Early Moves by Pope Leo

[00:00:00] Foreign. [00:00:10] Two weeks. We're already getting a sense of the Leo pontificate. What does it mean? What has he done so far? What does it mean and how do we interpret it? That's what we're going to talk about today on Crisis Point. Hello, I'm Eric Sims, your host and chief of Crisis Magazine. As always, make sure that you see smash that like button. Subscribe to the channel, let other people know about what we're doing here. We really do appreciate it. The biggest thing I want to mention, though, it's May, which means it is our twice a year. I never know if I should say biannual, because I never know if biannual means twice a year. It's like bimonthly. It's twice a year, twice every other month, or every twice a month biannual. I think that means twice a year. Anyway, twice a year we have a fundraiser and May is one of those two times. And so please go to crisismagazine.com you'll get a dialog box that'll pop up asking you to donate. Please do so. We love monthly donations, but anything you can give helps. We offer all our content for free, and so we appreciate any donations. That's what keeps us going. Otherwise we couldn't offer all our content for free. So I really would appreciate if you would donate to our fundraiser. [00:01:14] Okay, so I don't want this podcast to become and All Leo all the time podcast. We're not going to talk about Pope Leo and everything he does in every single podcast. [00:01:30] After all, I'm not hyper papalist. I don't think the entire Catholic Church runs and revolves around the Pope. I think that the Pope is obviously a vital. The papacy is obviously a vital office. It's a center of unity. But we shouldn't have a celebrity pope attitude or hyperpavist attitude. By everything he says and does, we have to follow and comment on. [00:01:53] That being said, we're only human around here. He's only been Pope, like I said, for less than two weeks. It'll be two weeks this Thursday. [00:02:00] And we all kind of want to know what's this pontificate going to be like, you know, by the. By the end of Francis's pontificate, I think everybody was tired of it. Even his supporters were tired of it. We knew exactly what he was going to do after 12 years. We knew what he was going to say in each situation. We knew what he was going to do. It just had become very repetitive and frankly, very boring. Well, now we got this new excitement. What's he gonna. What's Leo gonna do next? What's he gonna say? Who's he gonna appoint? Where is he gonna go? [00:02:28] So I get that, and I have it, too. I'm not acting like I'm above that. I have the exact same interest. [00:02:35] So I am going to talk about Pope Leo a decent amount, I think, over the coming weeks and maybe even months, more so than I. I mean, I wasn't even talking about Francis, you know, in the last few months of his pontificate, because I just didn't think there was anything new to be said, really. [00:02:50] So we all want to know. So let's go ahead and just dive in then, to some of the things that Pope Francis, I'm sorry, Pope Leo has said and done in the last, you know, week and a half as the pope. Okay. Probably the most controversial thing I think that he's done so far is at the Regina Celi on Sunday. [00:03:10] He said that he strongly felt the spiritual presence of Pope Francis accompanying us from heaven. [00:03:19] And so it's a very clear statement that Pope Leo thinks that Pope Francis is in heaven right now. [00:03:26] And so, of course, that got a lot of speculation. First of all, does that mean he's going to try to canonize Pope Francis? Do we really need another pope canonized, much less Pope Francis? I will come out and just say very explicitly, I don't think Francis should ever be canonized a saint. I frankly think that. I don't think that Pope John XXIII should have been canonized. I don't think Paul VI should have been canonized, and I don't think John Paul II should have been canonized, at least not yet. [00:03:54] And I thought those were imprudent at the very word, at the very best, imprudent moves to canonize them. [00:04:02] I think with our hyper papalist mentality, canonizing popes, you know, all the most recent popes particularly, just doesn't seem to be a good idea. I also think. I mean, I'm going to go on a little tangent here. It just seems odd to me that we would canonize all the popes of an era in which we have one of the worst crises in the Catholic Church ever. Like, we have more people leave than probably any time other than maybe the 16th century. [00:04:28] It would be like canonizing the popes that immediately proceeded and were concurrent with Martin Luther and everybody leaving the Catholic church in the 1500s. [00:04:40] That just doesn't make much sense. Clearly, if the popes are doing such a great job, we wouldn't have millions and millions of People leaving the Catholic Church. I'm not saying it's the Pope's fault that everybody's leaving, but at the same time, it