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Help[Opinions] Re: Pope Leo XIV
in reply to a message by Lux Ashton
On the new pope himself? Deeply and profoundly skeptical. I'm a deeply religious person, but I think being religious in 2025 requires a ruthless skepticism about the religious leaders who claim any kind of leadership role. This man is substantially better than many of the alternatives that could've been considered (the other American whose name was bandied about, Cardinal Dolan, is an enraging human being), but I have a feeling I'm going to be raging against him for the next two decades. I do find his public slaps towards J. D. Vance to be encouraging, but his role in shuffling around accused sex offenders in the Roman Catholic hierarchy is upsetting, if unsurprising. (Is there anyone at the highest levels of the Catholic Church who wasn't explicitly complicit in those scandals?)
As far as the name: he appears to have chosen Leo after Leo XIII, who had some solid perspectives that are perhaps hopeful as to where this man's priorities will lie.
And I do like the name Leo.
Andrew
put a smile on your face - make the world a better place (:
As far as the name: he appears to have chosen Leo after Leo XIII, who had some solid perspectives that are perhaps hopeful as to where this man's priorities will lie.
And I do like the name Leo.
put a smile on your face - make the world a better place (:
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It seems a “could be worse, could be better situation.” At least he’s on Francis’ page concerning social and immigration issues.
I might have officially apostasized if Peter Erdo had become pope.
I might have officially apostasized if Peter Erdo had become pope.
I follow a lot of religion-related social media accounts for two reasons: (1) my faith is important to me, and that also includes a genuine academic-ish fascination with different religious traditions; moreover, within the loose confederation that might called the "religious left," robust interfaith dialogue is exceedingly important, so it's interesting to see where communities will find common ground to fight for common causes (ex: LGBTQIA+ inclusion in religious spaces; immigration; abortion access; etc.); (2) I find some of the more extreme subsects of religious groups to be incredibly interesting even if I find their views revolting. To that last part, I follow a lot of traditionalist-minded Catholic pages, including some young arch-traditional priests. Based on their (surprisingly robust) social media activity, a lot of that group had coalesced around Cardinal Robert Sarah of Guinea. I know the broader narrative was that traditionalist groups had coalesced around Erdő, but that wasn't what I saw in my corner of the internet.
So I did some digging into Robert Sarah.
Robert Sarah's activities as cardinal include:
- Being something akin to a condom truther: it seems to have been removed from his Wikipedia page (perhaps understandably) but at one point he talked about how condoms don't actually do anything and it would make more sense to spend money treating people diagnosed with HIV than to try and prevent transmission through contraception.
- Comparing transgender people to ISIS, calling them essentially two sides of the same coin.
- Opposing immigration.
- Intense Islamophobia (Erdő looks like a happy-go-lucky fella by comparison).
- ...and his primary theological activity seems to revolve around the physical position of a priest while saying mass. (Actual theology is one area where, social positions aside, I think Francis made a demonstrably positive impact; specifically, his writings and speeches actually seemed to encompass climate activism/preservation of the world as something of a sacrament. The transition from that kind of thinking about the world and faith and such, to something that seems so trivial to me....)
So I did some digging into Robert Sarah.
Robert Sarah's activities as cardinal include:
- Being something akin to a condom truther: it seems to have been removed from his Wikipedia page (perhaps understandably) but at one point he talked about how condoms don't actually do anything and it would make more sense to spend money treating people diagnosed with HIV than to try and prevent transmission through contraception.
- Comparing transgender people to ISIS, calling them essentially two sides of the same coin.
- Opposing immigration.
- Intense Islamophobia (Erdő looks like a happy-go-lucky fella by comparison).
- ...and his primary theological activity seems to revolve around the physical position of a priest while saying mass. (Actual theology is one area where, social positions aside, I think Francis made a demonstrably positive impact; specifically, his writings and speeches actually seemed to encompass climate activism/preservation of the world as something of a sacrament. The transition from that kind of thinking about the world and faith and such, to something that seems so trivial to me....)
Do you know his stance on LGBTQ? I couldn’t really find any definitive answers anywhere.
It's on wikipedia.
Thank you!
Erdo is definitely too conservative. I’m not Catholic but some of my Catholic friends were hoping it wouldn’t be him.
I’m surprised they elected an American. I thought the Italian Parolin was the one. But Cardinal Prevost seems like a pretty good pick. I think he will continue on with the policies of Francis and not move too far in either direction.
I like the name Leo.
I’m surprised they elected an American. I thought the Italian Parolin was the one. But Cardinal Prevost seems like a pretty good pick. I think he will continue on with the policies of Francis and not move too far in either direction.
I like the name Leo.
Apparently, he has dual American-Peruvian citizenship and has Spanish, Italian, and French ancestry and is fluent in multiple languages. I wonder if his ability to communicate with just about everyone in the conclave had a role in getting picked.