Pope Francis has done it again. He has got himself into the news – on social media – by turning up at a record shop in Rome to spend 10 minutes browsing among the LPs like a normal citizen. As teenagers are keenly aware, vinyl is very much of the moment, so the Pope is on-trend. He’s also authentic – he loves classical music and talks about it knowledgeably.
It’s not the only time the Pope has got headlines lately. He effortlessly generated any amount of comment on social and conventional media when he declared at a Vatican audience that it was “a kind of selfishness” for couples to have dogs or cats rather than children. Whatever the merits of the argument – and many Catholics in Britain would instinctively protest that it is good to have both – he created a stir.
Pundits piled into the argument to take issue with the notion that children are better than dogs, or that relationships should be open to new life or to criticise him for insensitivity to those who can’t have children. Catholics take the view that marriage must be open to the possibility of having children, but the point here is that the Pope has a gift for generating coverage and occasionally stirring up argument. It also helps that he also has visual appeal in a visual age in his simple white dress; that counts for a great deal.
And then he confounded Catholics who thought of him as unambiguously liberal by using his address to the Vatican diplomatic corps to criticise the so-called cancel culture, a speech which Dr Gavin Ashenden discusses in this magazine. He was blunt in asserting that this aspect of the culture is damaging because “under the guise of defending diversity, it ends up cancelling all sense of identity”, and warned that this mindset risks censoring those who “defend a respectful and balanced understanding of various cultures”. That too got coverage.
In many ways, Francis’s capacity to attract attention is all to the good. In general it is better to be argued with than ignored. And in his actions the Pope never gives the impression that he is courting publicity; rather publicity comes to him. But this useful attribute has its dangers. The Pope must also be aware that his pronouncements may be disseminated beyond the context in which they are made. That means he needs to think before he talks. There may be a loss of spontaneity in considering what he says before he says it, but a shrewd Jesuit such as he must know that discretion in public pronouncements is worthwhile. Certainly, Francis must feel free to be controversial; it just helps if he – and we –know that this is what he actually intends.
This article first appeared in the February 2022 issue of the Catholic Herald. Subscribe today.
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