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For as long as anyone can remember, the Vatican has had a special genius for snatching public relations defeat from the jaws of victory.
Even by that standard, the fracas surrounding Pope Francis’ meeting with Kim Davis last week, which broke out immediately after his massively successful US trip, sets a new standard.
Without necessarily blaming the pope’s own media team, which seemingly was caught as off-guard as everyone else, there have been three separate breakdowns in communications strategy:
- Apparently believing (or perhaps just hoping) that the pope’s brief encounter with the Kentucky clerk wouldn’t leak out.
- Not being prepared to respond immediately when the news did break, thereby creating an interpretive vacuum.
- Issuing a belated statement saying the pope did not intend to endorse Davis’ position “in all its particular and complex aspects,” but leaving unresolved precisely what he did mean by it.
One predictable consequence is that just as the past 48 hours were consumed by speculation over who put the pope up to the meeting, the next 48 will probably be marked by conspiracy theories as to who put him up to issuing the statement.
Another is that liberals will take a maximal reading of the statement, suggesting the pope has disavowed Davis, while conservatives will argue it simply means Francis hasn’t written her a blank check. Perhaps intentionally, the brief text could lend itself to either interpretation.
For a pope who by rights should be basking in the after-glow of a bravura outing to Cuba and the United States, it’s a fairly depressing scenario.
Aside from Machiavellian subplots and political spin, there is one serious conclusion to be drawn from the mess: There is now an urgent need for the Catholic Church to elaborate on precisely how it understands the right, and the limits, of conscientious objection. Continue reading
Sources
- Image: YouTube
- John L. Allen Jr., associate editor of Crux and specializes in coverage of the Vatican.
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