Pope Francis criticised the “suicidal” attitude of some of his critics in an interview aired on US television.
Responding to questions on CBS’s 60 Minutes about US conservatives who oppose the approach of his pontificate, Francis said: “You used an adjective, ‘conservative’. That is, conservative is one who clings to something and does not want to see beyond that.”
He said this was a false approach to history and tradition.
“It is a suicidal attitude. Because one thing is to take tradition into account, to consider situations from the past, but quite another is to be closed up inside a dogmatic box.”
Speaking to a webinar last week, before the interview aired, three US bishops offered their visions to remedy the Church’s divisions.
Bishop Daniel Flores of Brownsville told the webinar “Civilise It: Unifying a Divided Church” that the synodal process offered “a diagnosis of the culture, especially in the West, that is deeply divided and really unable to kind of have a human conversation anymore”.
He added that “to respond to that, the Church has to upgrade the quality of its own communion”.
San Diego’s Cardinal Robert McElroy noted that polarisation is much less pronounced in his diocese’s Hispanic and Asian parishes, asking, “How can we move to a deeper level where we build solidarity among people?”
He recalled a study the bishops’ conference conducted more than a decade ago on Catholic attitudes.
“The one way that brought people together across the board, those who are pro-life and stressing euthanasia and those who are stressing the poor and peace, and all this, they found that the virtue of compassion is the one thing that will bring people together. It is a bridging virtue.”
Bishop Robert Barron of Winnona-Rochester said that he encouraged older, more liberal clergy and younger, more conservative priests to socialise together.
After the Catholic NFL star Harrison Butker provoked controversy with his commencement address to graduates at Benedictine College, some of its founders accused him of driving division.
Butker, the place kicker for the Super Bowl champions the Kansas City Chiefs and an outspoken devotee of the old rite, told the college’s class of 2024 that the “most important title” to which female graduates should aspire is that of “homemaker”.
His speech denounced liberal cultural values and criticised Gay Pride celebrations.
“Things like abortion, IVF, surrogacy, euthanasia, as well as a growing support for the degenerate cultural values and media all stem from the pervasiveness of disorder,” he said.
The Sisters of Mount St Scholastica, one of the founders of Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas, criticised his remarks. “Instead of promoting unity in our church, our nation, and the world, his comments seem to have fostered division,” they said in a statement.
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