Speaking at daily Mass last Thursday, Pope Francis warned Christians against turning their faith into a rigid ideology.
“The faith passes, so to speak, through a distiller and becomes ideology,” he said, according to Radio Vatican. “And ideology does not beckon [people]. In ideologies there is not Jesus: in his tenderness, his love, his meekness. And ideologies are rigid, always. Of every sign: rigid.
“And when a Christian becomes a disciple of the ideology, he has lost the faith: he is no longer a disciple of Jesus, he is a disciple of this attitude of thought… For this reason Jesus said to them: ‘You have taken away the key of knowledge.’ The knowledge of Jesus is transformed into an ideological and also moralistic knowledge, because these close the door with many requirements.”
“The faith becomes ideology and ideology frightens, ideology chases away the people, distances, distances the people and distances of the Church of the people,” Francis added. “But it is a serious illness, this of ideological Christians. It is an illness, but it is not new, eh?”
He said Christian ideology was the result of a lack of true prayer.
I can’t help it
This post made me smile. I have the same reaction: I can’t help liking this beak. Even though he can find it in him to be a bit broadminded about gays, but women are still beyond the pale. Which, I guess, is much the same as saying he’s one of the good old boys of religion, any religion. But he’s so genuine about caring for the poor, I can’t help liking him.
And 70% of the world’s poor are women, so there’s that.
Same rotten theology with a smiley face sticker on top.
Same church, yes. Same theology, no. I can’t recall a clearer rejection of evangelism from the Vatican in . . . forever. Christianity grew not out of a fear of damnation, but a rejection of it through love.
That said, the Catholic Church is, if nothing else, a bureaucracy. Bureaucracies are made up of bureaucrats. Leaders come and go, bureaucrats are forever.
Just waiting to see how Fat Timmy Dolan and the other jewelled princes of the US church respond.
I worry about this guy’s longevity.