The Pope for agnostics. . .

I have heard it said and written many times that Pope Francis is held in high esteem by non-Roman and even non-attending self-proclaimed Christians because he gives a kindly human face to their own problems with the Scriptures, doctrine, and truth.  Certainly this must be so.  After all, this is the man who refuses to judge, who goes the second mile to talk to those on the fringes of the faith while calling believers in the traditional faith rigid and uncaring, and who expresses his own doubts so openly.  Who living on the fringes of the faith would not feel welcomed by someone who seems to have his own struggles with the words of Jesus and the doctrines proclaimed in Scripture?  He is a Pope for Doubters and Progressives but the real test is whether he is bringing them back into the sphere of the truth that endures forever or merely making them feel better about their own rejection and uncertainties.  He has given the liberal wing of his church permission to depart even further from the faith but he has yet to show any evidence that his laissez-faire attitude toward doctrine has welcomed anyone back to the pews.

My own suspicion is that he is not bringing many back into the fold but is certainly helping those who insist upon living on the fringes of doctrine and life feel better about their tenuous position on the edge.  While some will say that is good, unless the olive branch brings them closer to the faith flowing out of Scripture and confessed in the creed, it remains a rather empty gesture. Without a bridge designed to bring those who struggle to accept and confess the faith into a fuller life within the communion of faith, it is a bridge too far.  While I am not at all suggesting that the faithful should be callous or cold in their treatment of those on the fringes, the whole enterprise of evangelization is to bring people into the full embrace of Christ and not to confirm them in their doubts or approve of their own rejection of the core of Christian faith and life.

This Pope is not quite the figure of a Fulton Sheen.  Where you like or dislike the Archbishop, he went to where the people were and challenged them to come where Christ is.  That is the goal of apologetics.  It is not to defend a weak and fragile faith but to reveal the strength and power of Christ and Him crucified to those who fear trusting Him or anyone.  We engage the doubter not so that he might be confirmed in his doubts but so that they may be answered by the Word of the Lord that endures forever.  Yes, the Lord woos and wins us over, persuades us (as the KJV put it in Romans 8), but He does so not with a weak of fragile truth.  Christ engages us with a truth so strong that it is without comparison and with a love that is not mere words but arms outstretched in suffering for us and for the whole world.  

Our Lord does not join the sinner in his sin in order that he might feel less guilty or convicted by that sin.  He offers to those living in shame and in the shadow of death forgiveness and life.  He does not leave sin to the darkness but calls it out to the light where forgiveness can overpower it.  He does not join the doubter in his doubts or the smug in his prideful rejection of God's Word but confronts them with truth so strong it can save not only one soul but a whole world.  He does not live an immoral life so that those who do might feel better about their words and actions but addresses the immoral with more than a word of judgment in the mercy that rescues and redeems.  He does not tell the sinful woman that she is okay but sends her forth in mercy and calls her to "go and sin no more."   It is precisely this that is missing in Pope Francis' words to those on the edge of Christianity.  There can and should be more.  Rome already knows more in the stunning witness of a John Paul II against the cheapening of life, marriage, sex, and family.  And there it is.  While Francis is out bringing roses and chocolates to those who reject the core of Christian faith and life, his other hand is gutting what is left of John Paul II's legacy of life and virtue.  While no one wishes another to die, perhaps it is true that Francis' passing would relieve the faithful of a leader who has taken them in the wrong direction.  Unless, however, he is replaced with someone better, it is merely the change of watch on a ship already sinking.