seems weird to me to canonize the very popes when we don't normally canonize popes. If you look at the last, since the 16th century, there was only two popes that were canonized before recent times, that was Pius V and Pius X. [00:05:06] Then all of a sudden everybody since 1960 is being canonized, every pope. So I don't think he should be canonized. That's not the point here though. [00:05:14] Leo clearly said though that he thinks that Francis is in heaven. So is this something, is this a problem? Is this something we should be concerned about? [00:05:24] I would just say, first of all, I do think it's wrong to say this. Even if Pope Francis were a very holy man and somebody we all kind of thought was probably going to heaven, I still don't think it's a good idea to say this quickly after somebody's death because I think honestly we should still be an attitude of praying for somebody. I mean, I have a rule in my, you know, with my, my mother in law, my father in law, when they passed away, they're both Catholic, they're both good people, good Catholics. I do believe that their destination was heaven. I think when they died, their destination was heaven. I have no idea though how long they might had to spend in purgatory. So I had it that I would pray for them by name every day for one year after their death. Then after that they would still be included in my general prayers for those who had died in my family and my wife's family. But I thought that would be a good way to just make sure. I always reminded myself they needed specific prayers for one year after their death. And there's a lot of different things, traditions in the church of praying for people, you know, a certain number of days after their death on the, on the three month anniversary, I think it is the one year anniversary because we should not assume somebody is in heaven because they might need our prayers in purgatory. So to say Pope Francis is in heaven less than a month after he passed away I think is just uncharitable to Pope Francis because what it does is it lessens the number of people praying for him, praying for his soul in case he's in purgatory. [00:06:52] And so I think that is just a mistake that you would, that he would, that Leah would say that. I think maybe only an obvious thing, like maybe Sister Wilhelmina, but even a Sister Wilhelmina, I think for a year after her death or so, I think you should still be talking about praying for her. I think right now we can clearly. I think, I believe that we can talk about Sister Wilhelmina as if she's in heaven and ask her to pray for us. I think there's nothing wrong with that. [00:07:17] And I think also that it does seem to minimize the many scandals and corruption that seem to be under Pope Francis. [00:07:30] And, you know, if he just went straight to heaven, which you're kind of implying by saying he's in heaven already, what does that say for the victims of people that he. [00:07:39] Of people that he has not punished, some of the victims of Father Rutnik and people like that and the people who are scandalized in the faith by the statements he made? I just think that's just poor form. I mean, poor form at the very least. [00:07:56] At the same time, I'm not going to make a big deal about this. I'm not going to act like, okay, now Pope Francis, we have to write him off. I'm sorry, Pope Leo. I'm going to say Pope Francis a few times for Pope Leo. I'm sure that. [00:08:10] But I don't think we should write off Pope Leo and say, oh, see, look, he's just like Francis. He thinks everybody's in heaven. He's just like Frank. He's just like, you know, he's post Vatican. Two popes who religiously indifferent. I mean, I literally wrote a book on the religious indifference, deadly indifference. So I do know what I'm talking about when I talk about religious indifference. I don't think we can just subscribe ascribe that to Pope Leo just because he said that. [00:08:35] There's not, you know, just because Francis seemed to be a universalist in many ways, I don't think we just automatically say Leo is because he said this. In fact, I feel like this is almost standard political language that a pope would say about his predecessor, these nice things that make it sound like he was a saint. It would not shock me, for example, if some Middle Ages pope talked about his predecessor in similar terms just because it was politically expedient to do so. It made it so that people who were kind of his predecessor's people would feel comfortable and things like that. I'm not saying that's right to do it again. I said at the beginning, I think it's wrong to. For him to have said that. That being said, I just don't. I'm not going to make a big deal about this. And now all Of a sudden be like, okay, see, here we go again. St. Francis 2.0, things like that. That's what I really think. This is a perfect example of what I've been talking about since Leo was elected. What people like Peter Kwasneski talked about is