UNITED KINGDOM
Independent Catholic News

Rebecca Tinsley
Tuesday, June 9, 2015

“The Great Reformer: Francis and the making of a radical Pope”
by Austen Ivereigh, publisher: Allen & Unwin, 2105

A recent profile of Pope Francis in Der Spiegel* reports a Vatican whispering campaign against the Argentine pontiff. When Francis highlighted the pomp and ostentation of the clergy, it was “an unspoken declaration of war, especially against the Vatican Curia.” By challenging corruption in the Vatican bank, and ex-communicating Mafia bosses, Francis also confronted Rome’s unsavoury vested interests, the article suggests. Those plotting against Francis accuse him of caring little for tradition or theology, wondering if his “confusion” will abate by the Synod of Bishops in October.

This whispering campaign makes Austen Ivereigh’s biography of Jorge Bergoglio all the more timely.

The story of Bergoglio, as Ivereigh tells it, is also the story of Argentina. The reader…