Did an Archbishop from Kentucky troll the Pope?

[Octafish]

Talk about conservative.

Joseph Kurtz, the archbishop of Louisville, Kentucky, and the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, wouldn’t comment on the meeting itself and how it came about, noting that he stayed about a mile away from the nunciature where Pope Francis stayed during his visit to D.C. But “I can comment on the fact that in Kentucky, I had said that I’m not a lawyer or a politician, but I had certainly hoped that room could be made for people of conscience,” he said on Wednesday. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops was the primary coordinator of the pope’s schedule during his visit to the United States.

-- Emma Green, The Atlantic, "Why Did Pope Francis Meet With Kim Davis?"

"I was a mile away at the time."

[el_bryanto]

1. Thanks for the link to that article. Informative. nt

[Octafish]

3. .WaPo says the lawyer didn't see anybody meet the Pope.

There may be a lot more to the story...

When news broke Tuesday night that she had met with Pope Francis, it was the Liberty Counsel that bore the news. “He held out his hand and she clasped his hands and held them,” Staver, who did not attend the meeting, said earlier today. He said the pope “spoke English the entire time” and that Davis said “she would pray for him. She asked the pope to pray for her, and he said he would pray.”

-- The Controversial Group at the Center of It All,

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/09/30/pope-francis-kim-davis-and-the-controversial-group-at-the-center-of-it-all/

It's not clear yet who would be in the selfies.

[joeybee12]

2. Interesting...knr

[Octafish]

4. Amazing how fast all that good went down the drain.

Pope Francis addressed Congress and got matters of war and peace, capital and income inequality, and global warming and protecting the planet on the agenda. Suddenly, that's forgotten. I can't believe the Pope would sacrifice all that to meet with a person who has come to symbolize official bigotry.

Something else in the story rings hollow: The reporter on the plane echoed the language used by the Archbishop:

Terry Moran, ABC News: Holy Father, thank you, thank you very much and thank you to the Vatican staff as well. Holy Father, you visited the Little Sisters of the Poor and we were told that you wanted to show your support for them and their case in the courts. And, Holy Father, do you also support those individuals, including government officials, who say they cannot in good conscience, their own personal conscience, abide by some laws or discharge their duties as government officials, for example in issuing marriage licenses to same sex couples? Do you support those kinds of claims of religious liberty?

Pope Francis: I can’t have in mind all cases that can exist about conscientious objection. But, yes, I can say conscientious objection is a right that is a part of every human right. It is a right. And if a person does not allow others to be a conscientious objector, he denies a right. Conscientious objection must enter into every juridical structure because it is a right, a human right. Otherwise we would end up in a situation where we select what is a right, saying 'this right that has merit, this one does not.' It (conscientious objection) is a human right. It always moved me when I read, and I read it many times, when I read the Chancon Roland, when the people were all in line and before them was the baptismal font – the baptismal font or the sword. And, they had to choose. They weren’t permitted conscientious objection. It is a right and if we want to make peace we have to respect all rights.

(Editor’s note: He’s referring to provencal poem: Song of Roland in which Crusaders forced Muslims to choose between being baptized or being killed by the sword. The Pope says they were not allowed to choose conscientious objection)

Terry Moran, ABC News: Would that include government officials as well?

Pope Francis: It is a human right and if a government official is a human person, he has that right. It is a human right.

SOURCE: http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/full-transcript-of-pope-francis-inflight-interview-from-philadelphia-to-rome-60499/

What the lawyer Staver stated:

Staver also pointed out that the pope mentioned freedom of conscience during his speech to Congress, although even the most direct reference to that subject was opaque: “A delicate balance is required to combat violence perpetrated in the name of a religion, an ideology or an economic system, while also safeguarding religious freedom, intellectual freedom, and individual freedoms,” the pope said.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/09/pope-francis-allegedly-met-with-kim-davis-what-does-it-mean/408166/

And what the Archbishop of Kentucky stated:

Joseph Kurtz, the archbishop of Louisville, Kentucky, and the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, wouldn’t comment on the meeting itself and how it came about, noting that he stayed about a mile away from the nunciature where Pope Francis stayed during his visit to D.C. But “I can comment on the fact that in Kentucky, I had said that I’m not a lawyer or a politician, but I had certainly hoped that room could be made for people of conscience,” he said on Wednesday. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops was the primary coordinator of the pope’s schedule during his visit to the United States.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/09/pope-francis-allegedly-met-with-kim-davis-what-does-it-mean/408166/

Of course, ABC and Bill Casey have an interesting history, banking with the Vatican through BCCI and all that -- not that he would have been a conscientious objector to the profits in finance and off-the-books skullduggery.