that we should not have this hermeneutic of suspicion, this nitpicking attitude where we are just waiting for Leo to say something that is a little bit outside of what we want him to say. And then we pounce. We say, see, I told you, I told you he's a heretic. I told you he's awful. I told you he's Francis 2.0. [00:09:55] I just think that that is a, the wrong attitude to have. I'm not saying we just act like everything he does is perfect. Like, I mean, I said at the beginning. I think what he did by saying that that was a mistake. He shouldn't have said that. [00:10:09] But I'm not going to just now all of a sudden. Never give him benefit of doubt. Write them off. Act like, okay, this is a lost papacy, just like the last one. I, I think that is a, a, a poor attitude to have. So I, you know, I, I, I'm, I don't want again, I'm not going to have this podcast be all Leo all the time. Also not going to be like, let's find the things Leo does wrong and nitpick them. I'm simply, I just don't think this is that big a deal that Leo said this. [00:10:36] It's not like it's some infallible statement. It's not like it's even some definitive statement. Just simply a flowery language, frankly, that he made during the Regina Cheling. Call me a Pope splainer if you want, but I just think that at this point, that's as far as we can go. [00:10:54] Okay. Another thing, let's talk about something else in the Leo pontificate. So far, so far, Leo the peacemaker. [00:11:00] We, we've, we're seeing that Pope Leo from the beginning has made a great emphasis on peace, on peace, particularly in Ukraine and in Gaza. And I think this is wonderful. I think also we have to be, I want to be clear about something. I think all the popes, all the popes over the past 120 years, and I mean before that, but 120 years old matters for this context, have been wonderful when it comes to calling for peace and doing everything they can to have the nations avoid war. I feel like a lot of American Catholics are frankly, not anti war enough. I Think as Catholics, we should really, truly look at war as the last resort. We should look at military conflict as something we try to avoid as much as possible. I'm not a pacifist. [00:11:52] Catholics aren't pacifists. I don't think there's, there's never a reason you can have a military conflict. I'm just saying that most, I mean, just about everyone in the 20th century and 21st century have not followed just wars. And the popes, from Pope Benedict XV during World War I to Pope Francis and now Pope Leo, have been strong in defending the churches, teaching against war and really being the moral voice against war. And Pope Leo seems to be doing this as well. In fact, I want to pull up a post by Trump, a true social post. Let me put it up on the screen here. [00:12:32] Okay, there it is. Let me remove this here real quick. [00:12:35] And this was. Okay, so Donald Trump had a conference call with Vladimir Putin and he posted after just completing my two hour call with President Vladimir Putin of Russia, I believe it went very well. [00:12:47] Russia and Ukraine will immediately start negotiations toward a ceasefire and more importantly, an end to the war. [00:12:53] He goes on to say that, you know, he talks about trade and things like that. He goes, likewise, Ukraine can be a great beneficiary in the process of rebuilding his country. Negotiations between Russia and Ukraine will begin immediately. I so informed President Vladimir Zelensky of Ukraine, some other people, blah, blah, blah. He goes, and immediately after the call with President, after President Putin, he says, the Vatican, as represented by the Pope, being Pope Leo, has stated that would be very interested in hosting the negotiations. [00:13:25] Let the process begin. [00:13:27] So basically what Trump is saying here is he talked to Putin, he's going to talk to Zelenskyy, he's really working towards a ceasefire and an end to this war between Russia and Ukraine. And the Pope has offered to be the host of these negotiations. [00:13:41] I think this is just wonderful. We saw the scene. I don't know if you remember it, but it was at the funeral of Pope Francis, I believe, wasn't it, where Zelensky and Trump, they met at St. Peter's and I thought this was a great scene, that this is the role of the Catholic Church when it comes to geopolitics. It is bringing peace, is bringing people together for negotiations. [00:14:07] In the American conservative movement, there's this idea that any negotiations is appeasement. Oh, you're just Chamberlain. That's not the Catholic viewpoint. There is a time for negotiations. In fact, there's usually the time is for negotiations. The time is not for belligerence and conflict. It's usually time for negotiations. There are times, like I said, where you just have no other choice. [00:14:30] But if Pope Leo were to host these negotiations and think about how wonderful that would be, first of all, for the prestige of the Vatican. Because, let's