Why Do Normal Events, Like Book Launches, Become ‘Imbergoglios’ That Snare the Pope?

National Catholic Register, 31 January 2020

The Vatican snafus in recent years are usually launched by commentators who are eager to advocate for Pope Francis, but often end up doing more harm than good.

I call them “imbergoglios.” An imbroglio that snares Pope Francis.

An “imbroglio” is an “extremely confused, complicated or embarrassing situation.”

The latest Vatican imbroglio arose over the recent book written by Benedict XVI and Cardinal Robert Sarah.

It becomes an imbergoglio when Pope Francis — Papa Bergoglio — is just going about his business and the people around him create an almighty flap. The Holy Father gets sucked into the imbroglio even though the principal decisions were not his. The imbroglio, which is not the Holy Father’s fault, nevertheless embroils him and becomes an imbergoglio. And then it ends in farce. All of which is terribly embarrassing for the Catholic Church and causes criticism to fly toward Pope Francis.

There is much angst in Rome and in the Catholic press that normal events — book launches, prayer services on the feast of St. Francis of Assisi — become imbergoglios too often.

A classic imbergoglio took place on St. Ignatius’ Day in 2018. A simple comment went viral, then thermonuclear.

In a congratulatory column for the Jesuit founder’s feast, commentator Father Thomas Rosica, who enjoyed the favor of the Holy Father’s inner circle, wrote that “Pope Francis breaks Catholic traditions whenever he wants. … Our Church has indeed entered a new phase: With the advent of this first Jesuit pope, it is openly ruled by an individual rather than by the authority of Scripture alone or even its own dictates of Tradition plus Scripture.”

Pope Francis never said that, never put himself above the deposit of the faith, transmitted by Scripture and Tradition. But it got enormous attention and caused many people to wonder, baselessly, about whether the Holy Father understood his role and elementary theology of the Petrine office.

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