Pope Lennon I

Mark Lambert on Francis's seeming aversion to the Sign of the Cross and blessing people.

From De Omnibus Dubitandum Est.

After the Pope admonishes Italian footballers (soccer players for my American readers) for making the sign of the cross before matches, I had to - yet again - cock an eyebrow and say "what the...?"

The Pope has previously caused a great deal of consternation by not making the sign of the cross, on numerous occasions he has refused to give his apostolic blessing at an audience:

Again you wonder what on earth is he doing??

Who can forget the weirdness back in March when he decided to sharply withdraw his hand from anyone trying to kiss the papal ring?

And then there are instances like this when he ridiculed an altar boy for standing with his hands together in a prayerful posture:

And yet this all contradicts his prepared general audience catechises where he has spoken about the importance of making the Sign of the Cross. As always with Pope Francis, the words and the actions rarely correspond!

Whatever he intends by these mixed messages, it is hard to reconcile them with the man who is charged with the office of the prince of the Apostles.

It is quite extraordinary that there are still people trying to explain away the strangely anti-Catholic things the pope does and says, many of them even blame the faithful, criticise the laity for not understanding. Honestly it’s like enabling an abuser!

Dr Peter Kwasniewski wrote a blistering critique of the Pope's Christmas address posted at The Remnant. He has also constructed a word cloud which bore interesting results which speak for themselves.

“Change” is mentioned 32 times in the document. “New” is mentioned 26 times. “Jesus” or “Christ” is mentioned 9 times. “Tradition” is mentioned 4 times. “Truth” is mentioned once.
Whatever inspiration Newman may or may not have contributed to this address, one thing is clear: for Pope Francis, to be perfect is to talk about change often.

I think he should have concluded his address: "𝑴𝒆𝒓𝒓𝒚 𝑪𝒉𝒂𝒏𝒈𝒆𝒎𝒂𝒔!"

Although there are consistently conflicting reports about the Pope, like his football admonishment about not making the sign of the Cross juxtaposed with his audience admonishment to make the sign of the Cross, the distressing direction of travel for Pope Francis seems very much to be against expressions of religion.

Couple this with his UN involvement where he recently gave a speech calling for a new supranational "legally constituted authority" to meet the great moral evils of "climate change" and "new slavery" to tackle "global challenges facing humanity, such as integral development, peace, care of our common home, climate change, poverty, war, migration, human trafficking, organ trafficking, the protection of the common good and new forms of slavery." All sounds great, but the UN's unabashed agenda in this direction mostly involves contraception and abortion to stem the growing population.

And let's not forget his visit to the UAE where he signed a “Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and Living Together” with Sheik Ahmad el-Tayeb, Grand Imam of Cairo’s al-Azhar Mosque, during the interreligious meeting in Abu Dhabi on Feb. 4.

The document incited controversy among Christians for asserting that “the pluralism and the diversity of religions” are “willed by God in His wisdom” – a statement many believe contravenes the Catholic Faith.

It seems very much like the direction of travel is towards no religion. Or am I missing something?