Pope Francis has passed away

MsZem said:
I think this should have its own thread.

As a non-Catholic, I hope the next pope will continue Francis's (relatively) liberal and compassionate agenda.
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Non-Catholic (Methodist) here as well. IIRC, at least half of the College of Cardinals were appointed by Francis. But that doesn’t mean they were mostly liberal or progressive and under (I think) age 80.
 
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ilovepaydays said:
Non-Catholic (Methodist) here as well. IIRC, at least half of the College of Cardinals were appointed by Francis. But that doesn’t mean they were mostly liberal or progressive and under (I think) age 80.
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I think he appointed about 3/4 of the cardinals eligible to vote for the next pope, and presumably many have similar outlooks. Only cardinals under 80 can vote.

I was very sad today to hear this news.
 
I'm not necessarily sad about Francis' passing - I'm not Catholic, so I don't feel it as impacting my faith directly, I do feel sympathy for my fellow Christians who are Catholic. I was quite surprised to wake up just after 3am and see the news as he'd been out in public yesterday. I can't help but thinking that Easter Sunday wore him out and he just couldn't bounce back.

I wouldn't make any assumptions about the College of Cardinals or their views on global politics. John Paul II, Benedict and Francis were all very different men in that regard and yet the vast majority of the cardinals who elected Francis had been appointed by John Paul II and Benedict.

When Francis was in the hospital in February/March, I watched a few YT pods speculating on what may happen in the upcoming Conclave and I came away with the impression that trying to assess any of the candidates through a purely secular political lens is an arrogant, misguided & wholly disrespectful approach to the question that fails to understand the myriad of issues within the Catholic Church today. The cardinals will be far more concerned with questions of doctrine, church management, and the spiritual health of their congregation than they are with world politics and those issues will be what guides them as the convene in the Conclave to select a new Pope.
 
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Karen-W said:
The cardinals will be far more concerned with questions of doctrine, church management, and the spiritual health of their congregation than they are with world politics and those issues will be what guides them as the convene in the Conclave to select a new Pope.
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Here's hoping, but I wouldn't count on it! The Catholic Church is and always has been a political organization.

Despite my political differences with Francis, and despite considering myself agnostic, I do think he was a good and sincere man, far better than his predecessor. I'm glad he didn't suffer much.
 
I saw this last night/ around 1 AM I was still awake when it appeared on the screen of my phone.

Non-Christian here.

I respected Pope Francis for his compassion. At his age (88) this was not too unexpected, but I felt sad because I liked him and I hope the next Pope will be just as caring about All people.

RIP.
 
All the early handicapping in the English-language press speaks of liberal, moderate and conservative candidates. Of course it doesn’t mean what it means for secular politicians, although there is some overlap, but much is predicated on role of women/LGBT issues, climate change, migration, poverty and international conflicts. Those are all pretty political.

Additionally of course there are issues of liturgy and theology specific to the Church which don’t much concern non-Catholics. I appreciated Francis’ voice and care for those in need.
 
Private Citizen said:
Here's hoping, but I wouldn't count on it! The Catholic Church is and always has been a political organization.
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Well, all organizations are inherently political to some extent. But, really, most of the YT pods I listened to when analyzing the College of Cardinals really highlighted that the descriptions/labels of "progressive" or "conservative" or "traditional" etc they were using were not synonymous with those same labels' usage in secular politics. The terms can, somewhat, be loosely similar to secular politics, but it's more about questions of the use of Latin Mass, same-sex unions, the role of women in the Church, and other doctrinal questions.

Sure, the probability of a cardinal who wants to continue expanding the role of women in the Church being someone who also supports mass, global immigration without borders is pretty high, but it's not a guarantee. Nor is it a guarantee that just because a cardinal is from Asia or Africa, they must be socially liberal - in fact, that's not been the case at all with many of the leading African cardinals being quite conservative - both politically and with regard to Catholic doctrine.

