Pomp and Plainness
May 22, 2025 | 329 words | Papal Politics, World Economics
The Catholic Church just selected a new Pope, amid much pomp and circumstance. Some 133 old guys who had achieved the rank of “Cardinal” cast their votes in the Sistine Chapel, one of the world’s most intricately decorated sacred spaces, while dressed in flowing red vestments and matching caps.
Once the ‘winner’ was announced all the participants changed into flowing white vestments with pointy white hats, to formally acknowledge the elevation of one of their own into this new, very demanding role, leading an organization with 1.3 billion members. As it did for many people around the world, this announcement and the accompanying ceremony brought tears to my eyes.
But the Catholic right in the United States responded with fear and alarm, as reported by Kathryn Joyce in Vanity Fair magazine. She quotes a variety of ‘traditionalist’ pod casters who are not fooled by Leo XIV’s decision to wear the formal vestments Francis shunned when greeting the multitudes for the first time as Pope from the balcony in St. Peter’s Square. They don’t care if he will be more amenable to the Latin Mass that Francis was trying to quell near the end of his papacy,
Instead they ruminate about what they feel is a new liberal status quo. They sense Leo will follow what for them is a heretical path, where the word ‘ecumenicism’ is hijacked to mean all religions will get you to heaven. They brood over the continued implementation of Amoris Laetitia, Francis’s 2016 apostolic exhortation that opened the door for divorced and remarried Catholics to receive communion.
Meanwhile, far away from both the majesty of the Sistine Chapel and the strain of traditionalist complaint, much of the world’s Catholic population contents itself to worship in quite modest structures, amid a daily struggle for one or more of life’s necessities – food, clothing, and shelter. Things the most ardent conservative podcasters here in the privileged United States already have in abundance, and therefore take for granted.
Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr.
bobcavjr@gmail.com