The pope really doesn’t like Republicans

Ever since Francis started lobbing missiles at doctrinal conservatives, the latter have been asking ‘is the Pope Catholic?’

Last week we learned that Pope Francis has torn up the Catholic Church’s teaching that same-sex civil partnerships are gravely immoral. This week he will be rooting for the pro-abortion candidate in the US presidential election.

These two surreal developments are causing distress bordering on spiritual despair to conservative American Catholics. Whether you feel any sympathy for them depends on your point of view. The Pope, it is safe to say, is unlikely to lose any sleep over the matter.

Francis dislikes the United States in general and its president in particular. That’s not surprising; so do most Argentinians. What is surprising is the depth of his contempt for conservative American Catholics. In fact, it’s hard to say whom he hates more, Trump or traditionalists. At any rate, he’s gunning for both of them now…

What sort of pope is looking forward to a Biden-then-Harris presidency that will use a mixture of legislation, executive orders and Supreme Court packing to remove all legal protections from Catholics who adhere strictly to the Church’s teaching on sexual morality? The answer is: a new kind of pope, one who not only regards doctrine as negotiable (as have several popes down the ages, though without admitting it) but who subordinates it to a personal agenda that is more political than theological.