Reformed Rhetoric: Priming the Catholic Church for Long-term Change
By Minnie Jang
Over seven million followers on Twitter. Time’s 2013 “Person of the Year.” Hundreds of thousands of people lined up in the streets to see him during his recent visit to the United States. Since his election in April 2013, Pope Francis has garnered unparalleled media attention. With nearly 50,000 media mentions in his first year as pontiff alone and tourism in Vatican City tripling since the beginning of his tenure, he has brought increased attention to the papacy and gained a celebrity-like status. Media outlets are fond of calling him “the people’s pope.” This label draws attention to Pope Francis’s message of compassion for marginalized populations. Through rhetoric of openness and compassion, he has shifted the conversation away from traditionally controversial social issues, such as homosexuality and divorce, to that of building “a church that is poor and is for the poor.” In evaluating the pope and his refocused rhetoric, the natural inclination is to look for tangible results. How many people has he lifted out of poverty? How much have Church expenditures changed? Yet these quantitative measures are the wrong frame of analysis. Harvard Divinity School assistant dean for ministry studies and field education Emily Click explained to the HPR that Pope Francis is not trying to control outcomes, and that “we often discount a shift in conversation as a powerful move.” While attempting to measure “the Francis effect” has value in ensuring that rhetoric does not wholly replace action, it should not substitute or devalue the importance of conversational change. During the first two and a half years of his papacy, Pope Francis has initiated this complex process of change, looking outward toward the global Church’s varying priorities and looking inward toward reforming the discourse of the Church itself. These rhetoric-based reforms have sown the seeds of long-term change, which is just beginning to be defined in concrete terms. The Past And Present Of A Global Church As one of the oldest religious institutions in existence, the Vatican has accumulated a significant amount of historical baggage, from sexual abuse scandals to financial corruption, along the way. Although attempts have been made to modernize the Church’s practices, most notably during the Second Vatican Council 50 years ago, change is slow at St. Peter’s Basilica. In the United States, that process has been frustrating for Catholics whose views align with those of John Gehring, author of The Francis Effect: A Radical Pope’s Challenge to the American Catholic Church. He describes how a church that was “once known as a towering force for social justice became known for a narrow agenda most closely aligned with one political party.” Modern-day perception commonly links the Catholic Church to inflexible moral beliefs regarding social issues and associates it with conservative parties in the United States. However, in the Western world, the Catholic Church’s global reach is often forgotten. Pope Francis’s message reaches beyond American Catholics and their familiarity with issues of abortion, marriage, and divorce to Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa, which account for the bulk of the Church’s growth in followers over the past century. A lamentation from Ugandan bishop Joseph Anthony Zziwa, a participant in the Vatican’s synod this fall, illuminates this dichotomy. He indignantly said, “You keep asking someone from Nigeria to tell me about homosexuality, to tell me about divorce, when five of his children have been abducted by Boko Haram? You think that person has time to talk about that?” Representing a country in which homosexuality is criminalized and family structures are non-nuclear, Bishop Zziwa shines light on the stark contrast between the dominant themes of Catholic debate in America and the priorities of countries facing far more urgent challenges. As the first pope from Latin America, Pope Francis is sensitive to the needs of the global Church, having made serving the poor a priority when in his home country of Argentina. Now his rhetorical commitment is directed towards ushering in a new era of inclusivity for non-Western Catholics, as changing demographics move the Church’s population center further south. Re-Form A poverty-centric, compassionate discourse, however, is not foundationally different from what the Catholic Church has always advocated as its mission. Previous popes have berated capitalism in its unregulated form, and “a preferential option for the poor,” a doctrinal mandate to aid those in need, has long been ingrained in Catholic social teaching. If Pope Francis is not fundamentally changing any doctrines, can he truly be called a reformer? Harvard Divinity School professor Francis Clooney, S.J. would argue that he is. In an interview with the HPR, he stated, “Reform is quite often a return to the basics; it is re-form, removing errant bad habits, unnecessary cultural and clerical baggage.” By adopting a tone that is welcoming and forgiving with regard to contentious social issues while simultaneously refocusing attention toward service, Pope Francis is returning the Church to one of its central missions in caring for the poor. As Clooney puts it, by introducing “a breath of fresh air, a