“Loosen up, Bro”

Yes, he is really high-fiving around. Go figure.

One is at a loss to say whether Cardinal Maradiage is more arrogant, or Bishop Francis more incompetent. What seems clear to me is that both are masters of their respective discipline; this,very charitably assuming Francis does not actually want these public controversies. The Cardinal allows himself a level of familiarity and public defiance that can only be called boorish, and no doubt he does so because he feels his new appointment to “Turbo Cardinal” lets him think he can play the MiniMe of the Bishop of Rome unpunished.

Francis, though, created or encouraged every bit of this very public mess. In June last year he said to the progressive nuns dressed in everyday clothes they shouldn't be worried about what the CDF writes to them, thus clearly and publicly undermining the authority of both the office (the CDF) and the person (++ Müller). In Brazil, he invited the faithful to “make a mess” like a teenager overcome by revolutionary hormones. Moreover, with his appointment of the “Gang of Eight” he has created a power central – again, a very public one – whose members now feel entitled to exploit their position of prominence even in matters not pertaining to the specific reason of their appointment: administrative reform.

Francis is the one who has fathered this mess also in other, very grave ways. His continued attacks (as in: attacks) to Catholic orthodoxy encourage the worst among his followers to do the same, and to do so in the certainty not only of impunity but of overt or covert approval. Furthermore, Francis' obsession with public utterances and his tragic inability to keep his mouth shut – which he would do if he had some fear of The Lord – encourages others to do the same. As a result, disagreements among Cardinals are now – if the one who disagree is a chap like Maradiaga – carried on very publicly, in a very aggressive way, taking liberties not even politicians would allow themselves to take. In the reign of Francis, now degenerated to a shameless quest for popularity, it is not surprising that internal disagreements have become popularity wars.

“Loosen up, Bro” is the public and explicit message Maradiaga sends to Müller.

What an arrogant boor. And what a fitting man for this Papacy.

Mundabor