Australia and the World Past and Present

During his papacy, pope Francis raised the ire of some of the more conservative cardinals within the Catholic church.

There were flashpoints over communion for divorced Catholics, sexuality and the Pope’s ecumenical outreach.

Some commentators describe such criticism emanating from the conservatives as ‘reactionary’. The cardinals themselves would probably argue that they are upholding the eternal truths of the Church.

The controversy over relaxing communion for divorced or remarried Catholics was intense amongst the clergy. The reality is that many Catholics find themselves in this boat. They still consider themselves Catholic. Their faith is important to them and their religious community is important to them. In practice, many divorced and remarried people continue to take communion. Francis was always looking for ways to draw in or keep lay members in the fold. Sometimes there is gap between Church doctrine and people’s lives. Francis was seeking to be as inclusive as possible. But when it came to changing Church doctrine, it was going to see a reaction from some of the clergy.

Same-sex marriage was another flashpoint. Francis supported the long-held doctrine of marriage being between a man and a woman. But he was looking at things like blessings for civil unions. He was searching for other ways to welcome the gay community to the Church. For some, this would never be enough.

The more Conservative cardinals tend to believe that there are core teachings that have stood the better part of two millennia and that these should not be subject to change. They argue that these teachings give followers a reference point for how to live their lives. They say that these are eternal truths that shouldn’t change with the vagaries of time. That they are not culture or time-dependent. That they are universal truths that stand for all time.

A more liberal view is that the Church must move with the times and adapt to society as it changes. That it should reflect present-day issues and concerns. While conservatives say that it is people who should change, ‘liberals’ are open to changing canon law.

Much of these debates played out in the 1960s through Vatican II. This movement within the Catholic Church stressed the importance of human rights and suggested that the use of Latin is Mass was unnecessary.

In the traditional Mass a priest often faces towards the alter and ‘God’. Proponents of a more congregation-centered Church suggest that priests should face towards worshippers and address them in the local vernaculars. So for many Conservatives, Vatican II represented a turning away from God towards humanism or populism.

After Francis became Pope in 2013, he moved to remove some of the more conservative cardinals from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. This body is responsible for discipline within the Church and is very influential in the teachings of the Church.

One of those removed was US cardinal Raymond Burke. Burke was seen as being more clericalist than pastoralist. Burke would become one of the most vocal critics of Francis.

There has always been different views within the Catholic Church. It was inevitable that Francis’ papacy would lead to some kind on Conservative reaction. The question was going to be how intense that opposition would be. For some, core Catholic concepts such as sin and repentance were being tossed aside, with the Church trying to adapt to a post-Christian world.

Some cardinals will be viewing the upcoming conclave as an opportunity to right the ship. They believed that the pendulum had swung to far under Francis and now they want it to swing back the other way. However, the College of Cardinals now may well have a tendency to continue in the tradition of Francis given that he has appointed so many of them as cardinals in the first place.