Transcript

4.22.25 · Washington Post

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Speaker 1: Welcome to the reading of the Washington Post for Tuesday,
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April twenty second, twenty twenty five. As a reminder, RADIOI
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is a reading service intended for people or blind or
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have other disabilities that make it difficult to read printed material.
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You're reading for today is Cindy Fraser. Today's front page
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headlines from The Washington Post are hope Francis dies at
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eighty eight. He changed church's approach, if not its doctrine
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a PAPC of humility, form and mercy. Our next headline,
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Harvard sues to stop freeze on funding. School accuses Trump
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of trying to gain leverage over academic decisions. Our next headline,
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historic outreach to LGBTQ plus people Catholics at crossholds as
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they await a successor. Next, how Opium undercut five things.
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Emails from start agency called Musk's order voluntary. Now it's
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a joke to many. Our next headline. President stays in
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heccess's corner amid dysfunction in the Pentagon. The Defense Secretary
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remains defiant. In the final headline from today's front page
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reads Retrieval of U. S. Soldier's bodies involved hundreds search
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for remains of four in Lithuanian Bog was fraught with challenges.
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Now let's turn to our first item, entitled Pope Francis
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dies at eighty eight. He changed church's approach, if not
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its doctrine. A papacy of humility, warmth and mercy by
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Anthony Faiola from Vatican City, three days after white smoke
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billog from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel. In March
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twenty thirteen, the former Archbishop of Buenos Aires greeted the
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international press inside a cavernous Vatican audience hall. As he
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rose from a richly upholstered armchair, a pair of well
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worn black shoes peak doubt from underneath his new papal robes.
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The decision by Pope Francis born hore Mario Bargoglio to
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reject the lavish red slippers of his office was widely
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interpreted as a small act of rebellion in the tradition
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bound Vatican. The Argentinian Jesuit had assumed the mantle of
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a church dazed by the abdication of Pope Benedict the
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sixteenth and wounded by revelations of rampant sexual abuse in
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the priesthood. And financial scandal. Now after the surprise selection
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of the first non European pontiff since seven forty one,
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Francis was demonstrating modestly but unmistakably that he would be
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a different kind of pope. Francis eighty eight, died April
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twenty first of cerebral stroke and cardiocirculatory collapsed, the Vatican
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announced in February, after a bout with bronchitis, he had
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been hospitalized in Rome with what Vatican officials called a
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complex clinical picture that included a diagnosis of double pneumonia.
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Over recent years, he had suffered recurring respiratory infections, undergone
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colon and abdominal surgery, and experience increasing mobility problems, requiring
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the use of a cane and wheelchair. His death came
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after Francis, ignoring doctor's orders to convalesce for two months
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and avoid large crowds, sought to continue his duties, making
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public appearances and holding private audiences before and during Easter.
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On Sunday, a day before his death, he met one
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on one with Vice President J. D. Vance and later
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funneled through a throng of thirty five thousand faithful in
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Saint Peter's Square in the popemobile in Vatican City regality
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was always part of the papal mystique. Yet after receiving
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the nod, Francis personally placed a call to cancel his
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newspaper subscription back home in Buenos Aires. Previous contiffs had
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traveled in the majestic comfort of a black limousine and
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lived in an opulent ten room apartment overlooking Saint Peter Square.
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Francis hisched rides on a holy seen minibus to his
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chosen quarters, a boarding house plunked behind a gas station.
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It remained his home. During his first audience with Vatican journalists,
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one of them, a vision impaired man led by a
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guide dog, fumbled for words as he meant the Pope,
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finally asking Francis to pray for his wife and daughter,
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and a special blessing for your dog too, the Pope said,
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smiling mischievously, before laying hands on fur. A ripple of
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laughter among the press only grew as the stunned looks
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of senior Vatican officials. It was a tail tale moment
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for a pontiff who through landmark conclusion, revelatory humility, and
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an occasional dash of humor would bring a humble style
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and welcoming tone to the job of leading one point
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three eight nine and billion Catholics. Francis was most radical
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not in his theologial reforms, but rather in his methods.
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He embraced cultural practices from tango to Twitter, using the
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social media platform now known as Acts as a regular
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tool for communicating to the faithful, he became the first
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pope to give regular and long interviews to secular reporters.
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In them, an image emerged of a man who came
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to the papacy not as a scholar or bureaucrat, but
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as a frontline cleric used to working in shantytowns. Nowhere
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more than in his historic outreach to the LGBTQ plus
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community did his candid comments hint at momentous change in
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the approach, if not the official teachings of the Church.
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As the first Latin American and first Jesuit pope, he
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brought a novel worldview and perspective to the Holy See,
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the ancient city state where he always seen something of
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an outsider. In contrast to Benedict, a German theologian revered
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by traditionalists, Francis focused his papacy on pastoralism and outreach,
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rather than the reinforcement of doctrine. Francis took off the
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table all the obsessions the church had with issues of sexuality.
