There is a great deal of frustration in me for the way that Pope Francis has been spoken of in death. He is lauded as the great pastoral and compassionate face of Roman Catholicism, indeed, of Christianity. The implicit contrast is between Benedict XVI who was by all means an academic and scholastic individual by nature. Hidden in this contrast is another. That word pastoral has come to be a wiggle word that means little regard for doctrine and truth. There is nothing pastoral in that.
The perception I had of Francis was not pastoral at all but rather petty. He was known to be vindictive against those who disagreed with him (don't forget that he literally kicked cardinals out of their digs for having the nerve to challenge him!). He was judgmental (even though he insisted who am I to judge and described the Latin Mass and communion in hand as proud). He was by his own admission not even interested in doctrine (though this was his primary job as Pope to preserve and proclaim the doctrine and teaching of his own communion). He was anything but humble and his humility was more photo op than his character (he was self-referential, arrogant enough to demand his personality over tradition, and petty enough to refuse transparency in the finances of Rome). He was not compassionate toward the victims of sexual abuse (and actually hid or protected some of those high profile types accused of this). He was so joyful, they say, except those who worked for him found him in a sour mood more than happy (ask anyone in the Vatican). Worse than anything, however, was the fact that he gave witness to the false idea that sincerity matters more than anything else and that truth can be bent for the sake of opening the doors to the oppressed minorities of the day (usually LGBTQ+).
What is worse for Lutherans is that we too often make the same mistake. We presume that our pastors are being pastoral by refusing to speak the truth and that love means fudging the truth for the sake of seeming to play nice. We act as if it is more important to find approval buy those outside the faith than it is to find approval from God by keeping the faith and preaching the Word without apology. We complain that too much is made of liturgy and if people want evangelical style music and services, what is the big deal? We complain about those who are concerned for those who commune and laud those who let people decide if they believe rightly and can benefit from this communion by their recognition of His flesh and blood. We trash talk pastors behind close doors and then wonder why the seminaries are not turning out more of them. We complain about seminaries and think there should be more options and less rigorous ones as if all the training were either worthless or not essential to the high and holy calling. We say we want pastoral pastors but what we really mean is that we want pastors who will not make too much of those who deny or disagree with the faith and its worship distilled through the ages. We make the same mistake in presuming that a pastoral pastor will tell us what we want to hear rather than what we must hear from God's Word.
Pope Francis did not live up to the hype of him as pastoral and compassionate and accepting. The problem here is more than his hypocrisy, the problem is that he seemed to care more about appearing to be flexible and nice than orthodox and true. Lutherans should not fall into the same trap. Our best pastors are not those who let us believe what we want, worship how we like, sing what makes us feel good, and hear what we want to hear. Our best pastors are often those who appear controlling but who refuse to compromise the truth and who love us enough to address us with the Word none of us wants to hear. Sure, sometimes pastors screw up and are their own worst enemies. But more often than not, they fail because we refuse to hear the truth or heed the Word of the Lord from their lips. Not because they weren't pastoral enough for us.
2 comments:
"In the final moments Francis’ mortal body was on this earth, the Holy Father demonstrated ever more clearly that indeed, there is no climate crisis. There are no personal actions he or the world’s elite would ever, ever, take for the climate. It is all theater.
"On climate change, Francis died as he lived: another political hypocrite."
Excerpted from an April 29, 2025, Federalist article, "It Takes A Lot Of Jet Fuel To Throw A Funeral For A Climate Alarmist Pope" (https://thefederalist.com/2025/04/29/it-takes-a-lot-of-jet-fuel-to-throw-a-funeral-for-a-climate-alarmist-pope/) by Daniel Turner, a professed Romanist.
For Protestants, the various Popes throughout history were often seen as less pastoral, and more secular in their roles as religious leaders. The system of the Papacy, with its power, influence, pomp and ritual, with ornaments and relics, holy water, statues, Cathedrals, and stained glass windows became the antithesis of the simplicity of the Gospel message. Our Lord soundly criticized the Pharisees and the externals of religious profession without reverence for the truths of God’s word. Why, we might ask, did the early church fathers emulate the Pharisees, and set up similar traditions? Was the Gospel message alone insufficient? Warren Wiersbe, who wrote commentaries on the Bible, once said, and I paraphrase, “ A Christian minister of the word cannot be considered faithful until he gives up striving to attract people to himself, and strives only to attract them to Christ.” The Papal system, in my view, was not what Jesus had in mind when He left Peter in charge of the church upon His ascension. I do not think even Peter realized what time and sin would do to bring the church into a worldly place alien from the Gospel, where pomp replaced simplicity of worship, and the trappings of religious fervor were mere substitutes for authenticity.
Soli Deo Gloria
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