As the Conclave begins to elect a new pope in Rome, Crisis Magazine has published my latest article, on the papacy and the “sacrifice of the intellect.” Here’s a snippet:
It is hard for many Catholics to face the fact that a pope has erred in his teaching or that he has done terrible things. Many tend to think the “bad popes” are something from the past, safely tucked away in the pages of a history book where they can no longer harm us. In recent times, the Church has exalted the authority of the pope so much that, for some, it is the center of the Faith itself.
During the pontificates of John Paul II and Benedict XVI, many seemed to understand the papacy this way and defended those pontiffs when many criticized them for upholding unpopular teaching such as that on contraception. But I get the impression the same people felt they could not criticize the obvious problems with the Franciscan pontificate because they had defended those pontiffs not because what they said was true but merely because it was the pope who said it.
Do check out the rest at Crisis, in your charity