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You have no more discussion about relations before marriage, about
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divorced people, about whether homosexuals are transgender people are sons
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and daughters of God, said Marco Politi, a papal biographer
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and longtime Vatican watcher. His was the image of the
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Good Samaritan, and through him, the image he gave of
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the Church was of a good Samaritan. During Francis' tenure,
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Catholicism faced serious resurgent challenges, the expansion of evangelical Christian churches,
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especially in the developing world, the abandonment of organized religion,
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a clerical shortage, and lingering disgust over the cover up
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and mismanagement of sexual abuse allegations. The church still grew
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unto Francis, especially in Africa, expanding globally by nearly eleven percent,
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but the pace was slightly slower than under Benedict, largely
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owing to an exodus in Europe of those frustrated with
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abuse scandals and the pace of reforms. Younger Catholics unwilling
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to pay church taxes. In countries such as Germany also
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drifted away. The number of baptisms in their church has
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decreased significantly, from nearly eighteen million in nineteen ninety eight
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to thirteen point three million in twenty twenty two, according
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to FIDES, a Vatican news agency. Behind the scenes, Francis
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proved a tough administrator. He took aim a corruption within
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the Vatican's busanting bureaucracy, though he could not keep the
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Holy See in the latter stages of his papacy from
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hurtling toward financial crisis as global donations dropped and pension
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deficits jumped. He shook up the College of Cardinals, naming
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one hundred eight of its one hundred thirty five voting
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members and making sure the conclave that would pick his
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successor was more diverse and less dominated by Europeans. His
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writings and statements brought harsh rebukes from some doctrinally conservative Catholics,
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the most steadfast of whom deeply opposed his move to
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stamp out the traditional Latin mass a liturgy he saw
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as exclusionary. He was more broadly embraced by liberals, even
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if they felt his personal ecumenism never translated into the
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radical reform they sought, especially on the role of women.
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Although aspects of his reluctance to stand on ceremony would
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win him praise on the left and right, both camps
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would also accuse him of sowing confusion through actions that
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sometimes seemed contradictory or purposely vague. Asked about gay priest
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by journalists on a flight back to Italy from Brazil
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in twenty thirteen, early in Francis's papacy, the pope memorably replied,
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if a person is gay and seeks God and has
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good will, who am I to judge? In an odd
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to modern norms, he used the colloquial gay, a term
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previous popes had avoided. He later went further, calling in
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January twenty twenty three, for the abolition of secular anti
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gay laws, while bluntly stating that being homosexual is not
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a crime, to the exasperation of religious conservatives, he later
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defended the secular legal rights of same sex couples, while
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maintaining his opposition to same sex marriage within the church.
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In twenty twenty three, he went further, opening the door
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to some blessings of gay couples by Catholic priests, and
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he released guidance declaring that under certain circumstances, transgender people
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may be baptized, serve as god parents, and witness weddings.
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In December of that year, the Vatican Office in charge
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of Doctrine, then newly run by France's ally and fellow Argentine,
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outlined landmark guidelines for ordained ministers to bless people in
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same sex couples, raising the ire of conservatives and praise
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from liberals. Later clarifications released by the Vatican often left
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both sides guessing what the pope meant. Though LGBTQ plus
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outreach became a hallmark of his papacy, Francis did not
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fundamentally change Church doctrine or its official teachings that homosexuality
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is intrinsically disordered. Regarding the Vatican's environmental policy, he joined
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the fight against human driven climate change and a one
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hundred ninety two page encyclical that warned against synthetic agrotoxins
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and bioaccumulation from industrial waste. He declared pollution a sin.
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Like John Paul the Second, the charismatic Pontiff, Francis canonized
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as a saint. The Argentine leveraged his grass whose popularity
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and media spotlight to focus attention on the poor and
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marginalized in an effort to foster compassion. His first official
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trip was to the Italian island of Lampedusa, a burdened
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way station for refugees, sinking the sanctuary in Europe from
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conflicts in North Africa and the Middle East. In an
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unsubtle message to Christians who would turn away Musslim refugees,
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he sponsored a group of Syrians to live in Rome
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during the civil war in their country. In twenty sixteen,
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after then presidential candidate Donald Trump vowed to build a
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wall along the US Mexico border, the Pope said, a
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person who thinks only about building walls wherever they may be,
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and not building bridges is not Christian. In Trump's second term,
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Francis positioned the church as a spiritual bulwark against mass
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deportations of the United States and appeared to chide Vice
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President J. D. Vance, a conservative Catholic, for misinterpreting theological
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concepts to defend the practice the act of deporting people who,
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in many cases have left their own land for reasons
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of extreme poverty, insecurity, exploitation, persecution, or serious deterioration of
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the environment damages the dignity of many men and women
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and of entire families, and places them in a state
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of particular vulnerability and defenselessness. Francis wrote in a recent
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letter to US bishops he frustrated Vatican security officials by
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issuing the bulletproof lid of the Potwobio. On his historic
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trip to the United States in twenty fifteen, Francis traveled
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in a humble fiat, preaching that priests should be shepherds
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who lived with the smell of the sheep. He opened
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car windows and mingled with the mass's during papal visits.
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In a pre Easter tradition, he knelt to wash the
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feet of Catholics and non Catholics, some of them painfully
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disfigured and disease. It's all or nothing, he told a
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Brazilian TV's days. Either you make the journey as you
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have to make it with human communication, or you shouldn't
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make it at all. At times he was given a
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sudden verse of emotion. On a trip to the Philippines
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of twenty fifteen, he discarded prepared remarks and spontaneously embraced
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a young girl who had asked him why God allows
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children to suffer at the neglect of parents or the
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ills of drug abuse and prostitution. She is the only
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one who has put a question for which there is
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no answer, and she wasn't even to express it in words,
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but in tears, he told the crowd. Vatican official struggled
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to contain his unscripted comments, such as when he suggested
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flexibility on the Church's opposition to contraception during an outbreak
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of the Zeca virus in Latin America that was causing
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birth defects. At times, Francis leaned into the role of
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pope as diplomat, particularly in Latin America, where his influence
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could be seen in the thought between Cuba and in
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the United States. Under President Barack Obama, a secretive deal
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to reach detent with China saw the Vatican grant Beijing
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the right to select bishops with a pop holding only
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a vito. The Vatican defended the deal as bringing Chinese
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Roman Catholics out of the shadows, though the move was
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derided as appeasement by a range of critics, from human
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rights groups to American Conservatives. Coming from a country in
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the global South, Francis held a common view of the
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United States that was never fully trusting of its influence
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and power. During the twenty twenty three encounter with Jesuit
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priests in Lisbon, he blasted the quote strong reactionary attitude
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of traditionalist American Catholics, describing them with an apparently self
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created Italian word india tristi, or backward looking people. He
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leveraged the authority of his office to call for religious
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coexistence and an end to Satarian strife in Iraq, where
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he met in March twenty twenty one with a grand
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Ietola Ali Sistani, a preeminent religious figure for Iraqi Schiites,
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from a desert stage on the plane of Erth, said
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to be the birthplace of Abraham, the Hebrew patriarch, also
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revered by Christians and Muslims, he told a multi faith crowd,
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we need one another. He could be stern, particularly with
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the Vatican City bureaucracy, which he saw as overwrought and wasteful,
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but he also brought a comforting casualness to his job,
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rejecting fire and brimstone in favor of outreach. Almost everything
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he did, including his rap approachment with divorced Catholics and
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women who had had abortions, could be seen as a
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manifestation of his central ideal mercy. And Yet, while Francis's
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inclusive style brought cheers from liberal and casual Catholics, notable atheists,
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and secular celebrities. Gay pop rock star Elton John called
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him a miracle, it proved divisive within his church. His
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ideology was nuanced and far from consistently liberal. He once
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compared gender theory the study of gender identity to nuclear weapons.
