The problem is semi-modernist JPII couldn't write Total modernist heretic Francis Amoris and Leo supports AL. Dr K can only be right if Leo recants AL, and Francis other heresies etc..: Peter Kwasniewski 13h · I think if people viewed Leo XIV as being rather like John Paul II
I think if people viewed Leo XIV as being rather like John Paul II—with all the good and the bad this implies—rather than as the long-awaited pope who will "scour the Shire," they would be a lot less disappointed, and a lot more able to roll with the punches, and even appreciate the good as it comes.
Every pope since Vatican II has been a mixed bag except for Francis (whom I don't see as a mixed bag, but as an unmixed catastrophe). All of them have promoted wonky interreligious dialoguing, for example; that is "par for the course." To express shock or horror at this is like expressing surprise that movies nowadays are usually dumb, tasteless, and offensive.
What interests me more, as someone thinking in terms of decades-long dynamics and the slow rebuilding of the Church at the grassroots level, is the tone of the pontificate, the atmosphere, the ambiance, the signaling, the kind of space opened up by the pontiff's way of managing. Let's put it this way: the moment a pope wears a nice vestment, thousands of sacristies open up across the world and nice vestments are brought out again. That small ripple effect, if it happens over and over, will have more consequence in the long run than handshakes with orange-clad Tibetan monks or whatever the meeting du jour is at the Vatican.
This may sound cynical, as if I'm downplaying or evacuating the significance of what the pope is saying/doing. Rather, I'm merely pointing out that what will be most decisive in the long run is not the easily forgotten daily agenda at the Vatican, but the sense transmitted by the pope of what can and cannot, should or should not, be done at the local level. In regard to that sphere, it's fair to say that we've already seen a bit of a positive "Leo effect," and I expect it to continue.
Even simply the relief at no longer having Fearful Francis around is enough to make some bishops relax, and some priests step up their game.
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Peter Kwasniewski
I think if people viewed Leo XIV as being rather like John Paul II—with all the good and the bad this implies—rather than as the long-awaited pope who will "scour the Shire," they would be a lot less disappointed, and a lot more able to roll with the punches, and even appreciate the good as it comes.
Every pope since Vatican II has been a mixed bag except for Francis (whom I don't see as a mixed bag, but as an unmixed catastrophe). All of them have promoted wonky interreligious dialoguing, for example; that is "par for the course." To express shock or horror at this is like expressing surprise that movies nowadays are usually dumb, tasteless, and offensive.
What interests me more, as someone thinking in terms of decades-long dynamics and the slow rebuilding of the Church at the grassroots level, is the tone of the pontificate, the atmosphere, the ambiance, the signaling, the kind of space opened up by the pontiff's way of managing. Let's put it this way: the moment a pope wears a nice vestment, thousands of sacristies open up across the world and nice vestments are brought out again. That small ripple effect, if it happens over and over, will have more consequence in the long run than handshakes with orange-clad Tibetan monks or whatever the meeting du jour is at the Vatican.
This may sound cynical, as if I'm downplaying or evacuating the significance of what the pope is saying/doing. Rather, I'm merely pointing out that what will be most decisive in the long run is not the easily forgotten daily agenda at the Vatican, but the sense transmitted by the pope of what can and cannot, should or should not, be done at the local level. In regard to that sphere, it's fair to say that we've already seen a bit of a positive "Leo effect," and I expect it to continue.
Even simply the relief at no longer having Fearful Francis around is enough to make some bishops relax, and some priests step up their game.
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