The real echo: Money to gain Power; Power to protect Money.

[joeybee12]

5. He also met with a group of nuns who are fighting Obamacare on

the contraception mandate...more ammo, IMHO, that he knew who davis was.

[Octafish]

7. Thanks for the kind reminder.

I would like to know what his true intentions are.

[pnwmom]

10. So? In his official speeches, he spoke out on the importance of universal insurance.

I don't think it matters who the Bishops asked him to meet with privately. The Bishops, as a group, are much more rightwing than he is.

[trotsky]

19. "The Bishops, as a group, are much more rightwing than he is."

Just curious, on what do you base this?

The bishops oppose abortion and all forms of contraception. So does the pope.

The bishops oppose marriage equality. So does the pope.

The bishops oppose anyone not cis-straight living the life they want, loving the person they want. So does the pope.

To their credit, the bishops recognize poverty as a problem we must fight. But then again, so does the pope. But neither wants to consider some of the major root causes (women's lack of power and control over their reproductive choices).

Can you explain to me why you think the bishops are more conservative than him? Are there some issues on which they disagree?

[pnwmom]

22. The Bishops were appointed by John Paul or Benedict.

And their focus has been on sexual morality. They wrote encyclicals on other issues, but to many of these Bishops the most important issue has been abortion, and the second most important has been anti-gay. Any Catholic in the pews knows this.

Neither Benedict nor John Paul would ever have said about a gay priest, "Who am I to judge?"

Pope Francis, on the other hand, has been making a concerted effort to shift the focus away from those issues to the environment and the global economy. In a whole week of public meetings, he never mentioned the word abortion, and when everyone thought he was about to, he called for an end to the death penalty instead. And he never mentioned contraception or sexual morality at all.

I think he was ill-used by whoever arranged for him to meet with Kim Davis. And even the Vatican realizes this, which is why their initial reaction was to refuse to confirm the meeting had taken place.

[trotsky]

23. OK, but you didn't answer my question.

I asked, "Are there some issues on which they disagree?"

Your answer simply noted a difference in their approaches to issues. The pope views homosexuality as a sin, just as the bishops do. His positions on abortion, contraception, and sexual morality are all the same as theirs - he just didn't emphasize them. Again, their positions are all the same.

So if you're going to say the bishops are more right-wing than the pope, you should be able to point to some issues on which the bishops take a conservative stance, and the pope a more liberal one. Can you?

[pnwmom]

24. The difference in focus makes a huge difference to Catholics in the pews, if not to you.

The impression conveyed by the other Popes, through their words and their actions, was that the only important, grave sins were abortion and gay sex (and murder, but that goes without saying). So if you were a straight male, and not a murderer, you never had to worry about grave sin. You were set.

Now, all those straight males are supposed to be examining their consciences for how they treat poor people and the environment. For Catholics like Scalia, Alito, Ryan and Gingrich, having a Pope tell them this must be quite an unwelcome shock.

[trotsky]

25. That is true, however that still doesn't answer my question.

How are the bishops more right-wing? Being "right-wing" is defined by policy positions, not approach.

John McCain is right-wing, but takes a more constructive approach to politics than Ted Cruz, who is also right-wing. They agree on topics like abortion, etc. They're both right-wing. See what I'm saying?

[pnwmom]

26. I don't define right-wing the same way you do. If you take some issues seriously

and only nod at others (if that), then you are more skewed to the issues you take seriously.

For example, if a governor keeps the marijuana law on the books, but directs the police not to enforce it, he's NOT as rightwing as a governor who keeps the marijuana law on the books and tells the police to throw everyone in jail.