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Few of his teachings proved more contentious than his opus
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on the family Amoris They Teach You, or the Joy
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of Love in the document derisively dubbed the Joy of
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Sex in at least one conservative blog. Francis told married
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couples that they should not fear a healthy sexual desire
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and suggested that they start their days with a morning kiss.
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More important, he appeared to open the door for divorced
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and remarried Catholics, long considered by the church to be
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living in a state of adultery, to receive Holy communion.
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Such decisions, as with the brief blessings he authorized for
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people in Saint Sex's union were left to the discretion
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of pastors, part of his effort to build flexibility into
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a less top down church. Francis's fiercest critics, including Raymond Burke,
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a conservative U s cardinal who would become a chief
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antagonist within the church, decried to his teachings as so
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in confusion among the Catholic flock. Practically speaking, division has
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entered the church, which is contrary to our very nature,
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Burke said in twenty sixteen, while arguing that the Pope's
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teaching on divorced Catholics may have deviated from the faith's
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fundamental principles, Francis remained unbowed. May the church be a
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place of God's mercy and hope, where all feel welcomed, loved, forgiven,
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and encouraged to live according to the good life of
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the Gospel, he said in twenty thirteen, when he was
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also named Time magazine's Person of the Year. And to
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make others feel welcomed, loved, forgiven, and encouraged, the church
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must be with doors wide open, so that all may enter.
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Francis's early tolerance for open descent would fade along with
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his health in the latter stages of his papacy. In
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late twenty twenty three, he caused an outcry among conservatives
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by removing one critic, Bishop Joseph Strickland, as head of
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the Diocese of Tyler, Texas. He also stripped traditional privileges,
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including a Rome apartment, from Burke. Francis relayed his thinking
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to his biographer Austin Ivorret. A cardinal in his oath
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promises obedience to Blessed Peter and the person of the
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Supreme Pontiff. Ivorret wrote after discussing the move against Burke
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with Francis, the wording is not accidental, a spiritual calling.
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Francis's father, Martre Jose Francisco Bergoglio, emigrated from Italy's Piedmont
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region with his parents and five siblings. In nineteen twenty eight,
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they ventured west to join family already living in what
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was then the immigrants paradise of Argentina, one of the
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world's wealthiest countries by the early twentieth century, the Great Depression,
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as well as the start of a long succession of
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military rulers, undermined the country's promise. The Bargoglios relocated from
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the countryside to bustling Buenos Aires, the capital. There the
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Pope's father, a bookkeeper, met his future wife, Regina Maria Sigori,
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the daughter of Italian immigrants at Mass. The couple, who
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spoke Italian and Spanish at home, settled in the working
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class neighborhood of Flores. Jorge Mario Bogoglio, the eldest of
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five siblings, was born in the capital on December seventeenth,
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nineteen thirty six. At the time, Flores was a relative backwater,
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a cluster of homes crisscrossed by dirt roads and vegetable fields.
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As a youth, Jorge played soccer and danced up tempo
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malungas at parties. His only immediate survivor is his sister,
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Maria Elena Gargoblio. His spiritual life was deeply influenced by
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Rosa Passolo, his paternal grandmother, who cared for him during
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the day. In Italy, she had joined a Catholic group
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opposed to fascism, and in Argentina she instilled in her
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young charge a sense of social justice. Even as Pope
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Francis would keep in his prayer book a letter she
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wrote him at his ordination. If on some painful day
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sickness or the loss of a loved one fills you
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with grief. It read remember that a sigh before the tabernacle,
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where the greatest and most august martyr resides, and a
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gaze at Mary at the foot of the cross, can
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make a drop of balm fall on the deepest and
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most painful rooms. An encounter on September twenty first, nineteen
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fifty three, stirred Jorgees calling to the priesthood under the
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vaulted ceilings and frescoed walls of the Basilica San Jose
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de Flores. He went to confession and met a visiting priest,
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Carlos Duarte Ibarra, who was dying of leukemia. An impressionable
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sixteen year old. The future Pope took comfort in Duigte's
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absence of religious sternness and his spirit of forgiveness. He
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died the following year. Pope Francis recalled in his twenty
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sixteen book The Name of God Is Mercy, writing with
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Italian journalist Andrea Tornielle, I still remember how when I
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got home after his funeral and burial, I felt as
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though I had been abandoned, and I cried a lot
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that night really a lot and hid in my room.
