Romans woke up last Saturday to a disturbing sight. Posters featuring a stern-looking Pope Francis had been plastered all over the historic city centre. “Ah Francis,” they said in Roman dialect, “you’ve taken over congregations, removed priests, decapitated the Order of Malta and the Franciscans of the Immaculate, ignored cardinals … but where’s your mercy?” Workers swiftly took down the notices or covered them with “illegal advertising” signs, but not before they had sent a jolt through the Catholic world.
The anonymous posters were a nod to the Roman tradition of pasquinate, where nameless citizens criticised the authorities by leaving messages on the city’s statues. Popes were frequent targets during the era of the Papal States, but rarely after the unification of Italy.
As we went to press, the posters’ creators were unknown. Most commentators blamed “conservatives” or “traditionalists”, though one Italian theologian suggested it was the work of “a small but ideologically violent underworld of clericofascism”.
While the posters’ provenance is unclear, their message is easily understood: that the media image of Pope Francis as a gentle pastor belies his true authoritarian nature. The chosen photograph, which shows a glum-looking Pontiff shivering during an outdoor general audience, is widely circulated on the internet by papal critics who see it as evidence that Francis isn’t always the radiant, smiling figure he appears to be.
The posters prompted a debate about the Pope’s popularity. Is the Holy Father less beloved than is widely supposed? Not according to most surveys. A poll in December gave Francis an 85.8 per cent approval rating among American Catholics, up from 84.2 per cent. In 2014 the Pew Research Centre found that 84 per cent of Europeans view him favourably, as do 72 per cent of Latin Americans.
But, as we learned elsewhere in 2016, opinion polls do not tell the whole story. While Pope Francis is much loved outside the Church, his most ferocious critics are lodged within it. Do they form a recognisable group? The veteran Vatican commentator Marco Politi thinks so. He calls it a “movimento del sacro incenso”, a “movement of holy incense” – a pious, clerical-led reaction to Francis’s far-reaching reforms.
But the opposition to this papacy is less clearly defined. Some, for example, welcome the Pope’s overhaul of the Roman Curia, while expressing dismay over the departure of the Order of Malta Grand Master Fra’ Matthew Festing. Others back his financial reforms, while sharing the four cardinals’ famous dubia, or doubts, about aspects of his Magna Carta for the family, Amoris Laetitia.
This is not surprising. Both St John Paul II and Benedict XVI had harsh critics, and any pope who seeks far-reaching change inevitably encounters resistance. But the posters do suggest an unhealthy lack of communication within the Church. Reservations about Pope Francis’s decision-making style should be discussed openly within the Vatican, rather than through unsigned posters.
One way to address this would be to increase the diversity of outlook in the Pope’s inner circle. Men of outstanding stature such as the Vatican doctrinal chief Cardinal Gerhard Müller and liturgy prefect Cardinal Robert Sarah could be invited in, rather than kept at a distance. Their views would not necessarily prevail, but including them would help to cleanse the noxious atmosphere of polarisation that is enveloping Rome.
Caring for Christ
Hardly anyone who reads this magazine will have heard of Sister Tarcisia Hunhoff, a member of the Missionary Sisters, Servants of the Holy Spirit, who has been working in Papua New Guinea for the last 47 years, providing healthcare in a place where it is sorely needed.
Papua New Guinea is in the grip of an Aids epidemic and has a high incidence of TB. Catholic Church Health Care Services, for which Sister Tarcisia works, reaches about 70,000 clients a year, and has a very effective mother–to-child Aids prevention programme.
Sister Tarcisia’s latest project is founding Papua’s very first palliative care centre; until now, many have died on the streets of Port Moresby without even the most basic care. This will soon, God willing, change. Sister Tarcisia has said that this will be her last project, as she is now over 80.
On February 11 the Catholic Church, as well as celebrating the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, marks the World Day of the Sick. This is just the day to remember all those who are unwell, and all those who, like Sister Tarcisia, are looking after them. The sick suffer with Christ, and those who care for them tend the Suffering Christ. Not just in Lourdes, but all over the world, Catholics are responding to their call to tend to the sick with great devotion.
We are unable to determine whether Sister Tarcisia ever sees a copy of the Catholic Herald: but if you are reading this, and you know her, could you pass it on to her?
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