The Catholic and secular Left are beside themselves. They thought they owned the pope, and now they are in a state of disbelief.
Charles P. Pierce at Esquire called the Holy Father’s meeting with Kim Davis “a sin against charity,” and the “dumbest thing this Pope has ever done.” Nice to know he acknowledges the existence of sin. But to say that it was “dumb” of the pope to meet with this heroine, or to characterize it as a “hamhanded blunder,” is to seriously misread Pope Francis. He is, after all, a real Catholic, not a “pretend Catholic” (the pope recently used this term to describe the Mayor of Rome, a gay marriage enthusiast).
Pierce was so despondent with the pope that he said the Davis meeting “undermines his pastoral message, and it diminishes his stature by involving him in a petty American political dispute. A secret meeting with a nutball?” It would be more accurate to say that the meeting elevated the pope’s stature with real Catholics. Not surprisingly, Pierce did not see calling Davis a “nutball” as “a sin against charity.”
Gay activist Michelangelo Signorile ripped the pope as “a more sinister kind of politician,” one who “secretly supports hate.” Signorile has a reputation of being quite open about his brand of hate speech, so that may account for his aversion to secrets. It drove him mad that the pope broke bread with this courageous woman, which is why he said the meeting “is only encouraging the bigots.” By “bigots” he meant practically every man and woman who ever walked the face of the earth, up until the day before yesterday.
Bless the Holy Father for being so inclusive that he reached out to Kim Davis. If the “pretend Catholics” who consider themselves his base get nasty, they will be answered by the Catholic League.