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Why because I had lost a person who helped me
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feel the mercy of God taking us a cue at
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his path. Through the priesthood, Jorge Pergoglia worked as a labchemist,
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his mother wanted him to be a doctor, and briefly
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as a night club doorman. His spirituality deepened after he
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fell ill with pneumonia at twenty one, resulting in the
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eventual removal of most of one long In recollections of
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biographers Serio Reuben and Francisca Ambrogietti, he said a nun sister, Dolores,
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the woman who had prepared him for his first communion,
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came to a sick bed. You are imitating Christ, she
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told him, in what the future Pope would interpret as
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a lecture on how to confront Paine stoically. He was
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ordained in nineteen sixty nine after joining the Jesuits, a
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progressive Catholic order that emphasizes social justice and that before
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Francis had not produced the pope. His ascent toward higher
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office began at a time when Argentina, including the Catholic
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Church there, was deeply divided by a right wing military junta.
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In power from nineteen seventy six to nineteen eighty three.
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The Church hierarchy in Argentina stood accused of at best
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failing to denounce and at worst, being complicit in the
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Dirty War, during which at least ten thousand accused dissidents disappeared.
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The military was final left wing guerrillas, but its targets
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expanded to include political opponents, journalists, Jews, intellectuals and authors.
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Father Begoglio did not adhere to the radical liberation theology
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that led many idealistic young priests of his era to
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adopt sharply left wing views. In the book The Silence
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two thousand and five, Argentine journalist Horatio Vebitski reported that
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Father Begoglio, then a senior Jesuit, had lifted church protection
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from two leftist priests of his order, effectively allowing them
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to be jailed for refusing to end their politically tinged
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ministry in the Buenos Aire slums. One of them died
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before Father Begoglio became pope. The other, Francisco Halis, later
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insisted that allegations that Father Brogoglio and the Church had
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abandoned the two priests were based on false information, a
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critical trait as Francis became a leader, wrote biographer Ivorrey
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was his inscrutable, which earned him the nickname Mona Lisa
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among fellow Jesuits. Dozens of dissonant escapees, Ibaret noted, said
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Father Bergoglio help them to hide or to flee Argentina
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through covert networks. He was credited with alerting others who
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were being targeted for persecution. Father Bagoglio, Ivorret wrote, found
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himself in a delicate position. He was said to disdain
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the ideology of a junta, as well as a Marxist
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ideology of the left wing Monsonneo's guerrilla movement, but he
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was exceedingly practical and needed to maintain open lines with
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both sides to protect the Church. In a twenty ten
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trial on war crimes committed in Argentina during the junta years,
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the future Pope was questioned about est Balstrino, a chemist
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and communist militant who had campaigned for women's and laborers' rights,
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and who had been a supervisor at the lab where
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young Jorge Bagoglio once worked. He cited her as a
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major influence on is thinking. In the late nineteen seventies,
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she helped form the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo,
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a group of mothers of the disappeared whose regular marches
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with photos of their missing children presented a stark challenge
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to the junta. When the military began seizing dissidents, Father
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Bergoglio hid Balustrino's books on Marxism at her request. She
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was arrested, and Francis later admitted in a deposition that
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although he held a senior position in the church, he
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did not seek to secure her release. Balastrino, like many
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Argentine dissidents, is presumed to have been killed by being
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thrown from an airplane into the Atlantic Ocean. I blame
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myself for not doing enough, the future Pope said at
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the trial. In nineteen ninety two, Hope John Paul, the
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second named Father Bargoglio assistant bishop in Buenos Aires, and
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five years later he became archbishop. He served on Vatican commissions,
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and in two thousand and five was widely believed of
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com second to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger of Germany, later Pope Benedict.
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The sixteen, as a conclave convened to select the successor
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to John Paul, after his death as Cardinal Bergoglio, a
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position he would achieve in two thousand and one, he
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foreshadowed the revolutionary changes in style that would mark his
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years as Pope Francis. He lived in a modest dwelling
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after refusing to move into the large, impressive home of
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the city's top clerics. He washed the feet of AIDS patients,
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drug dealers, and prostitutes. He spent long days ministering in
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the sprawling slums known in Buenos Aires slangs as misery villages.
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While Catholic clerics in Eastern Europe clamored for a closer
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relationship between church and state, Cardinal Bargoglio sought a more
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detached approach. He believed that the Church in Argentina had
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become too closely associated with politicians, such as President Carlos Menem,
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who had been broadly denounced for corruption. In two thousan one,
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Argentina suffered a profound economic collapse that unleashed hunger and
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malnutrition in what had been Latin America's wealthiest nation. It
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was perhaps one of Cardinal Bargoglio's finest hours. He launched
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church backed relief operations that offered food medicine, job training,
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and shelter to the needy. In the years immediately before
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his election as pope, he displayed a continued wariness toward politics,
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setting up his notoriously adversarial relationship with President Christina Fernandez
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de Kitchener, a left wing populist. Kitchener painted Cardinal Bargoglio
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as complicit in the junta, and he responded with thinly
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veiled swipes at the Argentine political classes in grained corruption
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and haughty attitude toward the poor. His objection to Argentina's
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landmark bill legalizing same sex marriage provoked Kitchener, who backed
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the measure and described his tactics as reminiscent of medieval
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time and the Inquisition. The cardinals thought he was going
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to be more conservative, said the Reverend Thomas Rees, a
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Vatican analyst, but that was partly because he did not
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speak English, and many bishops outside of Latin America did
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not know him so well as they thought. In Buerens Aires,
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he had sat in the homes of poor people and
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heard their stories, and did not see the marketplace or
28:23
globalization as helping these people. An inclusive philosophy, but Francis's
28:30
approach to his papal office struck a new corps from
28:33
the outset. The Reverend Guillermo Carsher, then a Vatican protocol officer,
28:38
would recall striding through the massive doors of the Sistine
28:41
Chapel on the day Francis was elected. Upon finding him
28:45
in a hallway, Carcher knelt to kiss the papal ring.
