AS Catholics we have grown up to think of being Catholic as being too uniform and univocal. This was somewhat tempered by the recent Synod on the Family.<\/p>\n
There was even disquiet among bishops and cardinals that Pope Francis was insufficiently attentive to a singular view that they equated with unity.<\/p>\n
While one should give these people credit for the courage of their convictions and their preparedness to speak out, their concerns are not necessarily so grave.<\/p>\n
As the Vatican II-minded theologian Enzo Bianchi noted this week in the Rome daily, La Repubblica<\/em>, they have waged a fierce battle.<\/p>\n Bianchi, who is founder and Prior of the Ecumenical monastery of Bose in Northern Italy, said: “What is at play here is not Catholic doctrine on the indissolubility of marriage. No, it’s the pastoral dimension, his attitude towards those who make mistakes and towards contemporary society.”<\/p>\n Then he thundered: “Let’s be clear – what scandalises them is mercy!”<\/p>\n Who knows whether Pope Francis read that article last Wednesday after saying his morning prayers and before heading to his two-pronged general audience in the Paul VI Hall and Saint Peter’s Square.<\/p>\n But it did not seem to be a coincidence that, as he began to read his prepared remarks to the tens of thousands of people in the square, he put down his pages and said: “Before beginning this catechesis I would like, in the name of the Church, to ask your forgiveness for the scandals that have occurred recently both in Rome and in the Vatican. I ask your forgiveness.”<\/p>\n Pope Francis does not seem to be overly nervous about those bishops who are not entirely “on message” – that is, those who disagree with him on many issues to do with his ministry. And nor should he.<\/p>\n He is the first to say – indeed, to promote the idea – that we can accommodate a great deal of difference and diversity within the Catholic church without being worried that it will diminish the unity of the church. This is very true but it can be a new idea for some Catholics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" AS Catholics we have grown up to think of being Catholic as being too uniform and univocal. This was somewhat tempered by the recent Synod on the Family. There was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[17],"class_list":["post-1774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pastoral-messages","tag-pope"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1774","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1774"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1774\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1782,"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1774\/revisions\/1782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kmgit.com\/testbuzz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}