be honest, the Church has lost its moral authority in the eyes of many people in the world and through our own fault. It's not because, I mean, some of it's because an anti Catholic attitude, things like that, but a lot of it is because our own actions, our meaning, the bishops, particularly the Pope, others, has caused it so that most people, may not most, but a lot of people in the world no longer look to the Catholic Church as the moral voice, the moral leader of the world like it once was. Well, this would put it squarely back there. But more importantly, I think it would help lead to a true and lasting peace because you'd have the spiritual forces of the Catholic Church behind it. You would have it where both Putin and Zelensky would feel a certain amount of pressure. Pressure. You go to the Vatican for negotiations. You don't want to walk out of there and say, we're still fighting. You want to walk out of there shaking the Pope's hand and saying, yeah, I agreed. I'm the big man, I agreed to this and we're going to have peace now. And so I really think this is great that Pope Leo has gotten involved in this. I'm praying and hoping that he also can get involved with the conflict in Gaza, that he can stop the horrific attacks of Israel upon Gaza and he can bring peace between them and he can free the Palestinian people and bring a just peace for Israel as well, so that they are protected from attacks, but also that they are prevented from attacking others. I mean, that's what peace is, right? That's what we want in the Middle East. And so hopefully Pope Leo can do that. But the point is that if you look at what Pope Leo said so far, he's talked about peace a lot percent, like proportionally, peace is probably the thing he's talked about the most of anything he's talked about so far as the Pope. [00:16:26] Okay, next I want to talk about, which is, oh, this is big news, I think. And that is Cardinal Baldo Rainey, Reyna, Rene. I think Rene, I'm not quite sure how I pronounce it. He was appointed the head of the Pontifical John Paul II Theological Institute for Marriage and Family Sciences. [00:16:45] Now, this is a big deal. This is the Pro Life Academy, basically of the Catholic Church of the Vatican. And if we remember, it was Archbishop Paglia that was in charge of it under Pope Francis. He was put in charge of Pope Francis and Paglia, this guy, I mean, it's such a scandal that Francis made Paglia the head of the JP2 Institute for Life and Family. It's just such a scandal. The guy literally commissioned a homoerotic mural that included him in it. [00:17:18] Paglia, that is, and a naked Paglia. I'm sorry if you're listening to this with your kids, but it just, just the idea of Paglia as a head and everything that the, the this institute has done has basically made the Anti life institute. They've invited like basically pro abortion people to be advisors. I mean, it's just been a SC and it's made John Paul II, I'm sure, roll over in his grave. [00:17:48] Well, this is the first appointment that Francis has. I did it again. This is the first appointment that Leo has made. He's replaced probably the most. I mean Fernandez is probably the most scandalous appointment. But Pagley is right up there. If he's not number one, he's number two and he goes and replaces him. Now, I will say, just to be clear, I don't know a lot about Reina, who is his replacement. What I've seen is he seems to be okay. He seems to be at least pro life, unlike his predecessor, and he seems to be solid. There's some stories about him. [00:18:20] Supposedly he. He asked told a seminarian who was homosexual either go to conversion therapy to stop being homosexual or leave the seminary. I don't know how true that is. It's hard to say. He was accused of it. At the very least that's a good sign, obviously. [00:18:35] So I think this is a very good thing. So for all those who are freaking out because Leo said Francis is in heaven, let's not forget that personnel is policy. Personnel matters a lot. And already he's gotten rid of one of the worst of the personnel decisions of the Francis pontificate. So I think this is something we should look at and be happy about and know what a big deal this is. This is hopeful for a sign of things to come. [00:19:03] Now, just to be clear, I'll put the brakes on and my hyper papalism, it doesn't mean every appointment he's going to make is going to be a slam dunk, a home run, to use a baseball metaphor. Which is why I think the Pope would want me to make. [00:19:18] I think, you know, he's going to have some appointments that we're probably going to be, probably going to groan about, but the fact is this was one of the worst appointments of Francis and he's already overturned it less than two weeks and it's the first thing he did as the Pope. So I think this is very helpful. Okay, next on the list of Leo activities, there's a lot of chatter about reunion. [00:19:39] Working towards a reunion with Eastern Orthodox between the Catholic Church and the Orthodox churches. Now, first of all, I want to note this is in context of the 1700 anniversary of the Council of Nicaea actually is today, May 20, 2025. 