The Rude Pundit: This Fuckin' Pope
The nice thing about being an atheist is that you can say things like "Your god blows beagles" and not worry about lightning strikes frying you or earthquakes swallowing you up. Sure, sure, you gotta know your audience and maybe not say it to certain people's faces because they are delusional enough to think a magical sky wizard has commanded them to kill anyone who suggests that he blows any kind of dog. Another thing about atheism is it means you don't really have to give a shit what some high muckety-muck in a tall hat or turban tells you about how to live your life.
But the Rude Pundit's not an idiot and he's not so narrow-minded as to dismiss the words of leaders of different faiths, especially when those words can have an enormous impact on the genuine sheep who make up the flock. Let's put it this way: if just a word or two from a Zombie King could make all the zombies in the zombie apocalypse stop eating people and instead start organic gardens and go vegan, that would be a net positive. Sure, the world is still overrun with rotting zombies, but at least they're not trying to gnaw on your guts.
So, yeah, the Rude Pundit's finding himself more and more jazzed by Pope Francis the more he reads the things this fuckin' guy says. Like check out this interview he did with the Italian newspaper from Turin, La Stampa, last week. It's got the usual shit you expect from a, you know, Pope. God's love, prayer, blah-blah-blah.
But Francis is willing to get in the trenches and duke it out on issues of economics and public policy, with one important difference from, say, John Paul II, which we'll get to in a minute. Here's Francis on hunger in the world: "If we work with humanitarian organisations and are able to agree all together not to waste food, sending it instead to those who need it, we could do so much to help solve the problem of hunger in the world."
On anus-lickers like Rush Limbaugh who call him "Marxist," Francis says, "The Marxist ideology is wrong. But I have met many Marxists in my life who are good people, so I don’t feel offended."
On the uproar over his attack on trickle-down economics: "There is nothing in the Exhortation that cannot be found in the social Doctrine of the Church. I wasn’t speaking from a technical point of view, what I was trying to do was to give a picture of what is going on. The only specific quote I used was the one regarding the 'trickle-down theories' which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and social inclusiveness in the world. The promise was that when the glass was full, it would overflow, benefiting the poor. But what happens instead, is that when the glass is full, it magically gets bigger. Nothing ever comes out for the poor." (That's pretty much one of the most succinct, apt descriptions of the failure of American capitalism you're gonna read.)
On expanding the faith: "We must try to facilitate people’s faith, rather than control it. Last year in Argentina I condemned the attitude of some priests who did not baptise the children of unmarried mothers. This is a sick mentality." This led to a pretty amazing statement: "The exclusion of divorced people who contract a second marriage from communion is not a sanction. It is important to remember this." Conservative Catholic priests in the United States must have felt a kick in the taint. Francis says that he and the bishops will be dealing with questions of marriage and divorce in February.
On the relationship between the church and the political world: "Politics is noble; it is one of the highest forms of charity, as Paul VI used to say. We sully it when we mix it with business. The relationship between the Church and political power can also be corrupted if common good is not the only converging point."
Let's be clear here. Francis hasn't changed anything in any official sense yet. The Catholic Church still believes what it has believed about women, about abortion and contraception, about same sex marriage. And February's Synod might not change any of it. But here's the difference: while Francis did mention concern about "unborn children" in his Exhortation last month, it was in a larger context about the ravages of economic disparity. He wrote, "
I)t is also true that we have done little to adequately accompany women in very difficult situations, where abortion appears as a quick solution to their profound anguish, especially when the life developing within them is the result of rape or a situation of extreme poverty. Who can remain unmoved before such painful situations?" Within the context of Catholicism, that's pretty much the equivalent of selling all your possessions and joining the Peace Corps.
Compare that to John Paul II, who was all about condemning people for abortion, contraception, euthanasia, cloning, and more.
There's the difference. It's emphasis. You may be anti-choice, but if you see the problem as poverty and the need for more support and compassion for women, then we have something to talk about. But if you're preaching "genocide" and other JPII bullshit, then you can go fuck yourself under your robe. And if you actually wanna go after the moneychangers and the rich? Dude, we have a lot to talk about.
Yeah, the Rude Pundit's still got the problems with Catholicism that he's always had. But Francis has fucked with Catholicism's priorities in a way that hasn't been seen in generations. And if, as expected, he changes doctrine in February, well, if someone tells over a billion zombies to start planting seeds, it could be quite a garden that is reaped.
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