Even though they have the exact same law on the books.

Same with laws against gay sex, which existed till fairly recently. A governor who tried to enforce those laws would have been more rightwing than a governor who directed the state prosecutors to ignore them.

[trotsky]

27. Your distinction on governors also fails.

This isn't about "laws on the books," it's about personal policy positions.

Marijuana isn't exactly a great example here, since it's not really a left-right issue. Tends to skew left, but there are a lot of righties OK with marijuana use, and many Democrats against it.

If both governors oppose marijuana use, then they're both "right-wing" if we slap that label on that position. If one directs police not to enforce it, it may be because he merely wants to use resources elsewhere. He might even have a more devious plan in place to go after marijuana users. Who knows? If one governor said "I support the recreational use of marijuana by responsible citizens," that would make them less right-wing than the other.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/right+wing

1. members of a conservative or reactionary political party, or those opposing extensive political reform.
2. such a political party or a group of such parties.
3. that part of a political or social organization advocating a conservative or reactionary position

I do not see the distinction you are attempting to make as being part of the definition here. You are certainly free to invent your own definition, but it then muddies the language and makes discussion more difficult.

[Bluenorthwest]

6. None so blind....

Vatican Strengthens Ties with Evangelicals and Mormons Against Gay Marriage
http://time.com/3597245/vatican-evangelicals-mormons-gay-marriage/

Read up. It's about a Vatican produced conference against marriage equality in Rome last November. It quotes invited Participant Tony Perkins of Family Research Council as saying the atmosphere was 'euphoric' Francis was keynote speaker. On Friday, in addition to meeting Francis, Davis was given an award by Tony Perkins and Family Research Council.
So Tony has been invited to Vatican events produced by Gerhard Muller Archbishop of Germany I think he is. Muller also produces the World Meeting of Families which was the Philly event which by the way, banned all LGBT voices and groups from taking part.

But I'm sure that Kim being in the company of Perkins who has been in the news talking about meeting with the Pope would not have anything to do with her meeting the Pope. Nah. Not convoluted enough.

[Octafish]

8. Tell me about it.

Conscientious objection is a loaded term. The right wingers have used it to smear peaceniks -- from World War 1 through Vietnam. It's not supposed to be a problem anymore, as we have a "volunteer force."

War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today.
- John F. Kennedy

President Kennedy was himself a war hero. He lost his older brother Joe on a secret mission in World War 2. JFK hated war. That's why, as President, he always worked for the best solution to conflict through peace. That is a truly democratic position.

[icymist]

9. Going from conscientious objection into actively practicing that objection is a thin line.

This is the conscientious objection by the Spanish Catholics in America toward those the Church condemned as sodomites in California:

"Balboa Throws the Indians Who Have Committed the Abominable Crime of Sodomy to be Torn to Bits by Dogs." Theodore de Bry, Engraving for America, 1590.10

Spanish colonizers—from royalty to soldier to padre—believed that American Indians were intellectually, physiologically, and spiritually immature, if not actual animals. In the area eventually known as California, the genocidal policies of the Spanish Crown would eventually lead to a severe population crash: numbering one million at first contact, California Indians plummeted to about ten thousand survivors in just over one hundred years. Part of this massive loss were third-gender people, who were lost not by "passive" colonizing collateral damage such as disease or starvation, but through active, conscious, violent extermination. Speaking of the Chumash people living along the southern coast (my grandmother’s tribal roots), Pedro Fages, a Spanish soldier, makes clear that the soldiers and priests colonizing Mexico and what would become California arrived with a deep abhorrence of what they viewed as homosexual relationships. In his soldier’s memoir, written in 1775, Fages reports:

