The Next Pope Will Disappoint Anti-Francis Dissidents
The Anti-Francis dissidents are lost, hopefully they will find their way back
Is there a pope I did not like or one I hated the way some voiced their hatred for Pope Francis? No. I may have had disagreements but I cannot say I was happy that any pope died. Will I agree with the next pope? I have no idea but I will recognize his authority as I did with Popes St John Paul II, Benedict XVI and Francis.
I learned many years ago that the greatest source of evil is someone demanding their world their way. These pundits who hate Francis and demand the Church their way will find that God does not agree. They may find their place in Heaven is already taken by others who were not hateful against our latest pope.
How do we deal with the Francis dissidents? I could say ignore them but I should emphasize what that means. Do not listen to them. Do not read them. Never buy their books, attend their conferences, attend their classes or in any way pay attention to them. Reject them completely. Some, I believe are truly evil.
The next pope
The next pope will not totally agree with their ways and they will go after him in the same way. They reveal their lack of fidelity to the Church although claiming to be the most faithful. The pharisees did the same.
The still to be known pontiff most likely will be different than Francis maybe more to the left or more to the right but he will not be a puppet in the hands of the Francis dissidents of Catholicism. They may be shocked to learn that nothing the South American pope did or said was against Church teaching.
Francis sought to be more pastoral bringing not only works of mercy to the margins but also Christ’s merciful love in Church teaching to those same people. The dissidents are far from the margins. They teach in universities, work in chanceries or write or vlog from home to editorial offices in city financial districts. They do not live on the margins.
Pastoral work requires what the dissidents don’t do, look into the eyes of the sufferers and speak as Jesus would speak to them.
Who will be the next pope? Will he be like Francis? Probably not. Could he be like Pope Pius XII whom many traditionalists embrace? I don’t know. Do I care? Not really. All the popes had great teachings. Many anti-Francis Catholics teach redacted forms of what the popes actually said or wrote.
The biggest problem that many traditionalists hold against Francis is his restriction of the Latin Mass. I agree with him completely. If you listen to his antagonists you will hear them mention how much they embrace the Latin Mass but not how much they draw closer to Christ. That is the difference. I will say I hope the next pope keeps the restrictions or ends the Latin Mass completely.
The devil loves Latin
Many will tell you, erroneously, that the devil hates Latin. Sorry, the devil speaks Latin and does not hate the language at all. The devil hates humility so he loves those who stand for their church their way.
Let us take one candidate? Will Cardinal Sarah put restore the Latin Mass? I have no idea; I would not be surprised if he puts forth a rule that proscribes using any electronic device to pray the Liturgy of the Hours. He hates the breviary apps on the phone and loves to promote silence. He will strongly encourage and foster more silence in the world.
Certainly it is necessary to get young people out of their tablets and smart phones so as to experience God. I recommend extending this example to all priests. The Day Is Now Far Spent p. 257 2019; Ignatius Press
However, the African prelate also gets the real issues in the world that so many others do not. He wants us to understand that God is calling us to divinization. We will be like God. Of course, this sounds like the first temptation; he agrees but explains simply, yes we will be like God. This is his gift to us. He wants to give it to us; the devil wants us to take it for ourselves from God. That is the first temptation according to Cardinal Sarah.
Original Sin consisted in claiming to become by their own efforts what God is. Baptism, in contrast, which destroys in us the consequences of that first fault, is the humble, grateful acceptance of this unprecedented gift of divinization, the work of the Most Holy Trinity in us. Catechism of Spiritual Life p. 26-27 EWTN Publishing; 2022
This is why demanding the Church your way is disastrous. It is succumbing to the first temptation. “I want to follow Christ my way. I want to worship my way. I want to teach my way. I want doctrine my way.” The new pope will explain, no we must follow Christ his way.
The devil wants us to demand our world the way we want it. He wants us to demand the world the way we think Christ wants it, instead of how he actually wants it. God wants us to see and accept how much greater the world is as he created it and he wants us to embrace it.
The dissidents failed the test
The dissident crowd failed in the test from Francis on appreciating this. They demand the Latin Mass with its focus exclusively on the Eucharist as opposed to the call of the Church in experiencing God in the Word and in the Eucharist and all the Sacraments.
They demand that politicians be ordered not to receive the Eucharist if they reject Catholic teaching instead of the Church leaders teaching an understanding of the Eucharist which calls us to approach God on his terms not our own.
The next pope must lead us closer to Christ and lead us to continue to understand what it means to be a servant of Christ. If the Francis dissident crowd demands nothing more than a return to the liturgies before Vatican II then I am sure they will be truly disappointed. The next pope may lift some of the restrictions, but he will most likely not return us to those days because that would give people the world the way they want it that would be truly demonic.
The Church will follow a different direction under the pontificate of the new pope, but he will lead us differently maybe with new laws such as when you pray, make sure you do not do it electronically. Ultimately, he will, as his predecessors did, lead us to Christ.
Fr. Robert J Carr is pastor of St. Anthony Parish in Allston, MA
The parish podcast is at CatholicAudioMedia.com
The newest edition of Fr Robert J Carr's latest book is now available. Christ in Our Humanity. You can find it here.
Those issues are reasonable concerns. We use more traditional music. I was asked to consider the more contemporary hymns by other baby boomers such as myself, but I indicated that those younger than we are don't like them.
I don't do the turn around and greet your neighbor at Mass as I don't like it either..
I have a friend who celebrates the Anglican Ordinariate Mass, former Anglican now Catholic, and I appreciate what he does. He is also just a wealth of info.
'The next pope may lift some of the restrictions, but he will most likely not return us to those days because that would give people the world the way they want it that would be truly demonic.'
No, he won't do that. If one wonders why there are 'dissidents" it is because those who prefer to worship with the Mass of the Ages is because it fostered the majority of the great saints of Catholicism. That they, (traditional minded Catholics) are constantly berated by the hierarchy for just wishing to go about their Catholic lives in the ,manner that Catholics did before the tumult of Vatican II is obvious; Look at what has been lost in terms of Mass attendance, belief in the True Presence of the Eucharist, vocations, etc. What good has cone from VCII and it's novelties?? As a priset I know said to me that one can only receive graces from the OF Mass, in so far as they can enter into those graces. I, for one, cannot do as well with the OF as opposed to the EF Mass.