Additionally, there have been some significant church management issues that have caused some degree of scandal within the Vatican, and the cardinals may feel that having a stronger administrator than Francis turned out to be is necessary. I don't know that being a strong administrator/manager means you skew to one side of the secular political spectrum over the other.
Private Citizen said:
Despite my political differences with Francis, and despite considering myself agnostic, I do think he was a good and sincere man, far better than his predecessor. I'm glad he didn't suffer much.
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I too think Francis was a good & sincere man. I also thought that of Benedict. You may not agree with the directions in which they took the Church, but I believe they were both very sincere & strong in their faith, and they both leaned not on their own understanding, but on the Lord's. And I choose to believe that the College of Cardinals will be similarly led - through consultation & prayer with each other communally and with God individually.
 
Karen-W said:
Sure, the probability of a cardinal who wants to continue expanding the role of women in the Church being someone who also supports mass, global immigration without borders is pretty high, but it's not a guarantee.
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It's not like Pope Francis wanted to allow women to be ordained as deacons or priests, and I doubt many of the voting cardinals do, either. I also doubt that there are many cardinals who are hoping for mass migration without borders. But, I think that, like Pope Francis, there will be plenty of cardinals who feel great compassion for refugees, want these refugees to be helped, believe that immigrants should be treated with dignity, and are concerned about conditions that lead to people fleeing their countries. They probably didn't skip the part in the Bible about the Good Samaritan and probably have read the many passages in the Bible about helping the poor and suffering and strangers.
Karen-W said:
the cardinals may feel that having a stronger administrator than Francis turned out to be is necessary.
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Very possible. Although predicting who will be good at that may be difficult. Being a good administrator at the papal level is an entirely different thing from being a cardinal, priest, etc.
 
Allskate said:
Very possible. Although predicting who will be good at that may be difficult. Being a good administrator at the papal level is an entirely different thing from being a cardinal, priest, etc.
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The pope can have a "right-hand man" who is really good at that. I'm not sure if papal candidates get interviewed, but if they do, one who can say, "I'll bring X with me and appoint him as the administrator" may have an advantage.
 
MacMadame said:
The pope can have a "right-hand man" who is really good at that. I'm not sure if papal candidates get interviewed, but if they do, one who can say, "I'll bring X with me and appoint him as the administrator" may have an advantage.
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Some of the cardinals/papal candidates have been those right hand men/administrators, and not all are known to have been good at it.
 
I know he lived a good, long life, but I was very sad to learn of Pope Francis's passing. He was such a lovely, compassionate man. As others have said, we can only hope that his successor will be of similar spirit.
 
Allskate said:
It's not like Pope Francis wanted to allow women to be ordained as deacons or priests, and I doubt many of the voting cardinals do, either.
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I guess we really don’t know if he wanted that or not. I had the feeling he was open to ordaining women as deacons but thought that would result in another schism, which is probably true. He did at least appoint some women to synods and such, which is more than others have done.

If anyone reads Sean of the South, he is walking the Camino right now and had a lovely reflection on Pope Francis’s death… It’s not updated yet on SeanDietrich.com, but it is on the Facebook page.
 
allezfred said:
Pope Francis wasn’t all that radical as a pope. It just seems like it now since a lot of the world has moved to the right where having any kind of empathy is considered weak.
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He held a lot of troubling views, in fact.
 
The Pope looked very ill on Easter - my thought was his death would happen in the next 24-72 hours.

I have major theological issues with the Catholic Church, but this Pope was kind and appeared to want to bring the Church forward.

May his memory bring the Church moving forward.
 
I've been at funerals where people have taken photos of themselves with a deceased. In fact we did when I was pregnant and my husband's grandmother had died. She was so excited to meet her new great grandchild and had written loving letters to him.

We also did with our daughter who was stillborn. 43 years later those are precious.

I may have never considered selfies, but pictures with a deceased is not that unusual or maybe I am.
 
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