Yes. This is a kind of public leadership we are no longer used to—unassuming, self-effacing. Leaders of the world now are garish and brazen. You can think of half a dozen of their names in less than a minute. They're good at showbiz, they find the light and flash the smile. But this man wasn't trying to act like anything else.
And so, as they're saying in Europe, Francis the Humble.
May he be a living antidote. He loves the poor and not in an abstract way.
He gave the cardinal's palace in Buenos Aires to a missionary order with no money. He lives in an apartment, cooks his food, rides the bus. He rejects pomposity. He does not feel superior. He is a fellow soul.
He had booked a flight back to Argentina when the conclave ended.
But these two traits—his embrace of the church's doctrines and his characterological tenderness toward the poor—are very powerful together, and can create a powerful fusion.
He could bridge the gap or close some of the distance between social justice Catholics and traditional, doctrinal Catholics. That would be a relief.
I'm picking up an austerity vibe.
I hope I'm mis-reading this, fearing an emergent "redistribute the scarce 'precious' metals more equitably" type of approach to socio-economic justice from the Vatican; i.e. more "charity" in the modern sense. A "trickle down" form of self-justification.
In contrast to his predecessor Benedict who was led to simply express indignation in response to his view of all the socio-economic injustice that is currently being foisted upon the west.
"More charity!": This we DO NOT need. What we DO NEED is blind-moron eradication from among our midst.
"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you are taking tithes from the mint and the dill and the cumin, and leave the weightier matters of the law..." (Mat 23:23)I guess time will tell where this is going, and I hope my early read here is wrong.
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The root of "charity" is Latin caritas, as in fides, spes et caritas. Latin fides, spes et caritascorresponds to agape in Greek. Agape is the work that Paul used in 1 Corinthians 13 in his famous exaltation of love, probably the best known and most quoted of all the Letters.
There are five Greek words words for "love." Mania signifies animal lust; eros signifies emotional love; philos, friendship, strogy, conditional love or love vested with interest, and agape, unconditional or universal love.
Agape is the sine qua non of the good life and the good society, that is, unconditional love is a necessary and sufficient condition for achieving them. A personal life and the life of a society is measured by the degree to which the ideal of unconditional love is achieved. "Greater love than this hath no one, that any one his life may lay down for his friends." — Jn 15:13 (Young's Literal Translation)
It is not possible to legislate unconditional love, nor is it possible to achieve it by changing material conditions. which was Marx's mistake in thinking that abolition of private property would eliminate self-interest. That's the tail wagging the dog. However, it is true that as long as one owns anything, one cannot own everything, but that is matter of internal renunciation rather than necessarily external.
This is not to say that culture and law are irrelevant in promoting the good life and the good society, however. And bad culture and institutional practically guarantee that the good life will be difficult to achieve for most and the society will therefore deviate from the ideal to that degree.
The purpose of religion is twofold. First and foremost, it is directed at spirituality, which is personal transformation based on personal "revelation," i.e., the experience that, first, human beings are essentially spirit rather than matter, and eventually, all beings. This experience grounds the realization of the unity of life, and unconditional universal love is manifestation of that unity in experience.
Secondly, religion promotes the good society through spiritual formation of individuals in community. Religion shows how the basis of community is in the love individuals have for one another regardless of conditionality, and also how community is the community not only of persons but also of all beings, in that all are one at the source, difference being phenomenal rather than noumenal.
Normative religions have strayed far from this realization, however, and it remains largely hidden at their spiritual core, found in the teaching of the mystics and masters, saints and sages, prophets and avatars, whose words are sometime praised with lip-service but largely ignored if not derided.
Francis of Assisi realized this, lived it, and gave as the rule for his order. In taking the name of Francis, perhaps the new pope is setting Francis's teaching and example as his standard, which is the standard of perfection.
Consider the source, Matt. If the new Pope hasn't had his neo-liberal vetting before, he'll be getting it now. The pundits of the ruling class want to make damn sure that Francis I knows "the rules" in how he expresses his concern for the poor, etc.
The vatican is a medieval court in which the courtiers have a controlling interest. The ruler can only replace them to change things, which is usually not wont to do because they are the one who knows how the game works.
Same in the US, with the ruling elite. The president could appoint different people to controlling positions but is concerned with appointing anyone who doesn't already know the game.
This is how the people at the top stay on top in most any hierarchical institution.
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