“If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?” Pope FrancisWell, dude, you are, like, "the Pope," and in the past the Pope has been in charge of Judging Central.
Not that it ever made sense.
I mean, if young men are supposed to resist the calls of their libidos, what in the world difference does it make if the call is toward women, other men, or household pets? If they do what they are supposed to do, they'll never act on it.
The stronger the libido they overcome, the more holy they are, right? It's like "degree of difficulty" as a scoring element in a diving competition. I can understand the theory. I'm here to tell you that if I had lived my entire life without touching a woman and having to apologize if I even thought about touching a woman, I would have to have had assistance from an Invisible Friend or a very creative chemist.
So, like every Jesuit I've ever known, Francis appears to actually think this stuff though. Gay priests; straight priests; no difference. You can deal with your sexual "demons" or you can't. Understanding them as demons is the heavy lift.
He has also, by his actions, made it clear in a short time that his choice of the name Francis was in fact Francis of Assisi and not Francis Xavier, repeatedly taking up for the poor in ways that embarrass the body of rich men who elected him.
The parallels to the novel I cited the day the Red Hats picked him, Vicar of Christ, get more eerie every day.
His informality and his rejection of the bulletproof Popemobile will be, if he continues on his current path, literally the death of him.
If that sounds strange, ask yourself when in history that much wealth and power has been concentrated without violence on some level? It's been a long time since violence has been the first resort in church politics, but there's a long history of it.
I will cop to thinking an American Indian might be a little more attuned to that history but, c'mon, it is what it is, and connecting political violence to the Roman Catholic Church is not my imagination.
I suppose Francis may be oblivious to danger.
His remarks about gay priests could have been lifted right out of Jesus's positions as recorded in the book of Matthew, if Jesus had ever said anything one way or the other about gay people, which he did not.
The head of the Church establishment channels the ragged revolutionary who founded the organization. Now, that will be interesting to watch.
But if he's going to seriously put Jesus's ideas forward, he'd best remember how that ended the first time, and remember the gospel according to Kris Kristofferson:
Jesus was a capricorn. He ate organic food.He believed in love and peace and never wore no shoes.
Long hair, beard and sandals and a funky bunch of friends.
Reckon they'd just nail him up if if he came down again...