Ten Takeaways from Pope Francis’ Latest Interview

National Catholic Register, 3 September 2021

The Holy Father’s comments raise questions regarding a number of key issues, including relations with China, celebration of the traditional Latin Mass, and how he gets the information he needs to make decisions.

The recent wide-ranging, 90-minute interview that Pope Francis granted to the radio station of the Spanish bishops’ conference (Radio COPE), garnered wide attention for his comments about his health and possible resignation, but that was not the most significant part of the Holy Father’s comments.

Here are 10 takeaways from the interview.

Horizontal Horizons

While the interview was between religious people, in a religious setting and about various ecclesial topics, it was marked by a certain mundane horizon. God did not make much of an appearance. Health, finance, governance, travel and climate change were covered. The conceptual framework of the interview was that the Holy Father was the head of an institution of some sociological importance, not the universal pastor of the Church founded by Jesus Christ. Carlos Herrera interviewed Pope Francis much as one might the secretary-general of the United Nations, or the president of a country.

It is a widespread phenomenon to consider the Francis pontificate in this-worldly terms, where the faith is considered only for its horizontal impact. That seems a disservice to a pope who, in this interview, stresses that the charter of his pontificate is Evangelii Gaudium, the Joy the Gospel!

Papal Health and Resignation

The interview began with questions about the Pope’s recovery from bowel surgery earlier in the summer. The Holy Father said his life was entirely back to normal — even better, as he can now eat whatever he wants. 

He said the issue of resignation “never crossed his mind” despite some speculation in the press. The enormity of Benedict XVI’s abdication has evidently not fully settled in the life of the Church. Incapacity is no longer the reason to resign; any reason will do. 

Benedict’s abdication was entirely without precedent, as no pope had ever resigned absent a crisis. His explanation at the time of “diminishing strength” is simply to be expected in those who hold office for life.  Benedict’s explanation afterward, namely that he could no longer handle the rigors of papal trips, was even more puzzling. If jet lag is a reason to resign, any reason will do. Speculation about papal resignations for reasons of health, as was common in the latter years of St. John Paul II, assumes a link that is no longer there. 

The Hermeneutic of Rupture Endorsed? 

The most significant part of the interview touched on Traditionis Custodes (Guardians of the Tradition), the Holy Father’s recent legislation limiting celebration of the “extraordinary form” or “traditional Latin Mass.” Speaking about the permission now required, Pope Francis said: 

After this motu proprio, a priest who wants to celebrate … has to ask permission from Rome. A kind of permission for bi-ritualism, which is given only by Rome. [Like] a priest who celebrates in the Eastern Rite and the Latin Rite, he is bi-ritual but with the permission of Rome.

Since the liturgical reform of St. Paul VI, the Holy See has insisted — and in absolutely explicit language by Benedict XVI — that the “ordinary form” of the Mass is not a new “rite” but the same Roman Rite. In his liturgical legislation, Benedict XVI called the more ancient Mass and the more recent Mass two “expressions” or “forms” of the same Roman Rite.

This position has been tenaciously held by Rome against those of an extreme progressive bent who insisted that the older form of the Mass was abolished, replaced constructively with the new one. Certain traditionalist quarters agreed with that analysis, but lamented it. It was what Benedict XVI called the “hermeneutic of rupture,” an erroneous approach to Vatican II and its subsequent reforms.

To speak of the more ancient Mass as a different rite, like the Byzantine Rite or Syro-Malabar Rite, has never been done by the Vatican in the nearly 60 years since Vatican II. That Pope Francis does so now is of momentous import, if indeed it reflects the considered teaching of the Holy See and not just a passing comment of the Holy Father. 

The Pope and Putin

The most widely noted part of the interview was Pope Francis confusing the comments of Vladimir Putin with Angela Merkel on Afghanistan. 

At a Russia-German summit in August, Putin unleased a ferocious attack on the NATO policy in Afghanistan since 2001, attempting to spread democracy and human rights there. Pope Francis thought that Merkel had said what Putin had in fact said, and praised “her” skepticism about whether democracy and human rights were possible for the Afghan people.

Aside from the cringing embarrassment of getting it all completely backwards, the comments do invite further examination. Does the Holy Father believe democracy and human rights are not universally applicable, and that Afghanistan’s Islamic culture and history is somehow incapable of them? That is unlikely, as that position would, for example, be in disagreement with Pope St. John XXIII’s teaching in Mater et Magistra (1961) and Pacem in Terris (1963) and Pope St. John Paul II’s Centesimus Annus (1991).

In addition, that Pope Francis praised (unwittingly) Putin’s thinking sheds light on the Holy Father’s foreign policy, which in Syria and Ukraine has been rather more friendly toward Putin than one would normally expect. Perhaps there is more of a meeting of the minds there than previously thought.

What the Pope Knows

The Holy Father confirmed that he (quickly) reads only one Italian newspaper and does not watch television. Given that he does not know how to use a computer — a confession he made himself — the question does arise about how Pope Francis knows what he knows.

It is not a new question. In his 2010 interview book, Light of the World, it became evident that Benedict XVI realized how serious some controversies became when he read about them in the German press. In the days of John Paul II, writers knew that getting published in the Cracovian weekly Catholic journal meant that the Holy Father may well read it.

So who tells the pope what he knows if he is cut off from almost all media? How does he know what he knows about immigration, climate change, the Latin Mass and other subjects covered in the interview? It is not to suggest that the Pope is not informed; he has many people to brief him. But who are they, and what do they tell him?

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