redirection of the Church from self-protectiveness to engag-?ing the real needs of real people,” Pope Francis bridges the gap between doctrine and lived experience. From his unadorned frock to his decision to live in the Vatican guesthouse rather than the papal palace, his personal example underscores his connection with real people and communities. Moreover, his humility ?is symbolic. After delivering a historic address to Congress this past September, he went to bless a meal with the homeless of Washington, D.C., sending a clear message about the nature of his constituency. Pope Francis’s actions intersect with the most radical aspect of his rhetoric, which is his admittance of weakness and imperfection. When asked point-blank the question, “Who is Jorge Mario Bergoglio?” the pope reflected and responded, “I am a sinner whom the Lord has looked upon.” Rather than have the people come to him, Pope Francis goes to the people, and in doing so, he challenges others to do the same. Practice What You Preach While Pope Francis has reinvigorated the Church’s emphasis on poverty, it is less clear whether any action has accompanied this rhetoric. Catholic organizations make up a bulk of Forbes’s most recent list of the 50 largest charities in America, including Catholic Charities USA at number 13, Catholic Medical Mission Board at number 18, and Catholic Relief Services at number 45. Similarly, there are thousands of Catholic parishes serving their local communities in every region of the world. Due to the magnitude of the Catholic Church’s charitable reach, it is difficult to measure the extent to which Pope Francis’s arrival in the Vatican has had an effect on the giving of Catholic charities. However, on an individual level, there has been a marked change. A study conducted by Foundations?and Donors Interested in Catholic Activities in March 2014 found that one in four U.S. Catholics polled had increased their charitable giving in the year following Pope Francis’s election. Notably, 77 percent of those Catholics attributed their increased donations to the new pope, while remarking that they are likely to give more to Catholic organizations in the future as well. Although such evidence is beginning to show concrete results of “the Francis effect,” many Catholic leaders would argue that?it is too soon to feel the full benefits. In an interview with the HPR, Msgr. John Enzler, the president and CEO of Catholic Charities in Washington, D.C., explained how he expects to see a significant increase in giving around the holiday season, especially after the publicity garnered by Pope Francis’s recent visit. However, he notes that the pope’s greatest impact thus far has been in garnering more interest in Catholic Charities. The pope’s social media outreach and large-scale engagement have compelled Catholics and non-Catholics alike to pledge themselves to service. More than 100,000 individuals signed up for Walk with Francis, a campaign that included a pledge to “serve by reaching out and caring for those in need and supporting charitable efforts in our communities and beyond.”?Weighing the benefits of this increased attention, Click stressed that Pope Francis’s conversational change is a significant and powerful action in and of itself. “The very first step has to be getting people to look at things differently,” she said. “It’s not sufficient, but it’s also not sufficient to try and jump to the change. People just won’t get there.” While there have been concrete effects on charitable giving because of Pope Francis’s rhetoric, these positive changes pale in comparison to the good done by his changing tone. Rhetorical change may be difficult to quantify and measure, but it is integral to creating long-lasting effects. Pope Of The People In the context of the Catholic Church’s long and complicated history, Pope Francis is opening the page to a new chapter, implementing incremental changes with effects that may not be evident in their early stages but will hold major implications for the future. Shifting papal conversation to focus on the immediate needs of lived experiences and highlighting humanity’s obligation to care for the poor are his first steps to actually ending those inequalities and uplifting marginalized populations. Thus, his rhetoric and refocusing are just the start of his long-term goals. He is presenting Catholics with an opportunity to look outward and inward; to welcome and forgive; to recommit to compassion and service. For leaders like Msgr. Enzler, Francis’s message has given great “impetus, inspiration, and challenge to be more and more respondent to his example.” Drawing less from Francis’s celebrity and more from his leadership as a pope of the people, Msgr. Enzler explained, “The pope has just reaffirmed what I had believed. His message makes me more anxious to fulfill his dream and my dream as well, walking down in tandem with him trying to do work for the poor.” Leaders of the Catholic Church like Msgr. Enzler are taking seeds of the pope’s reformed rhetoric and planting them in different pockets of the world. The full “Francis effect” has yet to take hold, but it is clear that Pope Francis is spreading hope by his own example, rebranding and reaffirming Catholicism to meet the challenges of a changing world.
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