"Now traditionally these two holy conduits [i.e., the papacy and the GOP] have been on the same page. But with the ascension of this new incredibly humble washing the poor's feet, sleep on a convertible sofa, do you need a ride to the airport pope, things might be changing." Stewart also asks to whom the pope could possibly be referring, when he speaks about the obsession with abortion, contraception, and gay marriage as the sum total of what we have to talk about. And then he plays clips of GOP politicians, talking, talking, talking--abortion, abortion, abortion, contraception, gay marriage, etc.
And Andrew Sullivan keeps right on poking at the exceedingly sore spot called Francis that now makes the theocons itch and moan: Sullivan notes that George Neumayr recently wrote,
For the good of the faith, laity, clergy, bishops, and particularly powerful cardinals should start playing Paul to Francis’s Peter, as his culturally conditioned liberalism threatens to undermine the unity and orthodoxy of the faith.
To which Sullivan replies,
Bingo! The reactionaries determined to fuse Catholicism with the Republican right are rightly rattled. But note the pivot. They were only recently the relentless advocates of total obedience to papal authority. Now they’re calling for a mutiny among “laity, clergy, bishops, and particularly powerful cardinals” against the Pope. Well, at least their denial is wearing off, I suppose.
The very same folks who have loudly insisted for, oh, years now that a real and true Catholic never questions a papal statement suddenly want Pope Francis corrected by "powerful cardinals." The times, they appear to be a-changing, and how can those of us made the object of the every-papal-word-infallible rhetoric for years now not take some amusement in seeing the bouleversement?
P.S. Don't miss the valuable resource that America's editors have just posted, "A Landmark Conversation," gathering together a list of responses to Francis's interview published in America.
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