I have substantial evidence that those Indian men who, both here and farther inland, are observed in the dress, clothing, and character of women—there being two or three such in each village—pass as sodomites by profession (it being confirmed that all these Indians are much addicted to this abominable vice) and permit the heathen to practice the execrable, unnatural abuse of their bodies. They are called joyas, and are held in great esteem. Let this mention suffice for a matter which could not be omitted,—on account of the bearing it may have on the discussion of the reduction of these natives,—with a promise to revert in another place to an excess so criminal that it seems even forbidden to speak its name. . . . But we place our trust in God and expect that these accursed people will disappear with the growth of the missions. The abominable vice will be eliminated to the extent that the Catholic faith and all the other virtues are firmly implanted there, for the glory of God and the benefit of those poor ignorants.

http://whenturtlesfly.blogspot.com/2009/09/weapons-of-mass-destruction-mastiffs.html

And this is the conscientious objection toward the canonization by Pope Francis of Junipero Serra, the Spanish Catholic missionary to California:

(CNN)While in Washington, Pope Francis canonized a Spanish missionary buried at a mission in California. Over the weekend, a statue of the new saint was vandalized.

Staff at the Carmel Mission Basilica found the courtyard statue of St. Junipero Serra toppled and splattered with paint. Police are investigating, the basilica said on its Facebook page.

"Apparently a person or persons broke in, splattered paint and toppled down the courtyard statue of St. Serra and other historic statues on display," the post said.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/28/us/california-carmel-saint-serra-vandalize-pope-francis/

This shows what this Pope cares about the LGBT community in that he canonizes a person connected to genocide (gendercide?) of people who permit 'sodomites' and then meets with Kim Davis. I'm sorry Mr Pope, you cannot have it both ways; the power to allow bigots space to practice discrimination while saying that you don't judge LGBTs at the same time!

[Octafish]

11. That's what I hate about the Truth.

Like the past, I can't change it. What I can do is try to use the Truth -- from the Church's history to the idea that all people are equal -- and be a better person. Personally, that means treating others as I'd like to be treated and thanking God for the opportunity to be a sentient being capable of loving.

[trotsky]

16. But that's the essence of the PR campaign that defines his papacy.

Say tolerant-sounding things, but change nothing. Fool the liberals with your words, placate the conservatives with your deeds.

And now, even AFTER his meeting with bigot-du-jour Kim Davis, there is STILL a loyal legion of his fan club here at DU trying desperately to spin things for Frank.

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

18. +1

n/t

[Arugula Latte]

12. Spin, spin, spin...The Pope is a victim!

[Octafish]

14. Yeah. He came all the way to the USA to talk to Fox News' favorite former Democrat.

The PR Guru Behind the Pope Who Is Charming the World

by Katie Engelhart
Vice.com, November 21, 2013

EXCERPT...

Far and wide, observers speak of a “Francis Effect”.

But every modern-day media darling needs a PR machine, and Pope Francis is no exception. Enter Greg Burke: the 53-year-old Fox News correspondent turned Holy See handler (officially, Senior Communications Advisor to the Vatican’s Secretariat of State) who is quietly changing the way things are done in Vatican City.

To some, Burke may have seemed an unlikely candidate for papal spin-doctor. He’s a layman without PR experience: a cheery American with a penchant for sports analogies. He’s also a member of the controversial Catholic order Opus Dei: a traditionalist and a celibate whose spiritual practice reportedly involves self-flagellation. But after a year and a half on the job, Burke is credited with helping to open up and rejuvenate the Holy See. Of course, Burke would say it’s all Francis’s doing. “I’m going to kick the ball to the Pope,” Burke explained at a recent lecture in London. “I mean, the Pope scores goals, you know? The Pope scores goals for us... The people are just eating this stuff up.”

SNIP...

Flash back a few years to the reign of Pope Benedict XVI: The Catholic Church was awash in scandal. In 2006, Benedict gave his now infamous “Regensburg lecture”, in which he quoted a brutal critique of Islam and irked Muslims the world over. Three years later, he left many aghast with his decision to reverse the excommunication of a Holocaust-denying bishop. In 2010, the Church was slammed with a new wave of paedophilia allegations – and then the Vatican Bank controversy, and then “Vatilieaks”. Added to all that, the people didn’t seem to take much to Pope Benedict. “Benedict doesn’t smile,” a young Italian woman working at a tourist shop by St Peter’s Square told me earlier this year. “He is too much German!”

