Pope Francis is 80 on Saturday – the age at which cardinals must retire from the electoral college, which will choose the next leader of the world’s 1.2bn Roman Catholics. Will Francis also go at 80? In the past, popes ignored the watershed. They went on until they died. But Benedict XVI changed things when he became the first leader of the Catholic church to resign in more than 500 years. Francis has indicated that he might retire too. It is vital, not just for the church but the world, that he does not.

The two popes before Francis were conservatives. Between them, John Paul II and his successor, Benedict, set the public tone of Catholicism for more than three decades. In just three years, Francis has gone some way to hauling the church back towards the centre. But the ideological right is increasingly fighting back. Their private criticism of the first pope from the global south is turning to public dissent. Now is not the time for Francis to have innovative thoughts about institutionalising papal retirement by stepping down.

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Francis is not the liberal the secular media sometimes paint him. He takes the traditional Catholic line onabortion, contraception, gay marriage and women priests. And yet his positions can be more nuanced than the right can tolerate. Gay people have felt welcomed by his famous “who am I to judge?” remark. He has invited transgender people into the Vatican and physically embraced them. He has opened the path to fuller inclusion of divorced and remarried Catholics with the church. He has set up a commission to investigate the possibility of women deacons, which many see as the first step to female priests. And, at the recent 500th anniversary of the Reformation, he acknowledged that Martin Luther had a point about spiritual corruption within the Catholic church.

All this – together with his sweeping reforms of Vatican finances, his work to remodel the bureaucracy known as the Curia, and his moves to empower the wider church and rid the papacy of its monarchical status – have gone down badly with traditionalists.

Some of the men who became bishops during the previous 35-year conservative ascendancy have reacted with sullen silence, in what one Vatican veteran described as “passive-aggressive non-compliance”. But others have been publicly hostile or disdainful – and some are now openly resisting him. Just a month ago, four ultra-traditionalist cardinals issued a public challenge to the pope. They said that his ruling that, in certain circumstances, remarried Catholics might take communion could require a “formal act of correction” from the College of Cardinals. They published five dubia – doubts – virtually accusing the sitting pope of heresy: something without precedent in recent Catholic history. Those who rely on the internet for their information might be forgiven for supposing a civil war is raging inside the Catholic church. That is certainly what the “culture warriors” in the US – which is where many of the most ideological hardliners are to be found – want the world to believe.

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They paint a picture of a Catholic majority, loyal to the unchanging traditions and teachings of the church, locked in combat with a progressive pope who is diluting doctrine and capitulating to the moral relativism of contemporary secularism.

Such nonsense flies in the teeth of opinion polls, which show that 85% of US Catholics approve of this pope. Talk to Catholics in the pews in the United States and you encounter a less rigid, more generous, more pastoral mood than is evident among some of their bishops. In Europe and the UK, too, the vast majority of Catholics love this pope.



https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/dec/17/happy-birthday-pope-francis-world-sake-do-not-retire

HappyBirthday Your Holiness



Roman Catholic for life ...


To person under ...
Try harder next time..

I just came to be FTC. Nothing concerns me with the Pope's birthday.

I'm a traditionalist

.don't have much to say coz I don't know much about u and the church(Catholic).
I will just wish u happy. birthday. wish u many more on earth.
igba odun odun kan ni oo(200 years na 1 year oooo)

New age with grace.
lot of loves from
Afonjas

Happy biday your Holiness... lots of love.

Happy birthday sire!

Happy birthday to papa.....

Happy Birthday to the Pontiff.

May ur reign endure to eternity. O! Holy Father!!

Not a fan

Tiriii Gbosa for you, a former bouncer turn Pope

So these guy shares the same birthday with buhari. What an irony.

Happy birthday to the pope

Ok

HBD to Pope Francis

HBD

The Pope sharing birthday with Buhari!
This is so wrong. Light and darkness should have nothing in common, not even birthdays.

The same pope who rides in bulletproof cars, didnt he say wishing someone a happy birthday brought badluck

Happy Birthday to the holy father

Happy Birthday papa

Happy birthday.

There should be changes, if the pope wants to change the statuquo, so be it, and let othe people experience the seat. Pray for him at 80.

api birthday papa

The pope who believes faggs should be left alone to marry and f*ck themselves to delirium.
Happy birthday sha.

Merry birthday pope!

Happy Birthday His Holiness!!!

Share same birthday with duara. Why didn't he travel internationally as usual to celebrate with him?

tobishawn:

Pope Francis is 80 on Saturday – the age at which cardinals must retire from the electoral college, which will choose the next leader of the world’s 1.2bn Roman Catholics. Will Francis also go at 80? In the past, popes ignored the watershed. They went on until they died. But Benedict XVI changed things when he became the first leader of the Catholic church to resign in more than 500 years. Francis has indicated that he might retire too. It is vital, not just for the church but the world, that he does not.

The two popes before Francis were conservatives. Between them, John Paul II and his successor, Benedict, set the public tone of Catholicism for more than three decades. In just three years, Francis has gone some way to hauling the church back towards the centre. But the ideological right is increasingly fighting back. Their private criticism of the first pope from the global south is turning to public dissent. Now is not the time for Francis to have innovative thoughts about institutionalising papal retirement by stepping down.

Advertisement

Francis is not the liberal the secular media sometimes paint him. He takes the traditional Catholic line onabortion, contraception, gay marriage and women priests. And yet his positions can be more nuanced than the right can tolerate. Gay people have felt welcomed by his famous “who am I to judge?” remark. He has invited transgender people into the Vatican and physically embraced them. He has opened the path to fuller inclusion of divorced and remarried Catholics with the church. He has set up a commission to investigate the possibility of women deacons, which many see as the first step to female priests. And, at the recent 500th anniversary of the Reformation, he acknowledged that Martin Luther had a point about spiritual corruption within the Catholic church.

All this – together with his sweeping reforms of Vatican finances, his work to remodel the bureaucracy known as the Curia, and his moves to empower the wider church and rid the papacy of its monarchical status – have gone down badly with traditionalists.

Some of the men who became bishops during the previous 35-year conservative ascendancy have reacted with sullen silence, in what one Vatican veteran described as “passive-aggressive non-compliance”. But others have been publicly hostile or disdainful – and some are now openly resisting him. Just a month ago, four ultra-traditionalist cardinals issued a public challenge to the pope. They said that his ruling that, in certain circumstances, remarried Catholics might take communion could require a “formal act of correction” from the College of Cardinals. They published five dubia – doubts – virtually accusing the sitting pope of heresy: something without precedent in recent Catholic history. Those who rely on the internet for their information might be forgiven for supposing a civil war is raging inside the Catholic church. That is certainly what the “culture warriors” in the US – which is where many of the most ideological hardliners are to be found – want the world to believe.

Advertisement

They paint a picture of a Catholic majority, loyal to the unchanging traditions and teachings of the church, locked in combat with a progressive pope who is diluting doctrine and capitulating to the moral relativism of contemporary secularism.

Such nonsense flies in the teeth of opinion polls, which show that 85% of US Catholics approve of this pope. Talk to Catholics in the pews in the United States and you encounter a less rigid, more generous, more pastoral mood than is evident among some of their bishops. In Europe and the UK, too, the vast majority of Catholics love this pope.



https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/dec/17/happy-birthday-pope-francis-world-sake-do-not-retire

Happy birthday our supreme pontiff...

My father my mentor
H. B. D