The Republican Party’s dictatorial higher calling and “principled”
agenda is now considered even more infallible than longtime pretender; The Pope.
Since Pope Francis criticized capitalism and climate change deniers, based on biblical text and science respectively, Republicans are backing away from the Catholic Church. The party that once bashed Democratic's for not respecting the Pope, are now throwing the Pope under the bus for his lack of right wing purity. There's a funny irony too, also mention below.
One Republican cafeteria Catholic has now
provided us with an eye opening general glimpse of party’s political authority
over religion, reflected in the culmination of his statements below:AP: A Republican lawmaker said he will boycott Pope Francis' speech to Congress next week because of the possibility the pontiff will discuss his support for policies to fight climate change.
Three-term Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona said that as a Roman Catholic, he initially was excited to learn of the pope's visit to Washington and his address to Congress. But Gosar said he decided not to attend after he read media reports that the pope plans to devote much of the speech to advocating for what Gosar calls "flawed climate change policies."
Better than the Pope:
Gosar wrote that he was appalled by a papal teaching document that "condemned anyone skeptical of the link between human activity and climate change." when the pope chooses to act and talk like a leftist politician, then he can expect to be treated like one." Gosar said he has "a moral obligation and leadership responsibility to call out leaders, regardless of their titles, who ignore Christian persecution. If the pope "urged the Western nations to rescue persecuted Christians in the Middle East, I would back him wholeheartedly," Gosar added. "To promote questionable science as Catholic dogma is ridiculous," he said. He might reconsider the boycott if he were to receive "assurances" from the Vatican that the pope will focus his speech on religious tolerance and the sanctity of life.
Yes, the Vatican should take the time to assure Republican Rep. Gosar the Pope will back away from his own principled faith.
The Republican cliche "I'm not a scientist," used to deny climate change, is not something you'll hear Pope Francis say anytime soon:
His predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, was a theologian. Pope John Paul II, before that, was originally an actor and a philosopher. But Francis trained as a scientist.
It was ironic that, before publication, Catholic Republican presidential candidates like Jeb Bush and Rick Santorum had been admonishing the pope that science is better left to scientists. That was exactly what Francis, the former chemist, thought he was doing by accepting the view of 97 percent of actively publishing climate scientists. For Francis, the source of the Earth’s degradation was clear: “[T]he degree of human intervention, often in the service of business interests and consumerism, is actually making our earth less rich and beautiful, ever more limited and grey.”
Behind global capital’s indifference to the poor and the planet and all the “pain, death and destruction” it brings, he said, there lies “the stench of what Basil of Caesarea—one of the church’s first theologians—called ‘the dung of the devil.’ An unfettered pursuit of money rules. The service of the common good is left behind.” In this “subtle dictatorship,” capital has become an idol. In response, Francis called for change—“real change, structural change”—using the word no fewer than 32 times. Land, lodging and labor were “sacred rights,” and working for their “just distribution” was a “moral obligation” and, for Christians, a “commandment.”
