Pope Francis, The Joy of Love, and the pastoring of souls

*UPDATE: Cardinal Schönborn Gives Clarification on Communion (hopefully, this will put all the anti-Francis nastiness to rest.)

I am not going to lie. I am exhausted. I have been discussing the Pope's latest exhortation on my Facebook page for two days now, in several different posts and threads, and it's taken its toll. But, I have to blog it, and I hope to be coherent.

Pope Francis' post-synodal exhortation, Amoris Laetitia (AL), “The Joy of Love” is a 255-page, nine chapter document about Love and the Family. It's deep, thorough, beautiful, and wonderfully practical. It clearly and unequivocally restates Church teaching that abortion, contraception, and gay "marriage" are objectively, intrinsically immoral. It stresses the right of a child to have a mother and a father, the right of parents to educate their children, and the rights of conscience for health care workers and others.

I've heard almost no one talk about those facts or what else is in the document (and there is so much!). I've only heard people talk about what is not actually in the document, but what they believe is implied in a footnote, and they are upset.

Keep in mind: AL is not a doctrinal document, it is a pastoral one meant to accompany us messy, wounded souls on our journey to the heart of the Trinity. The exhortation is not magisterial in nature and does not intend to change magisterial teaching.

However, the ferocity and malice from some of the "faithful" is appalling. Listen well, please: I am not appalled by those who simply feel confused about some of the language used in the document -- specifically, that one footnote in this vast work, which the pope could not even immediately recall when asked about it on the plane ride on April 16. But on that plane ride, he did express great frustration with the fact that the media was focused on something they considered most important (the question of Holy Communion for the divorced and remarried), not what he considered most important:

"When I convoked the first synod, the great concern of the majority of the media was communion for the divorced and remarried, and, since I am not a saint, this bothered me, and then made me sad. Because...do you not realize that that is not the important problem? Don’t you realize that instead the family throughout the world is in crisis? Don’t we realize that the falling birth rate in Europe is enough to make one cry? And the family is the basis of society. Do you not realize that the youth don’t want to marry? ... Don’t you realize that the lack of work or the little work (available) means that a mother has to get two jobs and the children grow up alone? These are the big problems."

I share the Holy Father's frustration! It is troubling to me that the firestorm of discussion on social media is about something that, frankly, isn't even there. It troubles me that vast numbers of critics have not even read the document.

If nothing else, I urge all those concerned about the exhortation to read the "controversial" chapter, which is Chapter 8. I read it, and I found it true, and good, and beautiful. I kept shaking my head as I read it, wondering on what basis folks were upset? I kept thinking, "But there is nothing new here! I have know all of this for 21 years, since my reversion. It's nothing new!"

I am guessing that this type of passage, below, is what bothers some people, but can someone explain why? These are the same principles the Church has always used when discerning and pastoring individual souls and culpability:


301. For an adequate understanding of the possibility and need of special discernment in certain “irregular” situations, one thing must always be taken into account, lest anyone think that the demands of the Gospel are in any way being compromised. The Church possesses a solid body of reflection concerning mitigating factors and situations. Hence it is can no longer simply be said that all those in any “irregular” situation are living in a state of mortal sin and are deprived of sanctifying grace. More is involved here than mere ignorance of the rule. A subject may know full well the rule, yet have great difficulty in understanding “its inherent values”, or be in a concrete situation which does not allow him or her to act differently and decide otherwise without further sin. As the Synod Fathers put it, “factors may exist which limit the ability to make a decision”.

302. The Catechism of the Catholic Church clearly mentions these factors: “imputability and responsibility for an action can be diminished or even nullified by ignorance, inadvertence, duress, fear, habit, inordinate attachments, and other psychological or social factors”. In another paragraph, the Catechism refers once again to circumstances which mitigate moral responsibility, and mentions at length “affective immaturity, force of acquired habit, conditions of anxiety or other psychological or social factors that lessen or even extenuate moral culpability”. For this reason, a negative judgment about an objective situation does not imply a judgment about the imputability or culpability of the person.

(I urge you to read the entire chapter so that even this perfectly sound passage is put in the context of the whole.)

The Pope exhorts pastors to walk with, to "accompany", the wounded on their journeys to Christ and sanctity. It's what we do, it's what Christ does, it's what mercy and love require. In no way (and the pope says this time and again) does this change the moral law or the teaching of the Church or the requirements of the Gospel. But it acknowledges that in countless cases, due to the messed up cultures we all live in now, and the lack of formed consciences, we find ourselves in some real fixes! Some from which we cannot easily be extricated.

I use merely one example here, and it's a common one (I taught RCIA for five years, I can tell you many more):

A pastor encounters a secular and/or Protestant woman who (civilly) married a divorced man 20 years ago. She is currently moved to become a Catholic, but her beloved husband is not. Her secular husband wants no part of an annulment proceeding for his first marriage (let's say it was a Protestant wedding and assumed sacramental), and he certainly will not agree to live without sex for the rest of his life so that his wife can become Catholic and receive Communion. There are four children in the home, and that happy, stable home will be put at risk and likely be broken apart for those innocent children if the woman suddenly cuts the man off sexually. The Catholic Church recognizes the difficult situation and does not (now or previously) advise breaking apart the family.

So, what is the woman in the scenario to do? How does a pastor advise this particular soul in her particular situation? It's extremely complex (remember, truths and principles are simple, but people and circumstances are complicated), and aside from judicial issues, there are pastoral issues involved for this infinitely valuable soul and the souls of her family. That is exactly the kind of thing, that complexity, that question of levels of culpability, that Pope Francis was addressing in Chapter 8, and there is nothing new there.

The pope is addressing pastors who are dealing with these excruciating situations where individual human beings may not be fully culpable when they find themselves in a type of no-man's land with no easy solution.

We can work to gather people in, or we can push them away.

The hand-wringing, the complaints, the anger, the vitriol, the despairing by otherwise "faithful" Catholics is hard to watch. There is true hatred for this pope, and it's sad and ugly! (And I'm saying this as someone who admittedly prefers the "style" and doctrinal clarity of a Benedict or a St. John Paul II.)

I used to get annoyed when people would focus on the sins of the "older brother" in the Parable of the Prodigal Son, (because I so sympathized with that older brother) but now I see why he is the most miserable of the characters in the story. When we have everything, when all that the Father has is ours, why are we (as I was) so afraid at the idea that someone else might "get away with something"? I also think about the Parable of the Laborers, and those who came late and got the same wage as those of us who worked all day. Have we been treated unjustly? No, we haven't! Our wage is just! Are we envious because God is generous and extends mercy to those who haven't been laboring as long as we have -- or can't just "get it right"?

I reiterate: I am not speaking to those who simply wish to have clarification about the document and those who are sincerely confused. But there is something unholy about the whole-sale ignoring of a 255-page document by the Vicar of Christ on the crisis of marriage and family, when it's a message this world so desperately needs to hear.





Related article:  Amoris Laetitia and the Progressive Pope Myth