A floral representation of Pope Francis flashing a thumbs up in front of St Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican. Photo: Alessandro Bianchi/ReutersA floral representation of Pope Francis flashing a thumbs up in front of St Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican. Photo: Alessandro Bianchi/Reuters

Pope Francis has brought a breath of fresh air in the Catholic Church and raised expectations of change. But many admirers of this new style of communicating with the faithful and the world at large doubt how strong the odds are on real change really happening.

One of the Pope’s most recent pronunciations relate to the state of health of the global economy. Not surprisingly, his views on this subject are dire. Using apocalyptic language the Pope told La Vanguardia newspaper: “We are excluding an entire generation to sustain a system that can’t hold up anymore. An economy built on money-worship and war and scarred by yawning inequality and youth unemployment cannot survive.” Put simply, according to Pope Francis, the global economic system is near collapse.

The Pope also condemned the modern economic culture “of discarding the elderly”. He maintains that “in throwing away the elderly and the young, the future of a people is lost”.

Many believers and non-believers would agree with the Pope’s assessment even if they would probably use less strong language to express their views. Other religious leaders, including those in the Church of England, have expressed similar concern about the plight of the global economy.

But the question many are asking is whether Pope Francis is prescribing practical solutions to this ever-growing threat to societies throughout the world. One of Pope Francis’s recommendations to political leaders is “the legitimate redistribution of economic benefits by the state”. Conservative politicians and economists, especially in the US, have blasted the Pope calling him a socialist and saying he exceeded the mandate of his office by proposing the redistribution of wealth.

But some conservative economists and theologians defend Pope Francis’s stance. Michael Novak is a prominent Catholic philosopher, journalist and diplomat. Over time he changed his political views from liberal to conservative and now supports the Republican Party. But when a fellow journalist called the Pope’s comments about economic inequality and the need for regulation “just pure Marxism”, Novak jumped to the Pope’s defence.

Pope Francis’s appeal comes mainly from the fact that he lives his message in many ways

Interviewed on Bloomberg Television, Novak stated: “The Pope is concentrating on the basics. Love, care of the poor, humility, kindness. And those are what matter, really. The rest is housekeeping.” Novak said that he did not agree with all of the Pope’s economic pronouncements and said he wished the Pope wouldn’t say some of the too simple things he says in his speeches. “Priests and bishops are not trained to do economic analysis,” according to Novak.

There is no doubt that Pope Francis has elevated economic issues to prominence when before Church leaders only occasionally showed public concern about the way that free market economies were being managed. The Pope’s Latin American background in Argentina must have affected his views on the harsh realities that separate the haves from the have-nots in most societies.

The sad reality that the world faces is that so far no system has been found that can in practice deliver better results than capitalism. The debate on whether the state should get more involved in the redistribution of wealth will go on as it is evident that in the last few decades the rich have become richer and the poor are poorer. Novak explains this ideological shift from liberal to conservative came when he saw “government programmes intended to help the poor turned out be largely counterproductive” as they created a generation that has become dependent on a culture of state handouts.

The Church’s chances of changing the capitalist culture are not very high as its influence in education is diminishing steadily. The Jesuit religious order, to which Pope Francis belongs, has a good reputation of producing public leaders through their colleges and universities. But the numbers of these centres of educational excellence are diminishing as fewer religious educators are in direct contact with students in classrooms and lecture halls. Falling vocations mean that the Church can no longer be as effective in honing the moral values of tomorrow’s leaders.

Pope Francis’s appeal comes mainly from the fact that he lives his message in many ways. He doesn’t just challenge greed and excess verbally, he opts himself to live a simple life, including choosing not to live in the place in the Vatican.

As the global economy continues to struggle to come out of recession, the pope’s message will continue to resonate inside and outside the Catholic Church because the free market economy does need a major overhaul.

johncassarwhite@yahoo.com

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