1700 years ago the Council of Nicaea I think, kicked off. I think that's where what, what we're, I think that's what we're observing is, is the beginning of it. [00:20:05] And of course, the Council of Nicaea is the first ecumenical council of church, one of the most important, if not the most important. It basically set the tone, it set the, the, the, the paradigm for how council should be. The Emperor Constantine asked for the council and it's the one that, that went against the Arian heresies, the Arian crisis, and declared Jesus as both God and man. And of course we get the Nicene Creed, most of it. There's a little bit where it was added on to Council of Constantinople about 50, 60 years later. But the Nicene Creed comes of course from the Council of Nicaea. So in that context, though celebrating this, the Pope made a few comments. He said, as Bishop of Rome, I consider one of my priorities to be that the seeking. [00:20:54] I'm sorry, I consider one of my priorities to be that of seeking the re. Establishment of full and visible communion among all those who profess the same faith in God, the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. In other words, all Catholics and Orthodox, except the Council of Nicaea, even all the types of Orthodox, the Chalcedon Orthodox, the Oriental Orthodox, all the Orthodox accept the Council of Nicaea as authoritative. Even most Protestants accept the Council of Nicaea as important at the very least, and they wouldn't argue with anything. The Council of Nicaea declared in general the Creed and things like that. I mean, many Protestant churches, by the way, do read out the Creed at their worship services sometimes. [00:21:43] But the thing is that the Pope is talking about unity, particularly with the Orthodox, because I think that's the real context. Because let's be honest, you can't have a corporate union between the Catholic Church and Protestant churches because they don't have a corporate structure. How would you unite the Methodist Church, for example, with the Catholic Church when There is no hierarchy, no real hierarchy. I know they have bishops and whatnot, no sacramental hierarchy in any of these churches, even the Anglican Church. That would be impossible in a real sense, because we don't recognize their sacraments as valid. Even though they have the outward signs of a hierarchy, we know it's not a sacramental hierarchy. That's not the case with the Orthodox. All the different types of Orthodox, they have valid sacraments, so therefore they have a valid sacramental hierarchy. Therefore, you could have an actual union reunion between the Catholic Churches, a corporate reunion between the Catholic Church and these Orthodox Churches. Now, one of the things that I think that needs to be known, that Pope Leo said, was that he said it can only be a unity in faith. [00:22:48] Now, this is something very important in the progressive world. There has been a big push for unity between Catholics and other Protestant denominations, the Orthodox and even non Christians. But it's always been based on a lowest common denominator type of unity, a human fraternity, so to speak. I mean, Pope Francis was big on this. [00:23:11] And honestly, I believe that that undermines true ecumenism. True desire for unity among Christians is undermined when you go with the lowest common denominator. Because unity can only come, as Pope Leo said, in faith, in a shared faith, in a shared belief in the same things. When you receive Holy Communion, you are making a statement that you believe what the Church teaches. [00:23:37] If you don't believe that, then you're actually committing a sin by receiving Communion. So therefore, anybody who doesn't believe what the Catholic Church teaches should not receive Communion at a Catholic Church. But what we want, a true unity, would be where what we believe is the same. And so we all could receive from the same Eucharist and we could be united eucharistically. [00:23:58] And so I really think Francis harmed the cause of ecumenism with the Orthodox. He put it back, I think, decades at the very least. [00:24:06] Because the fact is, is that the Orthodox in general, they don't want to unite with a Catholic Church that doesn't even care about doctrine, that is squishy on doctrinal teachings, that is awful, maybe on how it celebrates the liturgy, they're not going to want to unite with that. I mean, what Francis did to the introducing us Custodus, for example, in trying to eliminate the Roman right, that actually put back relations with the Orthodox, like I said, many, many years, because all of a sudden they saw a Pope attack a traditional rite of the Church and try to eliminate it. Why would you, if you're thinking like an Orthodox Here, not a Catholic. As