In June 2012, the Vatican poached Greg Burke – then a Rome-based reporter for Fox News. Burke’s job would be to manage “communications issues” and to integrate the Vatican’s many media organs, explained a Vatican official. Burke himself said he was hired “to formulate the message and try to make sure everyone remains on message”.

“I know what journalists are looking for and what they need,” Burke told reporters, “and I know how things will play out in the media.”


CONTINUED...

http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/greg-burke-pope-pr

Nothing like PR skills, huh, Arugula Latte?

[trotsky]

17. Great article.

There are so many people who need to read it.

[Octafish]

30. Charles Pierce nailed it: The Vatican confirms Pope Francis was “ratf*cked” into meeting Kim Davis

Esquire's Charles Pierce speculated that Pope Francis had been railroaded by Evangelicals. Turns out he was right

SCOTT ERIC KAUFMAN
Salon, Oct. 2, 2015

EXCERPT...

Pierce wrote that we must “stipulate that there are more than a few members of the Church’s permanent bureaucracy, both within the Clan Of The Red Beanie and without, who are not happy that this gentleman got elected Pope, and who are not happy with what he’s done and said since he was.” If you are one of those people “and you’re looking to ratfuck the pope’s visit to the United States, and to his agenda in general, you’d be looking to put him in a box.”

“So, how would you do that?” Pierce asked, before answering, “I’d arrange for the pope to meet Davis, but not as an American culture war celebrity, but as a devout Christian whose faith is under vague assault.” Then, “with the pope safely back in Rome, I’d leak the news to a conservative Catholic website and wait for the inevitable explosion.”

Which, according to the Vatican’s latest statement, is exactly what happened. “The pope did not enter into the details of the situation of Mrs. Davis, and his meeting with her should not be considered a form of support of her position in all of its particular and complex aspects,” Rev. Lombardi said.

“Pope Francis met with several dozen persons who had been invited by the Nunciature to greet him as he prepared to leave Washington for New York City,” he continued. “Such brief greetings occur on all papal visits and are due to the Pope’s characteristic kindness and availability.”

“The Pope did not enter into the details of the situation of Mrs. Davis and his meeting with her should not be considered a form of support of her position in all of its particular and complex aspects.”

SOURCE: http://www.salon.com/2015/10/02/the_vatican_confirms_that_pope_francis_was_ratfcked_into_meeting_kim_davis/

Great links like to mine, as you know, for democracy, trotsky.

[trotsky]

31. Full damage control mode.

Here they go again. And folks just lap it up. So very sad.

[mulsh]

13. Charlie Pierce has some interesting stuff on this:

http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a38440/pope-francis-swindled-kim-davis-meeting/

[Octafish]

15. Faith-Based Goldbricking

Now that's what I'm talking about!

Was Pope Francis Actually Swindled into Meeting Kim Davis?

The Papal chase: WTF edition.

by Charles P. Pierce
Esquire, Oct. 1, 2015

EXCERPT...

The man is a real player within the institutional church. He first came to prominence as a whistleblower during one of the several investigations of the Vatican Bank, which may be what got him exiled to this godless Republic in the first place. Despite that fact, Vigano is well-known to be a Ratzinger loyalist and he always has been a cultural conservative, particularly on the issue of marriage equality. In April, in a move that was unprecedented, Vigano got involved with an anti-marriage equality march in Washington sponsored by the National Association For Marriage. (And, mirabile dictu, as we say around Castel Gandolfo at happy hour, one of the speakers at this rally was Mat Staver, who happens now to be Kim Davis's lawyer.) In short, Vigano, a Ratzinger loyalist, who has been conspicuous and publicly involved in the same cause as Kim Davis and her legal team, arranges a meeting with Davis that the legal team uses to its great public advantage. Once again paraphrasing New Orleans lawyer Lamar Parmentel from The Big Easy, the Vatican is a marvelous environment for coincidence.

