Pope Francis RIP

 It has just been announced that Pope Francis has passed away at the age of 88 years old. He is the first serving Pope to pass away since I started writing the Barnet Eye blog in 2008. As someone who identifies religiously as a 'Bad Roman Catholic', the news does warrent a comment. Of all the popes in my lifetime, I suspect Pope Frances has been the one most closely aligned with my own views. The first Pope I recall was Pope Paul, who seemed a distant figure, who I felt little empathy with. At Catholic schools, we'd pray for the Pope. I never really understood why, as surely he was the Pope and Holy enough already! I don't really recall anything about him, other than the fact that he was Pope. He was replaced by Pope John Paul I, he lasted around a month. At the time, I didn't really consider myself Catholic. He was replaced by Pope John Paul II, who was a dynamoic figure. The first Polish Pope. My Dad was hugely excited by him. He went to see him when he visited the UK and made a series of videos of the visit. To his dismay, I taped Match of The Day over them. Dad asked a couple of Priests around to watch the videos, and they got to see the highlights of Manchester City vs Ipswich instead. Dad would probably have killed me, but for one of the Priests saying "I missed match of the day as we were celebrating the Pope's visit, so this is divine providence". The Lord moves in mysterious ways. 

John Paul II was a massive figure and was seen by many as an inspiration to those who brought down the Berlin Wall. He was however and old man and for the lest years of his life, he was unable to really do very much Popery. I was working with a Fundamentalist Christian, when JPII was at the height of his powers. Ian Paisley had denounced him at the EU as "The Antichrist". I asked "What sort of a lunatic genuinely thinks the Pope is the Antchrist?". My colleague announced to a stunned pub "I do". This confirmed to me that the fellow was a bit odd. He'd had a lovely girlfriend who he split up with, because she served cheeecake with a fish slice to his parents. It made me realise that the extremes of religion attracts odd people. 

JPII was replaced by Benedict. A former Hitler youth member (who had recanted the NAZI ideology), he was a hardliner. Where JPII brought down the Soviet Union, Benedict changed the order of service of mass and made all manner of grammatical changes to various prayers. this was highly irritating, you'd start saying the passage and everyone else would say different words. To me it was completely pointless, but I am not a theologian. He also added chest beating to one of the prayers, which seemed to me a bit odd.

He retired and Francis took over. He was a lot more liberal. He told us not to judge people with different lifestyles to the Holy flock. He couldn't bring himself to say that such things were OK, but being a bit less judgemental is clearly a very good thing. I suspect he was a bit constrained by the two hundred od far more conservative cardinals who elected him. I wonder who they will choose. I hope it is someone who realises that we should be united as a human race, not divided. I hope it is someone who is brave enough to drag the Church into the modern era and make people like me a bit less embarassed about some of the policies of the organisation. Most of all, it would be nice if the new Pope read the Beatidues and made them the central plank of his mission. If you don't know what they are, google them.