Pope Francis says lots of awesome things in new interview

[hey_kayla_jay]

Six months into his papacy, Pope Francis sent shock waves through the Roman Catholic church on Thursday with the publication of his remarks that the church had grown “obsessed” with abortion, gay marriage and contraception, and that he had chosen not to talk about those issues despite recriminations from critics.

His surprising comments came in a

Comments

[hinoema]

“We have to find a new balance,” the pope continued, “otherwise even the moral edifice of the church is likely to fall like a house of cards, losing the freshness and fragrance of the Gospel.”

The Catholic Church (TM), Brought to You by Febreeze!

The US Conservatives are going to shit bricks about this.

“Nobody should try to use the words of the pope to minimize the urgent need to preach and teach about abortion,” said the Rev. Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life.

I take it he's the Church version of the mustache twirling Grand Vizier.

[sephirajo]

A lot of US Conservatives already don't like us. I can't see how t his will change much when the church across the street often called us "The Church of the Whore of Babylon!" Maybe now it will be the Church of the Whore of Air Fresheners :D

And as to Rev. Pavone, you are right on about him. -__-

[redstar826]

well, Catholic conservatives do exist though. I have the misfortune of being related to some of them.

[sephirajo]

Yes they do, and they baffle the shit out of me. But you do have to make the distinction between them and Christian Conservatives, as they will often loudly point out that they are in no way the same thing at all.

[redstar826]

well, Catholics are Christians. But yes, there are differences between the Catholic conservatives and the fundamentalist Protestant ones (which I think is what you are actually getting at here), although they do come together on some of these social issues. For instance, I think Santorum drew a lot of support from conservative Protestants even though he is Catholic

[sephirajo]

We are yes, but we get told all the time that we're not. I think my favorite freak out was when my mother in law loudly screamed at me to stop worshiping the Virgin Mary lest I burn in hell and take her son with me.

Yes, Santorum did draw support from all over, I wonder how much of it would have stayed long term though as it always seems to be right there that "You're catholic! We can't have you controlled BY THE POPE!" That was a large freak out with JFK presidency, so maybe it's just another example of ultra conservative dissonance. It's OKAY when OUR GUY is one, maybe. I don't know. The right baffles me. Especially the right among my own family who tend to gleefully forget about the whole putting deeds before words and helping those who need it.

...sorry this got rambly

[redstar826]

I think some of this is shifting though, although some of this might be regional. In the Michigan where I am, intermarriage between Catholics and Protestants is pretty common and there is a lot of movement between the two groups (people raised in one church, but switch later on, often because of marriage)

I have one Catholic parent and one Protestant parent (both sides of the family being fairly conservative, although not extreme fundamentalist) so I've seen some of these discussions play out in my own family, and the general consensus seems to be "meh, we don't care-we're still all white Christians who vote Republican".

[sephirajo]

Maybe my experience has been different because I'm the whitest of my family members and I'm only white because my mom married a white guy. Since a lot of the churches I've been to have done Spanish masses and have high latin@ population, maybe what I've seen has a helping of racism on the side. There's a pleasant thought. :/