When friends question the pope: 3 simple steps

Pope Francis delights people worldwide, as we saw in his recent visit to East Asia and Oceania. 

He also drives people crazy worldwide, and we saw that, too, for instance when he said: “All religions are paths to God. I will use an analogy, they are like different languages that express the divine.”

This alarmed many Catholics who believe, with the Catechism, that, “All salvation comes from Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body.”

They worried that the Pope himself was saying otherwise. He’s not. 

I wrote a whole book about the need to be clear about What Pope Francis Really Said. The book came to Audible last September and an article I wrote referencing it attracted 20,000 readers after Pope Francis spoke on 60 Minutes.

As I say in the book, there are three simple steps Catholics can take when they are troubled by what the Pope said.

First: Double check the Catechism.

Often, the “troubling” things Pope Francis says are just paraphrases of the Catechism. 

What I quoted above about salvation is from No. 846 of the Catechism. What comes right before it and right after it are also important. 

Right before it, the Church teaches about truth in other faiths, and says about Muslims: “together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day.” 

Right after it, the Catechism teaches that “Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart and, moved by grace, try in their actions do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience —  those too may achieve eternal salvation.”

Second: After checking the Catechism, check the context.

It’s always helpful to read the actual words of the Pope, which are available with a little digging, and not just a reporter’s account. (If you are reading a reporter's account, consider the publication and its own leanings, just as you would when reading secular news.)

When the Pope says something in a magisterial document defining what Catholics believe, then the charism of papal infallibility comes into play and Catholics must give the “obedience of faith.” But when the Pope says something in an informal setting, there is no expectation of infallibility.

These remarks were a impromptu question-and-answer session with young people of various religions. Singapore has only a small percentage of Catholics. The Pope was not trying to give Catholics the final word on the Church’s teaching; he was giving non-Catholics a first word on the Church’s teaching. 

At the same time, Catholics give “religious assent” even to non-magisterial statements the pope makes, when he is trying to help us understand revelation better. That means his words are something we should pay attention to.

In this case, Pope Francis is showing us that, when it comes to sharing the faith with non-believers, we should stress first what they get right, not what they get wrong. Jesus himself did this with the woman at the well, making sure to also stress that he is the one salvation. Jesus also stressed the holiness of other faiths in the Parable of the Good Samaritan.

Third: Follow the Pope, adding whatever details of the faith you think are important.

Last, if you think that the Pope left something out or said something unclearly, then maybe the Holy Spirit is urging you to action. Go and do what the Pope did: Encounter people who don’t know Jesus Christ, and share your love of Christ with them.

Catholics have “the obligation and the right to evangelize all,” as the Catechism puts it — or, as Pope Francis said, “There is a kind of preaching which falls to each of us as a daily responsibility. It has to do with bringing the Gospel to the people we meet, whether they be our neighbors or complete strangers” (No. 127).

He said that in The Joy of Evangelization  and followed it up by saying words very relevant to his remarks in Singapore. 

Pope Francis’s Singapore address was meant to console. Follow it up with texts meant to teach. In this case, maybe:

Of course, I also think you should read (or listen to) What Pope Francis Really Said, but I’m biased.

Read below what Aleteia said about the address, at the end of his Singapore trip.