an Orthodox, why would you want to unite with a church that once you unite with them, the leader could just eliminate your liturgy because he feels like it? [00:24:57] That is not something that, if I'm Orthodox, that I'm very attracted to. [00:25:01] So my hope is, first of all, Pope Leo has already shown a greater affinity for traditional liturgical practices and piety. That is a good thing for ecumenism with the Orthodox. But I also think that just, I'm hoping he emphasizes a unity in faith. [00:25:17] Now, to be clear, I do not think the Catholic Church will unite with the Orthodox Churches in my lifetime. I don't think it would happen in my children's lifetime or even my grandchildren's lifetime. I think there could. I'm hoping there'll be a progress towards it. I could see potentially small reunions, like maybe groups of Orthodox becoming Catholic. That would be a wonderful thing, of course. But the fact is, is that it's very difficult because who do you unite with? Because, for example, if, let's say the. The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople led the Greek Orthodox and said, okay, we're going to reunite with Rome because of this or that, well, I think there's about a 100% chance the Russian Orthodox are going to say, no, we're not going along with that. We want nothing to do with that. And most of the other autonomous churches won't. The All Cephalus Churches, they won't want to do that either. So really, it's not as bad as, like with the Protestants, where you literally have to unite with other. Each. Each person individually because there's no sacramental hierarchy. But at the same time, with the Orthodox Churches, you would have to have a corporate reunion with multiple jurisdictions individually because they're not going to agree with each other. And even when you do that, my guess is some people would still stay behind. So it'd be like an Eastern Catholic type of what happened with the Eastern Catholics in their reunion. But I'm still hopeful. I'm still happy that Pope Leo is talking about this, that Pope Leo wants a unity in faith. I'm hoping that means that his ecumenical relations and dialogue, so to speak, with the Orthodox will be more meaty. More meaty. Not just like, let's just talk about how much we like each other and how much we agree, but really say, okay, let's go to the real differences. Let's go to the real differences and hash out what do you believe? What do I believe? Where are we still separated? And is there any movement we can make towards making that that separation end. Not any of the. I mean, these, these ecumenical meetings they have in, like in Washington D.C. or Rome, whatever. They're mostly just cocktail parties where people get together, get paid to get together and talk about how great the other one is. Let's, let's, let's end that. I'm hoping Pope Leo moves towards that. So. [00:27:31] Okay, so I just, I think one of the things I want to talk about as well, just today in general is what I've noticed, which is the danger of making Leo in our image. I'm the first person to say that I could be doing this too. I mean, I'm trying to be hopeful, I'm trying to be optimistic. And maybe I'm reading too much into what Leo says in a positive direction. And maybe, like I said, I'm criticizing doom or trads for reading too much into it negatively. Maybe I'm reading too much into it positively. But one of the things I've noticed is progressive Catholics, what they've been doing is they have definitely been trying to market Leo as one of them. [00:28:12] If you read America Magazine or National Catholic Report, which I don't recommend, or Father James Martin, which I don't recommend, I do it as a job so you don't have to. [00:28:20] They're trying to make it where Leo is Francis 2.0, that Leo's their guy. He's really their guy. Maybe they're right. I don't know. I'm not saying they're necessarily wrong, but I think it's too early to say that. But I do know this. No matter what Leo does, they're going to try to make it. Unless Leo goes completely scorched earth against them, which I don't think he will do. They're trying to make it so that people perceive Leo as another Francis. And even their perception of Francis was actually a little bit wrong. He wasn't. I mean, like some of the statements he made about homosexuality wasn't something that Father James Martin would say, I'll put it that way. [00:28:53] The point, though is, is that I think they're going to try to meet be. [00:28:58] They're trying to make Leo in the image they want him to be. And I think conservative Catholics will probably do that. I think I might be doing that. Some real hardcore trads might not be doing that, but they're kind of making him in an image they hate. [00:29:10] You know, an anti image instead of an image, an anti tread image. So let's try to actually listen to Leo and take him for his word. That's one of the biggest frustrations I had with the the pope splainers during the Francis