It is one thing "to take tradition into account, to consider situations from the past, but quite another to be closed up inside a dogmatic box" Francis said.

He was responding to a probe into his thoughts on the backlash against his papacy by conservatives, including US clergy members.

According to the Daily Mail newspaper, the Pope's criticism will make explosive viewing on Sunday when the full interview is released in the US.

Same Church, different views

Francis envisions a merciful Catholic Church open to everyone. He describes it as a "field hospital" ready to bind up the wounds of a suffering humanity.

He's called for Catholics to embrace LGBTQ+ Catholics.

Last December, he approved letting Catholic priests bless same-sex couples - although the Church maintains a ban on gay marriage.

The blessing is for the people, not 'the union' itself, Francis says in the CBS interview.

"Some people were scandalised by this. But why?" he asks. Homosexuality is not a crime but a "human fact".

Not everyone's pleased with his ideas.

More conservative Catholics - including many groups in the United States - say they want a pope who lays down the law and presents doctrine in black-and-white terms.

They oppose the church becoming more welcoming to LGBT people and to giving lay people bigger roles in the institution.

They're not impressed with the Pope's outspokenness on the plight of migrants and on the need to address climate change either.

Calling out critics

Francis is straightforward about calling out his critics.

Some opponents in the US are "backwardists" who have replaced faith with ideology, the Pope says.

Last year he dismissed conservative Bishop Joseph E. Strickland who was a withering critic of his papacy and accused Francis of undermining the church's central teachings.

Recently, he has also sanctioned one of his most outspoken critics, US Cardinal Raymond Burke.

The Pope's remarks to CBS come at a time when a spotlight has been thrown on an extreme socially conservative trend in the US Catholic church.

This trend was highlighted by a sports celebrity's recent address at a Catholic school.

He described Pride Month as "evil" and suggested women would find the most fulfilment as homemakers.

Source

• CNN
• Daily Mail

Their concerns follow a speech on religious freedom last week, where Barr said "militant secularists" were behind a "campaign to destroy the traditional moral order".

He claimed Catholicism and other mainstream religions were the target of "organized destruction" by "secularists and their allies among progressives who have marshalled all the force of mass communications, popular culture, the entertainment industry and academia".

Barr also said the US "traditional Judeo-Christian moral system" was under siege by "modern secularists" who were responsible for every sort of "social pathology", including drug abuse, rising suicide rates and illegitimacy.

A Catholic theologian and professor of religion, Colt Anderson, says Barr's speech is a "threat to American democracy".

It was a "dog whistle" to ultra-conservative Catholics who have aligned themselves to Donald Trump in a campaign to limit the rights of LGBTQ Americans, immigrants and non-Christians, especially Muslims, and to criminalize almost all abortions.

"The attorney general is taking positions that are essentially un-Democratic" because they demolish the wall between church and state, Anderson says.

Some Washington-based Justice Department Catholic employees are also concerned.

"I was shocked by the speech and all this fire and brimstone," one says.

"Trump is Barr's imperfect vessel in serving a much higher cause: the gospel," says another.

Although many Trump policies are strongly opposed by the Vatican, Barr did not address these.

Pope Francis's pleas for the US to open its doors to more refugees, for instance.

Barr defends policies that turn away or imprison immigrants seeking refugee status at the US-Mexico border, even separating parents from their children.

His speech is a reminder that while Trump enjoys the support of many high-profile right-wing Christian evangelical leaders, he is also surrounded by conservative Catholics who are associated with organisations other Catholics consider extreme.

However, many conservative religious commentators are positive about Barr's speech.

"Barr took the gloves off, saying that religion is not jumping to its death; it's being pushed," one says.

"As we religious conservatives think about how to vote in the election next fall, we should ponder the fact that under Donald Trump, as awful as he is in so many ways, a man of William Barr's convictions is heading up the Department of Justice."

Liberal Catholics, on the other hand, arLiberal Catholics say the US attorney general William Barr's Catholic faith is threatening the separation of church and state.

There have been many schisms in the Church's 2,000-year history, he noted.

Although he said he is "not afraid of schisms," Francis added that he prays there won't be any as the "spiritual health of many people is at stake."

He said is concerned about the "rigid" ideology that has already infiltrated the American church, which his critics use to mask their own moral failings.

Led by Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, who stepped up attacks on the pope after Francis demoted him from a senior Vatican post, the conservative movement is growing.

Some conservative political movements in the United States have joined forces with religious conservatives to attack the pope.

Implying his critics are hypocrites, Francis confronted doctrinal issues raised in the U.S. and beyond by those who oppose his outreach to gay and divorced people and his concern for the poor and the environment.

"When you see Christians, bishops, priests, who are rigid, behind that there are problems and an unhealthy way of looking at the Gospel," Francis said.

"So I think we have to be gentle with people who are tempted by these attacks because they are going through problems. We have to accompany them with tenderness," he said.

Even though he is rejecting the conservatives' stance, he said he welcomes "loyal" criticism that leads to introspection and dialogue.

Such "constructive" criticism shows a love for the church. In contrast, his ideologically driven critics don't really want a response but merely to "throw stones and then hide their hand."

"Let there be dialogue, correction if there is some error. But the path of the schismatic is not Christian," he added.

Francis' allies, including German Cardinal Walter Kaper and the head of Francis' Jesuit order, have said the conservative criticism amounts to a "plot" to force the first Jesuit pope to resign so a conservative would take his place.

Asked about the criticism and risk of schism, Francis said his social teachings were identical to those of St. John Paul II, the standard-bearer for many conservative Catholics.

In a tweet posted yesterday, Rome correspondent Christopher Lamb says next month Burke will speak at a summit which includes a $500 per head priests' conference and seminarians-only event.

The tweet continues: "Francis says 'A schisms is always an elitist separation'".

Source

• Reuters
• Washington Times
• Image: Catholic World Report