(Also, I have been remiss in not mentioning that, because of the way John Paul II larded the cardinalate with conservatives, the pope was surrounded by conservative American clerics, including his host in Philadelphia, Charles Cardinal Chaput, who's really something of a dog's breakfast. While presiding in Denver, Chaput led the movement to deny communion to pro-choice American politicians. And, after this pope met with survivors of sexual abuse in Philadelphia, Chaput reached deeply into the Corporate Works Of Mercy to declare, "In some ways, we should get over this wanting to go back and blame, blame, blame. The church is happy to accept its responsibility, but I'm really quite tired of people making unjust accusations against people who are not to be blamed—and that happens sometimes." What a guy! As a pastor, Chaput would make a terrific collection agent.)

Ratzinger's fingerprints are all over this story. Vigano is a Benedict loyalist. Robert Moynihan, whose newsletter, Inside The Vatican, got the story first, is an actual lifelong Ratzinger protégé. And the Vatican press office acted just the way I'd want it to act, if I were the guy setting this up. First, it issues a silly non-denial denial, and then it merely confirms that the meeting occurred. At which point, the office clams up, leaving the story festering out there in the news cycle, and leaving the pope out there in the American culture war to twist in the wind. And, if this scenario is in any way accurate, it had its desired effect. The impact of what the pope actually said and did in America has been fairly well ratfcked.

Of course, this speculation depends vitally on the proposition that Papa Francesco didn't know who Kim Davis was, or anything about her current public display of faith-based goldbricking. I don't find that so very hard to believe; for all the attention it's gotten over here, it's not an international story of any consequence. (Whether he should have known about it, or have been briefed about it beforehand, is another matter entirely, as Dan Savage pointed out on Chris Hayes's program Wednesday night.) And, it can be argued, I guess, that I'm engaging in apologetics here. But the whole thing is just a little too hinky, and I know too well how these birds operate. They've had millennia to get really good at it.

SOURCE (W/LINKS): http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a38440/pope-francis-swindled-kim-davis-meeting/

Gee. That article looks familiar.

Thank you, mulsh. That is an outstanding read, usual form for Charlie Pierce.

[hamsterjill]

20. Why doesn't Kim Davis object to the Pope?

If she's an Apostolic Christian, wouldn't she take issue with parishioners being asked to confess their sins to a man (i.e., a priest) rather than directly to God himself? And since the Pope is representative of that faith, wouldn't she object to being in the same room as the Pope? I mean, standing next to him might imply that she approves of the demands of Catholicism.

Surely, if she objects so strongly to having her name on a piece of paper that is, in reality, nothing more than a receipt for the collection of a fee imposed by Rowan County for a marriage license, she would take issue with something as contradictory to her faith as confession to a priest!

[Octafish]

21. Great questions, yours. I am a Roman Catholic with fundamentalist Buddhist and Sufi elements.

So, I go with the open heart school of mind. Most of my Catholic friends, including more than a couple of priests, feel that love is what matters.

For instance, what Teilhard de Chardin observed:

“The day will come when, after harnessing space, the winds, the tides, and gravitation, we shall harness for God the energies of love. And on that day, for the second time in the history of the world, we shall have discovered fire.”

-- Fr. Teilhard de Chardin, S.J., "The Evolution of Chastity," in Toward the Future, 1936, XI, 86-87

http://teilharddechardin.org/index.php/teilhards-quotes

We're heading in that direction, hamsterjill! Thanks to you and all who care, it's coming a lot faster than anybody ever thought possible.

[hamsterjill]

28. Thank you. I agree completely. It is LOVE that matters.

As a liberal Christian, I have the "open heart school of mind" myself. Love is the most important thing, and with it, all things are possible. It is very disturbing when I see so called "Christians" preaching hate and, not only preaching it, but using twisted scripture to justify that hate. Love. That's what we all need, especially during these perilous times.

When we do harness for God the energies of love - - - I want to live in THAT world.

[Octafish]

29. When we approach our individual problems with empathy, we move the world in that direction.

Now, that isn't to say to let the warmongers and banksters get away with it. If we do, they'll move the world toward what we've been living for 53 years, where "Money Trumps Peace" and "Might Makes Right."

[Dont call me Shirley]

32. Learn to love yourself first, then love for the world is automatic. Love is the answer, O!