pontificate is Francis would say something and they would make it say. They would. They would make it seem like he said something he didn't really say. That's disrespectful, I think, to the papacy, to the Pope, because you're basically saying, oh, he doesn't really know what he's saying. He didn't really mean what he says. [00:29:38] Take Leo as words and his actions and not try and make them in his image. [00:29:42] Finally, before we get to live chat, I appreciate everybody in the live chat. By the way, I'll get to a couple of the comments here in a minute. [00:29:48] I'm gonna. I think I've already said it, but I'm just gonna say it again because this is my crowd I'm talking to. I could criticize the progressive Catholics all day and all night, and I'd have so many things to criticize them for. But the truth is, almost nobody watching this podcast is a progressive Catholic. So all it would do is we would just be affirmed in our greatness that we're better than they are. [00:30:10] That's why I sometimes am far more critical of our own camp. And I just want to say I'm not going to. I'm simply have no time for doom or trads. I just don't have time for them. I don't. I'm not going to give them oxygen by trying to really engage with them at this point. I mean, a doom or trad. What I mean by is somebody who's just like, they've already written off Leo. They already think he's a Francis 2.0, a disaster. I mean, realistically, I honestly think Leo will be somewhere between Benedict and Francis. He won't be anywhere near as bad as Francis, but he won't be as good as Benedict. That's my honest assessment. I'm open to being wrong about that. I'm hopeful that I'm wrong and he's even better than Benedict. But that's my guess of what he. He will be. [00:30:55] But the doomer trads are out. And there's not. Fortunately, by the way, there's not. Most trades are like this and I want to make that clear. It's very easy to be like, oh, the trads are doing this. They're so. They're so bad. There's some, you know, they do all these things when, of course, you're ignoring all the problems in your typical Novus Ordo parish. But the fact is, is There are doomer trads out there that are already like, this guy's the worst. And he's just like Francis 2.0. And all you guys are suckers for even having any positive thoughts towards him. That is simply a spiritually unhealthy way to live. And so I, I'm just not going to do it. I mean, I. If Leo ends up doing some bad things, you know, we'll call it out here at Crisis, we called out Francis many times over the years for things he did that were bad. We'll do it again for Leo if we have to. We're just not going to be looking for every single thing he does and how we can nitpick it and say how it's a scandal and blah, blah, blah. So I just, I'm not doing it. So I just want you to know I really think it's a hermeneutica suspicion when you're doomer trad. And I think it's something that we should avoid as Catholics. Okay. Off my soapbox. I apologize for that, but I'm getting a little tired of the doomer tragedies. You can probably tell. [00:32:02] Okay, let's go ahead and look at what we got here. Okay. Richard says hello from South Florida. Love your work. Thank you very much. As somebody who used to live in Florida for five years, I appreciate your, your support. And, and you're. You're watching the program from South Florida. [00:32:17] Okay. Ken says it's not even clear or certain that Francis made it into purgatory. I mean, here's the thing. [00:32:23] You're right, Ken. That's why we pray for him. We pray for him that he's in purgatory and that, that, that, that we don't pray for, that he is in purgatory. We pray for him to get out of purgatory and get into heaven, but we have no knowledge of where he went. [00:32:37] There's no reason to. To say we definitively know where he went. So that's why we pray for him. [00:32:43] JDE says it seems to be more about canonizing Vatican 2. Yeah, the, the canonization of these popes. I do think it's about canonizing Vatican 2. It's like it's a certain insecurity. [00:32:53] Notice a lot of Vatican II proponents are very insecure about their support for it. And so they want to do everything they can to make sure they, they continue that it's the super Council that, that, that you read all councils in light of, that interprets all of the councils. It's perfect. It had no problems with it whatsoever. All the reforms that were great. [00:33:15] You canonize the popes to kind of canonize Vatican ii. So I wouldn't be surprised if somebody tried to canonize the actual council itself. [00:33:22] Giovanni says canonizing all the Vatican 2 popes is like printing paper money. The more you print, the less it's worth. Yeah, that's a great point. By the way. I love the analogy to fiat currency. By the way, my. My book, Moral Money, the Case for Bitcoin, is coming out very soon. In fact, its publication day is June 17th. But I'll give you a little secret for those who