There seems to be an unlimited supply of conspiracy theories
and alleged scandals floating around the media—from the Pope fleeing both
assassination threats and warrants for his arrest to the Pope finally throwing
in the towel and caving to the never ending pederasty cover-up accusations. All
of the allegations are, of course, backed by definitive proofs! This goes
to show that when it comes to the Catholic Church, the National Enquirer is tied
for the most accurate secular news source. (See news stands for the hidden story behind the papal tumult as the Enquirer goes behind the scenes at the
Vatican in "Exclusive cover story: Pope Brain Cancer Bombshell.")
However, I’m inclined to believe what the man said. He is
old and feeble. He can’t travel around the world the way he used to—he has a
pacemaker and has been seen using a walker. And watch the poor man try to use
an iPad.
(See how he pushes the button and nothing happens?? Ugh. Now I feel like an 85
year old.)
However, I did read this article speculating that the
Blessed Virgin Mary asked Pope Benedict XVI to abdicate. (That sounds crazy.
But I assure you it’s not. ;o) She talks to both crazy people and sane people.) Early in his Papacy, Benedict asked for
prayers that he would not succumb to the ‘wolves’, which many feel referred to
certain Vatican officials who habitually opposed the Pope, partly due to aversion to
change. (Scheming bureaucrats hindering fruitful progress? We have those kinds
of wolves in North America too.) The author suggests that the time is right for
a new, invigorated Pope who will lay the smack down on the wolves and get them out of
there. I guess we’ll have to wait and see!
After talking with some coworkers I discovered they were
most confused about the matter of Papal Infallibility and how a person can go
from being fallible to (pretending to be) perfect and then back to fallible
again. I tried to explain that the Pope is infallible only in relation to faith
and morals, under very specific circumstances, so long as he is in agreement
with teachings that have been passed on for the last two millennia… and that
such infallible statements have almost never been proclaimed anyway. I told
them that the underlying belief is that the Holy Spirit is trusted to work
through the Pope (whether he’s good or evil) to ensure that the faith does not
become corrupted from what was passed on by the early Church. The infallibility
is not attached to the person but to the office. So the Holy Spirit uses
whoever happens to be in the office of Pope to maintain orthodoxy through
infallible statements, if necessary. Here's a cartoon illustration of how the Holy Spirit might prevent a stubborn Pope from 'infallibly' issuing a fallible statement:
The thing to remember is that the man in the Chair of Peter certainly does not have to be
perfect. And, in fact, in Galatians Chapter 2, St. Paul says that upon meeting
Peter he “opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned.” In the end,
Peter conceded to Paul that Christians are allowed to eat bacon (among other
things). However, with respect to Papal Infallibility, we believe that if Peter
had felt the need to deliberate on the matter and pray about it and utter a
binding and infallible statement, the Holy Spirit would have led him to the
same conclusion, regardless of whether or not Paul called him out on it. Now
that Benedict XVI is no longer Pope, the matter of infallibility just doesn’t
apply to him anymore, although nothing has changed regarding his personal
degree of perfection.
The fact that a Pope hasn’t abdicated in so long
(centuries!) makes it surprising, but not scandalous. Now ensues the media
frenzy of trying to guess the next Pope. This is a hopeless task due to the
fact that those in conclave do (gasp!) pray about it, and through prayer may be
inclined to choose someone they would not have picked based on a list of pros and
cons. A friend of mine recently returned from Africa. She was there when Pope Benedict announced his intention to abdicate and the local Cardinal made the statement that "if an African is chosen as Pope it's not because it is 'our turn' but because of the Holy Spirit." Well said!
Since I only know the names of about four Cardinals (none of whom Sarah Jones
would elect as Pope), I can’t really join in the guessing. But fortunately, this
year there is an app to ‘adopt’ a Cardinal to pray for before and during the
conclave. Mine is 75 year old Audrys Juozas Bačkis of Lithuania. I had never heard of him before so I
don’t know how to pronounce his name, but I feel like we have a pretty good
chance of winning. ;o) He’s kind of a cute old guy AND he speaks English. “VOTE
FOR ANDRYS—WEREWOLF SLAYER!”
I won’t pretend to
understand how a conclave works. But if anybody is interested, here is an
imperfect, but close enough, cartoon explanation.
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