Read this:
The Vatican felt compelled on Tuesday to deny that Pope Francis had "abolished sin", after a well-known Italian intellectual wrote that he had effectively done so through his words and gestures.
The singular exchange began on Sunday when Eugenio Scalfari, an atheist who writes opinion pieces for the left-leaning La Repubblica newspaper, published an article titled "Francis' Revolution: He has abolished sin".
Scalfari, who held a long private conversation with the pope earlier this year and wrote about it several times, concluded in the complex, treatise-like article that Francis believed sin effectively no longer existed because God's mercy and forgiveness were "eternal".
Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi told Vatican Radio that "this affirmation that the pope has abolished sin" was wrong.
"Those who really follow the pope daily know how many times he has spoken about sin and our (human) condition as sinners," Lombardi said.
Now read it again. Really.
We've mentioned before Mr. Scalfari's problems with truth. Consider how much drool the secular world has expended wanting this kind of stuff to be factual. The very idea that anyone would even contemplate a pope "abolishing sin" demonstrates just how far the Father of Lies has sunk his teeth into the world. That, or how stupid media types can be. Or maybe a little of both.
Still, how far have the guardians of the Magisterium fallen when people who would suggest that sin was abolished can even be taken seriously, rather than openly mocked?
Mockery of others requires a certain easy confidence, bordering on self-complacency, that contemporary churchmen do not often allow themselves to indulge in -- especially those who have an important PR function.
ReplyDeleteMaybe just as well.
Let me be clear. I'm not necessarily talking about churchmen doing the mocking.
ReplyDeleteWhen a guy like Scalfari comes out with the claim that the Pope, of all people, has "abolished sin," everyone from Dan Rather to Rowan to Jack Chick should like up to make fun of him. It's such a ridiculous claim that nobody should be able to take it seriously.
The only reason anyone can take it seriously is that so many who have the job of protecting the Church's teachings have insinuated or outright declared (Winnipeg Statement, Cardinal Martini, now Cardinal Marx- eg) that said teachings are meaningless or apt to be reversed.