28:49
Francis demurred, casually inviting the incredulous Carcher back to his
28:53
feet and asking him to stand before him as an equal.
28:57
Then we just stood there. He started to asking me
29:00
how my mom was doing. Carcher told The Washington Post
29:03
in twenty fifteen, I think that from the very beginning
29:07
we knew this man was going to be different. The
29:10
church that Francis inherited was in a state of disarray.
29:15
Benedict the sixteenth had shocked the world by retiring, the
29:18
first pope to do so since fourteen fifteen, after a
29:22
short tenure rocked by a resurgence of the clerical sex
29:25
scandals that had emerged under John Paul the Second. The
29:29
Vatican had also become tabloid fodder after Benedict's butler leaked
29:33
documents alleging that secret homosexual mafias and financial corruption lurked
29:39
behind the ancient walls of the Holy See. Francis pressed
29:43
for more transparency in the Roman Curia, the vast and
29:47
powerful Vatican bureaucracy. He sacked senior officials and created new commissions,
29:53
but his efforts, often thwarted by internal power struggles, never
29:58
quite lived up to the high hopes of men for
30:00
top to bottom reform. During his papacy, the Church continued
30:05
to suffer the fallout of revelations that for years the
30:08
Catholic hierarchy had shuffled from parish to parish priests known
30:13
to sexually abused children. Francis personally intervened to escalate a
30:18
small number of cases, and he created the first Pontifical
30:21
Commission dedicated to the protection of miners. But the Church
30:26
under Francis was sharply criticized for being too leaning with
30:30
accused clergy, and Francis promoted to Chilean bishop Juan Barros,
30:35
who had allegedly covered up for a pedophit priest. Francis
30:39
accepted Barrow's resignation in twenty eighteen. Under Francis's watch. In
30:44
January twenty nineteen, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the faith.
30:48
The Vatican watchdog that presides over investigations of sexual abuse
30:53
found former Washington Archbishop Theodore Macarrick guilty of sexually abusing
30:58
miners and adult seminarians. Macerrick was expelled from the priesthood,
31:03
marking the first time a cardinal or bishop in the
31:06
United States had been defract nodding to modern times, Francis's
31:12
position on same sex couples, guided by what he would
31:16
later describe as his belief that they should not be marginalized,
31:20
was especially complex. Reuben, an authorized biographer of Francis, told
31:25
reporters in twenty thirteen that during the same sex marriage
31:29
campaign in Argentina, then Cardinal Bergoglio had suggested a radical
31:34
idea to his peers that the Argentine Church publicly backed
31:39
same sex civil unions as an alternative. His position was
31:44
quickly shot down by more conservative bishops. His backing of
31:48
civil unions re emerged in twenty twenty when his words
31:52
as pope in support of legal rights for same sex
31:55
couples were highlighted in a documentary that premiered at the
31:58
Rome Film Festival. The comments sparked headlines worldwide, but he
32:04
had actually made them a year earlier, and a television
32:07
interview with a Mexican journalists said to have been conducted
32:11
with Vatican cameras and Vatican control of the footage. They
32:15
came to light after the documentary's director of Jennie Aveniski,
32:20
was granted access to Vatican archives, and what he found
32:24
raised the possibility the Church officials had been involved in
32:28
a decision to cut the comments from the original interview.
32:32
In a subsequent letter to Vatican embassies around the world,
32:35
the Office of the Holy See Secretary of State stressed
32:39
that the Pope was referring to secular unions and was
32:42
not establishing new doctrine. The March twenty twenty one decree
32:46
ordered priests not to bless san sex unions and made
32:50
crystal clear to the dismay of liberal priests and countries
32:53
such as Germany, that Francis's intention was never to change
32:57
official Church teachings. Nevertheless, Francis's position backing secular recognition for
33:04
same sex couples stood in stark contrast to the Vatican's
33:08
official position. A two thousand three document issued by the
33:12
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith described any legal
33:15
recognition of same sex couples as tantamount to the approval
33:20
of deviant behavior. Some gay Catholics experience repapproachment with their
33:24
families as a result of Frances's opening. In a twenty
33:28
fourteen interview, a thirty five year old lesbian in Florence,
33:31
Anna Maria, told the Post that her devoutly Catholic mother
33:35
had called her after hearing the popes who am I
33:38
to judge? Declaration. The two of them had grown distant
33:42
since she had told her mother years earlier that she
33:45
was a lesbian, But when she called me, she said,
33:48
if the pope is not judging you, then who am
33:51
I to judge in either. In his early twenty twenty
33:55
three call to eliminate laws that criminalize same sex relationships,
33:59
Francis still described homosexuality as a sin. Days later, he
34:04
clarified that he did not mean that same sex relations
34:07
were any more sinful than heterosexual sex outside marriage. I
34:12
should have said it is a sin, as is any
34:15
sexual act outside of marriage, Francis added in a written
34:19
reply to a priest ministering to the LGBTQ community in
34:23
the United States, he continued, I would tell whoever wants
34:27
to criminalize homosexuality that they are wrong. The lack of
34:31
church recognition of same sex marriage, however, still meant that
34:35
homosexuals had to abstain from sex for life to avoid sin.
