Mel Gibson, the controversial actor and director, is publicly spporting excommunicated Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò. Gibson wrote a letter addressed to Viganò on the blog of traditionalist publicist Aldo Maria Valli. In his letter Gibson referred to Pope Francis by his birth name, Jorge Bergoglio, and commended Viganò as a “courageous hero”. “I’m sure you Read more
In June 1973 Juan Perón, the 77-year-old former Argentinian president, came home to Buenos Aires from exile in Franco’s Spain after an absence of 18 years. That same year Father Jorge Bergoglio of the Society of Jesus became the head of Argentina’s Jesuits at the age of 36. One day he would become pope. Perón Read more
When Pope Francis visited his predecessor at Castle Gandolfo in March, he said to Benedict XVI that “we are brothers.” This image nicely frames the differences between them. It underscores that the election of Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio was not a rupture in the Church (as some suggest) but an unexpected lesson in apostolic continuity. Specifically, Read more
Much has been made of the impressions Pope Francis has created by his ordinary, every day activities: catching buses, using a telephone to make his own calls, not dressing in all the fine drapery usually worn by popes, treating people respectfully as he did the journalists, celebrating the Holy Thursday Mass in a Roman prison. Read more