For some reason, religious figures are widely presumed to merit indulgence on complex matters of ethics and justice. This may be why Pope Francis, who is currently struggling with a bout of illness, enjoys a reputation today as a “lonely moral voice.” That is, at any rate, the verdict delivered by David Gibson in a recent essay for the New York Times. Gibson, director of the Center on Religion and Culture at Fordham University, argues that the Pope puts “the needs and interests of others—including the least powerful—ahead of his own.” And it is this example of pious altruism, Gibson maintains, that has inspired 1.3 billion Catholics and anyone else who upholds the values of “humility and mercy” in a weary world.
If Pope Francis embodies humility and mercy, the social value of these qualities requires urgent reexamination. His commentary on the war in Ukraine has been perverse and contemptible. He has inveighed against the “madness” of Western democracies imposing sanctions on Russia and providing an invaded nation with the assistance it needs to defend itself. He has echoed Kremlin propaganda by accusing NATO of “barking” at Russia’s door. And he has repeatedly invoked Mahatma Gandhi’s injunction against national self-defence, insisting that there is no such thing as a “just war.”
Brian Stewart
Pope Francis has been no better on other matters of international security. In 2014, for instance, after the jihadist massacre of the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists in Paris, Francis declared that while killing in God’s name is an “absurdity,” freedom of speech had its limits and people really should not be mocking or insulting religious faith. One might have expected something more morally serious from a revered religious leader than a statement that sounds like a reader’s letter to the Guardian.
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