34:40
The Francis authorized decision in twenty twenty three to allow
34:44
short blessings of individuals in same sex unions sparked a
34:48
massive backlash within the church, particularly in Africa, where national
34:52
churches said they would not uphold the ruling. The decision
34:56
emboldened the pope's internal critics, who during francis papacy would
35:01
speak out against him with an ardor not seen since
35:04
Pope Paul SI reaffirmed the church's ban on artificial birth
35:08
control in nineteen sixty eight. The German Cardinal Gerhard Nuller,
35:12
a frequent Francis critic, went as far as to describe
35:16
the new guidance on blessings as blasphemy. Francis embraced the
35:21
notion of a synodyl church, or a less top down
35:24
institution where lay people and women were given more of
35:28
a voice. In twenty twenty three and twenty twenty four,
35:32
he set high expectations for two synods that were billed
35:35
as the most important gatherings of church leaders since the
35:38
nineteen sixties. For church liberals, the events failed to deliver
35:43
on several fronts. Francis did not budge on his opposition
35:47
to married priests and alothough he did not shut down
35:50
discussions of a woman deacons, he made clear that during
35:53
his papacy that would not become a reality. He promoted
35:58
women to unprecedented position of power within the male dominated Vatican,
36:03
even as his words on the role of women, he
36:06
often repeated the Church's portrayal of them as daughters, sisters, mothers,
36:11
sparked accusations of reductive thinking, especially on women. I've always
36:16
thought he was quite the traditionalist, Lucretascarathia, a church historian
36:21
and former editor of the Vatican women's magazine Women Church World,
36:26
told The Post in twenty twenty four after the leadership
36:29
of a Catholic university in Belgium rebuked Francis for his
36:33
statements on women during an encounter with students and staff.
36:37
With Benedict's death in late twenty twenty two, the world
36:41
glimpse of, first in modern times, a sitting pope nodding
36:45
at the coffin of his predecessor. The aftermath saw church
36:49
conservatives amp up their criticism of Francis, as well as
36:53
the unmasking of the author of a poison pen letter
36:56
provided to a journalist by a senior church official. The letter,
37:01
a bitter critique of the Francis era, was written by
37:04
Cardinal George pell, a concert of Titan whose name was
37:08
revealed after his death in January twenty twenty three. Though
37:13
Francis never clearly changed doctrine, he stocked the College of
37:16
Cardinals with less traditional thinkers and moved fast to mint
37:20
new saints. One of Francis's canonizations involved eight hundred thirteen
37:26
Italian martyrs of the fifteenth century. He may hold the
37:30
record for canonizations, a distinction he was said to have
37:33
happily embraced. Francis reportedly favored candidates for canonization who reflected
37:39
his personal focus on inequality, mercy, and the plight of
37:44
the poor, and he repeatedly weighed the too miracle rule
37:48
to speed their way to sainthud. The beneficiaries included Peter Faber,
37:53
a founder of Francis's Jesuit order and a figure viewed
37:57
as a personal hero of the Pope. Francis, on his
38:01
own birthday, canonized favor after telling the Catholic magazine America
38:06
why he found him so worthy. It was, the Pope said,
38:10
because of Faber's dialog with all, even the most remote
38:14
and even with his opponents, his simple piety, a certain nativity,
38:20
perhaps his being available straightway, his careful interior discernment, the
38:25
fact that he was a man capable of great and
38:28
strong decisions, but also capable of being so gentle and loving.
38:34
The next article from to day's front page is entitled
38:37
Harvard sues to stop freeze on funding. School accuses Trump
38:41
of trying to gain leverage over academic decision by Susan's
38:46
for Luga and Dannielle Douglas Gabrielle, Harvard University sued the
38:51
Trump administration in federal court Monday, the latest move in
38:55
the escalating fude between the nation's wealthiest school and the
38:58
White House. The lawsuit, filed a U. S. District Court
39:02
in Massachusetts against multiple federal agencies, seeks to block the
39:06
Trump administration from withholding federal funding as leverage to gain
39:11
control of academic decision making at Harvard. Alan M. Garber,
39:16
the president of Harvard, said in a message to the
39:19
university community Monday that the Trump administration's actions are unlawful
39:24
and beyond the government's authority. Although some members of the
39:28
administration have said their letter of demand since the smug
39:31
was issued by mistake, Garber said other statements and actions
39:35
suggest otherwise. In addition to a frieze of two point
39:39
two billion dollars in federal funding, the government has considered
39:43
taking steps to freeze an additional one billion dollars in
39:46
grants initiated numerous investigations of Harvard's operations threatened the education
39:52
of international students, and said that it is considering a
39:56
revocation of Harvard's tax exempt status. Arbor noted that the
40:00
government has cited the university's response to antisemitism as a
40:05
justification for its actions. As a Jew and as an American,
40:09
I know very well that there are valid concerns about
40:12
rising anti semitism, he said, and to address those concerns
40:17
effectively requires understanding, intention and vigilance. Harvard takes that work seriously.
40:24
We will continue to fight hate with the urgency of
40:27
demands as we fully comply with our obligations under the law.
40:31
That is not only our legal responsibility, it is our
40:35
moral imperative. The Ivy League University is accusing the Trump
40:39
administration of violating its First Amendment rights federal administrative procedures
40:44
and regulations for taking action against institutions. Harvard also claims
40:50
that while Trump administration officials have accused the school of
40:53
violating Title six, a federal law that says any school
40:57
found to violate civil rights is not eligible for FEMS
41:00
federal funding, they failed to follow the procedures set out
41:03
in the law. The President and fellows of Harvard College
41:07
filed the sweeping complaint against the Departments of Health and
41:11
Human Services, Education, Energy, and Defense, the General Services Administration,
41:17
the National Institutes of Health NASA, and the leaders of
41:21
those agencies. According to the complaint, the fatal procedural sworecomings
41:26
are compounded by the arbitrary and capricious nature of the decision.
