PopeWatch: Lord Dorwin Papacy

Ah, another fan of Asimov's Foundation Trilogy! And Mr McClarey has some choice words about Francis's words.

From The American Catholic

By Donald R. McClarey

The late Nelson Rockefeller liked to use the phrase in his speeches: Brotherhood of Man under the Fatherhood of God.  His aides used to privately refer to this as Bomfog:  a substance free platitude that sounded good and meant absolutely nothing.

The Pope is quite the Bomfog Artist.  A recent example:

“While a few sow tensions, confrontations and falsehoods”, he said, “we, on the other hand, are invited to patiently and decisively build a culture of peace, which is directed towards initiatives that embrace all aspects of human life and help us to reject the virus of indifference”.

What does he gain by this?  Favorable coverage in the Left-leaning media which seems all-important to him.

What does this obligate him to do?  Nothing.

What does the phrase mean?  Mean?  Glittering generalities are not supposed to mean anything substantive.

Much of this Papacy can be summed up by this observation from the first volume of Asimov’s Foundation trilogy:

“The analysis was the most difficult of the three by all odds. When Holk, after two days of steady work, succeeded in eliminating meaningless statements, vague gibberish, useless qualifications – in short, all the goo and dribble – he found he had nothing left. Everything cancelled out.

Lord Dorwin, gentlemen, in five days of discussion didn’t say one damned thing, and said it so you never noticed.”