Catholicism

Some striking facts about Pope Francis. Fact one: the Cardinals have elected a 76-year-old with only one lung. This undermines the idea that Pope Benedict stepped aside so that a younger, dynamic CEO-style figure would take charge, someone who could handle the exhausting job of running the Church. Instead the Cardinals went for a man of great individual piety who has lived a long and holy life. Fact two: we have the first Jesuit Pope. Traditionally, the Jesuits have been seen as a potential rival power base to the papacy. Now they are the papacy. The Jesuits have been, in recent decades, associated with the left, even the wacky wing

Some wag has gone around Rome putting up spoof ‘Vota Turkson’ posters. This is a reference to the Ghanian Cardinal Peter Turkson, who has been much-tipped to be the first black Pope. Turkson has a lot of support, it seems, and not all of it sardonic. Many Catholics say now is the time for an African Pope. And there’s a sense that it might take someone from the developing world to knock the Roman Curia — widely thought to be an arcane and corrupt body – into shape. But as I’ve written in this week’s magazine, a number of Vatican insiders think that, far from being an outsider, the next Pope must be an Italian. Only an Italian, it’s said,

As the late Christopher Hitchens used to say of the most vociferous, gay-obsessed clergy: ‘I have a rule of thumb for such clerics and have never known it to fail: Set your watch and sit back, and pretty soon they will be found sprawling lustily on the floor of the men’s room.’ In Cardinal Keith O’Brien’s case it was not on the floor of the men’s room but – if the stories of several former young novices are true – in late-night prayer sessions that His Eminence brought himself low. This is allegedly the same Keith O’Brien who was the author of last year’s tumescent comparison of civil marriage equality

A rather feverish mood around the Vatican today: La Repubblica’s sensational splash suggesting that Pope Benedict XVI was pushed out by a ‘gay mafia’ within the Church hierarchy has set Latin tongues wagging. Lurid whispers about sex and bribery abound. The theory – given wind by Benedict’s Ash Wednesday statement that opposition ‘mars the face of the church’ – is that the Pope was so appalled by the findings of the top secret 300-page dossier he commissioned into the ‘Vatileaks’ scandal, he decided he couldn’t go on. It’s all rather intoxicatingly Italian, even if it sounds a bit too much like a pastiche to be true. More sober voices point out

It’s got to be an African, hasn’t it? That’s what editors, including my esteemed boss, are saying across the country in response to Pope Benedict’s shock resignation. And Fraser’s right: a black conservative figure would make sense. It would perfectly represent the face of Catholicism in a globalised world. But there are good reasons to think that, far from being someone from the evangelically charged developing nations, the next Pontiff might be an American. Under Benedict, the power of America in the Holy See has increased dramatically. Vatican insiders even talk about the ‘American moment’ in Rome. Or as John Allen, the world’s best Vatican correspondent put it recently, ‘even

A few years ago, The Spectator, in an inspired notion for the Easter issue, asked a number of prominent individuals whether they believed in the Resurrection. And among the surprises was George Galloway, who replied emphatically in the affirmative: ‘Yes, I believe in the Resurrection. I believe God restored the life of Jesus of Nazareth and took him to his bosom. The example of suffering and sacrifice followed by vindication is central to my religious belief.’ One hopes there wasn’t an element of hubris here, whereby George identified himself with Christ — suffering followed by vindication — but the fact remains that it was a very public profession of faith

No sooner does Baroness Warsi denounce militant secularists who try to marginalise Christianity than, bang on cue, up surfaces Richard Dawkins with a survey commissioned by his Foundation for Reason and Science intended to demonstrate that Christianity is a minority pursuit. His Ipsos MORI poll, published today, is intended to unpick that bit of the 2001 census which found that more than 70 per cent of respondents identify themselves as Christian. So — selecting from 2,107 respondents questioned the 1,136 who either said they were Christian in the census or would have done so — his poll finds that 72 per cent of them did so because they were baptised

The Pope, as I’m sure you know, has touched down in Britain. Here, for CoffeeHousers, is the editorial on his visit from this week’s new-look issue of the magazine: Benedict brings hope The arrival of Pope Benedict XVI in Britain has provoked protests that, in the intesity of their anger, far exceed those that greet the state visits of blood-drenched dictators. That is because the Pope is seen to represent — in ascending order of secular distaste — religion, Christianity, the Roman Catholic Church and the conservative wing of Catholicism. Fair enough: Benedict does represent all of these things. He opposes atheism, regarding it as a desperately sad alienation of