41:31
Before the funding freeze, the government had threatened to terminate
41:35
nearly nine billion dollars in federal funding, not just to Harvard,
41:40
but also to affiliated Boston hospitals and independent corporate entities
41:45
not under Harvard's control. Harrison Fields, a spokesperson for the
41:50
White House, responded to the lawsuit by saying the gravy
41:54
train of federal assistance to institutions like Harvard, which enriched
41:58
their grossly overpaid buls bureaucrats with tax dollars from struggling
42:02
American families is coming to an end. Taxpayer funds are
42:06
a privileged and Harvard fails to meet the basic conditions
42:09
required to access that privilege. Kerbert Roosevelt, a professor at
42:15
the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School, said Harvard has
42:18
a solid case, especially the claims alleging the government violated
42:23
Title six and the Administrative Procedure Act. It looks as
42:28
though the administration is just sort of doing what it
42:31
wants to without real concern for what the law is,
42:34
said Roosevelt, an expert on constitutional law. He said a
42:39
win for Harvard could embolden other universities to fight back
42:42
against the Trump administration, but a loss in this case
42:46
could mean the end of their resistance. Jason Rubinstein, the
42:51
executive director of Harvard HILLEL, said that the school is
42:55
in the midst of a long and long overdue reckoning
42:59
with antisemetery and that Garber has taken important steps to
43:03
address the problem. Methodical federal civil rights oversight could play
43:08
a constructive role in that reform, he said, but the
43:12
government's current fast paced assault against Harvard, shuddering a political
43:17
life saving research, targeting the university's taxies and status, and
43:22
threatening all student feces, is neither deliberate nor methodical, and
43:27
its disregard for the necessities of negotiation and due process
43:31
threatens the barwalks of institutional independence and the rule of
43:35
law that undergird our shared freedoms. The Trump administration had
43:41
initially announced a review of nearly nine billion dollars in
43:44
federal funding to Harvard as a crackdown on colleges that
43:48
it claims are overrun with antisemitism and leftist ideology. As
43:54
part of the review, officials demanded in an April eleventh
43:58
letter that the university upend its hiring, admissions, and governance
44:03
and submit two years long federal oversight of multiple aspects
44:07
of its operations. When Harvard made clear last week that
44:11
the university would not comply, the administration responded forcefully by
44:17
freezing two point two billion dollars in funding within days.
44:21
It also sought to revoke the school's taxes and status
44:25
and threatened to bar the institution from enrolling international students
44:29
if certain student records were not turned over. The administration's
44:35
actions against universities have touched off protests nationally. With a
44:39
coordinated day of action Thursday at scores of campuses, thousands
44:44
of professors signed letters, inspired by one written to the
44:47
Harvard corporation, urging the school's leaders to refuse to acquiesce
44:51
to unlawful demands and to mount a coordinated response with
44:55
other schools and alumni. Other prominent university presidents spoke out
45:00
in support of Harvard's stance this week, as well as
45:03
political leaders such as former President Barack Obama, a graduate
45:08
of its law school. On Monday, Harvard's chapter of the
45:12
American Association of University Professors, which filed the lawsuit earlier
45:16
this month to block the Trump administration's cuts, praise the
45:20
university for taking legal action. It is high time for
45:25
leading civil society institutions like Harvard to refuse and resist
45:29
this federal government overreach and abuse, said Kirsten Weld, a
45:34
history professor at Harvard and president of the aau P
45:38
Harvard Faculty Chapter. The administration's approach, which it deems necessary
45:43
to combat campus anti semitism, has some prominent advocates. Kenneth L. Marcus,
45:49
founder and chief executive of the Brandei Center for Human
45:53
Rights under Law, a Jewish civil rights nonprofit, said before
45:57
the lawsuit was filed, the tauche hold of government response
46:01
was long overdue and appropriate given the breadth of the problem.
46:06
This is by far the most sweeping and comprehensive approach
46:10
we've seen to anti semitism in this country, said Marcus,
46:14
who headed the Education Department's Office for Civil Rights during
46:18
the first Trump administration and faulted the Biden administration for
46:22
not taking a more aggressive stance after campus protests began
46:26
over Israel's military operation in Gaza. Harvard leaders said the
46:31
government's directives conveyed in the wide ranging five page letter
46:35
were unlawful and unconstitutional. The steps ordered, they warned, would
46:40
be critically damaging to a generation's long partnership between the
46:44
federal government and universities that had powered scientific advances. No government,
46:51
regardless of which party is in power, should dictate what
46:54
private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire,
46:58
and which areas of study an inquiry they can pursue,
47:02
Garber told the campus community last week. In announcing the
47:06
lawsuit Monday, Garber listed research jeopardized by the funding freeze,
47:11
including efforts to understand how cancer spreads, to predict the
47:15
spread of infectious disease outbreaks, and to reduce the risk
47:19
of multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer's disease, and Parkinson's disease. The consequences
47:25
of the government's overreach will be severe and long lasting,
47:30
Garber wrote. The administration's multi agency Joint Task Force to
47:35
Combat Anti Semitism said last week that the school's position
47:39
reflected the troubling entitlement mindset that is endemic in our
47:43
nation's most prestigious universities and colleges. That federal investment does
47:48
not come with responsibility to uphold civil rights laws. Though
47:53
Harvard's fifty three billion dollar endowment makes it the wealthiest
47:56
university in the country, much of that money is restrics
48:00
directed by donors and the terms of their gifts. The
48:03
same night the funding freeze was announced, the first stop
48:06
work orders on major research projects were already hitting the school.