are watching the podcast right now. I just saw a notice that it had arrived from the printer to the warehouse already. It's only, what is it? May 20, so I'm guessing it's going to come out sooner than June 17, but I think I'll get copies before then. But anyway, go to my website, ericsammons.com to pre order a copy of Moral Money. Okay, there's my shill. [00:34:01] But it's a great analogy Giovanni makes, which is canonizing. The more popes, modern popes you canonize, the less it it's worth in the eyes of the world. People don't value it anymore. When Pope Pius X was the only canonized pope of the 20th century, people are like, wow, we really gotta, you know, that's special. That means something. But when every pope, no matter what, even Paul VI gets canonized, people are just like, okay. I mean, they're literally talking about canonizing Paul, John Paul I, who is Pope for a month. That's how much it's become. Not worthless almost in the eyes of the world. [00:34:34] Okay? William Jones says amen. Man, I am tired of that vulture watch. I assume you're talking about the, you know, the doomer trads and things like that. Yeah, I just. Let's. Let's not go there, people. Let's not go there. Everybody who has followed crisis and followed me knows I'm willing to criticize a Pope. [00:34:52] I'm not going to hold back if a Pope does something that is significantly scandalous to the faithful. I don't have to say, though, every single thing. I don't have to bring up every single thing a Pope does that's wrong. Every Pope makes mistakes at the same time. I'm not going to Pope splain either, so. But let's just be normal people and not let the hurt that Francis gave us turn us into these psychologically damaged snowflakes that can't handle anything. A new pope. [00:35:21] Okay? Eric D. Says hello from Texas. New convert here. Lord called me home to Catholic Church, brother. Welcome. Welcome to the church. Welcome home. We are very glad to have you. And you know, let's pray for, let's everybody in the chat here and watching this, pray for Eric D. That he continues to be the faithful servant of God. And it's just great, it's great that you're a member of the Catholic Church. All the people who join the church this Easter, we love you and we're glad to have you. [00:35:47] We are not an anti convert channel like some places is what I'm trying to say. Joseph Falco say, who thought that there would be an American Pope? Not me. Not me. I definitely did not think and not in my lifetime at least I didn't think there would be American Pope anytime soon. I just thought they'd be too nervous about the superpower of the world also being the home of the, the head of the Catholic Church. But clearly, you know, they, they had, they, they decide that wasn't a, a barrier to electing Pope Leo the 14th. Okay. AV creation says enjoy your show. But your camera white bounces off, makes you look orange. I am trying to go for the Trump look. Come on. I mean, come on. Orange man bad, right? Orange man good. Whatever. Come on. I mean this is, I think it actually is the lighting of the like with the walls and stuff because I have different ways I could light. Watch this. I'm going to do this. I've never done this on the camera for. Let's see how this works. I could do this. That looks real good, doesn't it? That looks super. Or this. Okay, that doesn't look good either. See, that's why I go with this. I think this is the best. [00:36:47] Yeah, let's see. Here we go. That's a little too bright. Anyway, that's a diversion from the topic. Thank you, AV Creations. [00:36:55] I do my best. My daughter, who does know all this stuff, she's a video. She actually works in video. She set it up for me originally, but she had certain limitations and I've kind of run with it since then, so. But honestly, I kind of am going to embrace the whole looking orange because orange man is the, is the, is the, is the bad man these days. And so let's go ahead and embrace that. Okay, well that definitely took us far afield as always. Pray for Pope Leo. Pray for the Catholic Church. Pray for our converts who just came to church recently and pray that next year we have twice as many, three times as many conversions in the Catholic Church that we did this year. I'm really hopeful that just having a Pope that doesn't attack Catholicism will be a catalyst for more conversions, particularly in America. Having an American pope, I know people want to make it like, oh, you only convert because you love Jesus and you believe what the Catholic Church teaches. I mean, that sounds nice, but we're human. There's psychological reasons. People start looking into the Catholic Church. And if it's an American pope, that causes Americans to look into Catholicism. That's how the Holy Spirit works. He works for these normal human means. So I'm fine with that. So let's pray for a flood of conversions into the Catholic Church next year. Okay? That's it for now. Until next time, everybody. God love you.