't know who put this list together. Probably they're 391 00:27:12.079 --> 00:27:16.200 sort of Italian centric, and Cardinal Bandangasco's a very significant 392 00:27:16.240 --> 00:27:20.039 figure in Italian catholic in the world of Italian Catholicism, 393 00:27:20.680 --> 00:27:22.480 but he's eighty two years old. He can't even vote 394 00:27:22.519 --> 00:27:25.599 for Pope let alone. I highly doubt he's going to 395 00:27:25.680 --> 00:27:30.440 be elected Pope, so that's probably not happening all right. 396 00:27:33.519 --> 00:27:40.359 Cardinal Matteo Zupi Cardinal Zupi is currently the Archbishop of 397 00:27:40.519 --> 00:27:45.119 Bologna in Italy. He had been an auxiliary bishop of 398 00:27:45.160 --> 00:27:48.720 the City of Rome before that. He's very close to 399 00:27:48.720 --> 00:27:52.759 Pope Francis. Francis has utilized him as his personal envoy 400 00:27:53.759 --> 00:27:58.599 to Ukraine for trying to help broker different peace talks 401 00:27:58.799 --> 00:28:04.400