48:13
The next day, Trump posted on social media, perhaps Harvard
48:17
should lose its tax exem status and be taxed as
48:20
a political entity if it keeps pushing political ideological and
48:25
terrorists inspired supporting sickness. Remember tax exam status is totally
48:30
contingent on acting in the public interest. The Trump administration
48:35
soon after asked the IRS to revoke the school's tax
48:38
exam status. It's just unfathomable, said Lily Bachelder, a professor
48:44
of law at New York University and former Assistant Secretary
48:48
of tax policy for the Treasury Department. Congress has repeatedly
48:52
enacted laws that make it a crime for the President
48:56
or any political appointees to help the White House to
48:59
directly or indirectly interfere in IRS audits or investigations of taxpayers,
49:05
and the President has done just this by tweeting that
49:09
he wants them to do so, even without political influence.
49:13
She said, it would be extremely rare for the IRS
49:16
to revoke an organization's taxes and status, and would only
49:20
happen after years of investigation and back and forth. This
49:24
is a really profound undermining of the law, Thatchelder said,
49:29
adding that all Americans should be worried about their ramifications
49:33
for nonprofits they care about, whether a church, congregation or
49:37
a community group. A White House spokesperson said last week
49:41
that investigations into an array of institutions began before Trump
49:45
posted on truth, Social and that any forthcoming actions would
49:49
be conducted independently of the president. Jason Newton, a spokesperson
49:54
for Harvard, said there is no legal basis to rescind
49:58
the school's taxes m status. The government, he noted, has
50:02
long exempted universities from taxes to support their educational mission.
50:07
The tax exemption means that more of every dollar can
50:10
go towards scholarships for students, life saving and life enhancing
50:14
medical research, and technological advancements that drive economic growth. Homeland
50:20
Security Secretary Christy L. Nome also has weighed in demanding
50:24
that Harvard's supply records on international students alleged to have
50:28
engaged in illegal and violent activities or face losing its
50:33
certification to enroll foreign students. According to the Institute of
50:37
International Education, Harvard had about seven thousand, eight hundred international
50:42
students enrolled last academic year. Other schools, starting with Columbia University,
50:48
but including Princeton, Cornell, Brown and Northwestern Universities and the
50:53
University of Pennsylvania, are facing funding threats too. Harvard stand
50:59
drew support from several of those institutions leaders last week,
51:03
though other college presidents continued to remain silent. Publicly. Unions
51:08
representing faculty members had already brought lawsuits challenging the Trump
51:12
administration's actions at Columbia and Harvard. Columbia's acting president, Claire Shipman,
51:19
said in his statement last week to her university community
51:22
that she had read with great interest Harvard's response to
51:26
the government's demands. Columbia has seen hundreds of research grants
51:30
terminated and funding hasn't been restored despite its efforts to
51:35
negotiate with the government. Those discussions are continuing, Shipman wrote,
51:40
but she made it clear there were lines in university
51:42
would not cross. Columbia would reject any agreement in which
51:47
the government dictates with the school teaches, researches, or whom
51:51
it hires, she wrote. Overly prescripted requests about our governance,
51:56
how we conduct our presidential search process, and how specifically
52:00
to address viewpoint diversity issues are not subject to negotiation,
52:04
she noted, and the school would reject any agreement that
52:09
would require us to relinquish our independence and autonomy as
52:12
an educational institution. Princeton President Christopher Eisgruper last week linked
52:19
to Garber's letter in a post on LinkedIn and wrote,
52:22
Princeton stands with Harvard. I encourage everyone to read President
52:27
Alan Garber's powerful letter in full. Icegrouper had previously spoken out,
52:33
writing in The Atlantic in March that the Trump administration's
52:36
attack on Columbia was the greatest threat to American university
52:40
since the Red Scare. After Princeton was targeted with cuts,
52:45
he told the campus community that the school would vigorously
52:49
defend academic freedom, and in a message to their community
52:53
last week, Stanford University President Jonathan Levin and Provost Jennie
52:59
Martinez said the Supreme Court had long ago recognized the
53:03
freedoms of the universities under the First Amendment as the
53:07
ability to determine who gets to teach, what is taught,
53:11
how subjects are taught, and who is admitted to study.
53:15
Universities need to address legitimate criticisms with humility, they wrote,
53:20
but the way to bring about constructive change is not
53:23
by destroying the nation's capacity for scientific research or through
53:27
the government taking control of a private institution. Harvard's objections
53:32
to the letter it received are rooted in the American
53:35
tradition of liberty, they wrote, a tradition essential to our
53:39
country's universities and worth defending On Tuesday, a group of
53:44
more than one hundred college presidents and other higher education
53:48
leaders publicly spoke out in a collective statement from the
53:52
American Association of Colleges and Universities. The leaders said they
53:56
reject the coercive use of public research funding. They said
54:00
they are open to constructive reform and do not oppose
54:03
legitimate government oversight, but quote, we must oppose undue government
54:08
intrusion into the lives of those who learn, live and
54:12
work on our campuses. The next item from to day's
54:16
front page is entitled Pope Francis dies at eighty eight.
54:20
He changed Church's approach, if not its doctrine, historic outreach
54:25
to l g B, t Q plus people Catholics at
54:28
a cross road as a wait a successor by Anthony Faiola,
54:33
Stefano Petrelli and Chicoharland from Vatican City. On his last day, Easter,
54:40
the holiest on the Christian calendar, Pope Francis double down
54:44
on the defining theme of his papacy, mercy. After a
54:49
private audience with Vice President J. D. Vans, who represented
54:52
an American administration Francis had taken to task for its
54:56
migrant crackdown and aid cuts. The Pope's fi speech was
55:00
read aloud in Saint Peter Square as a pontiff in
55:04
his wheel chair struggled for breath. How much contempt is
55:08
stirred up at times towards the vulnerable, the marginalized, and migrants,
55:12
the text said, the words read by a surrogate. Given
55:16
Francis's fragile health, I appeal to all those and positions
55:20
of political responsibility in our world not to yield to
55:24
the logic of fear. A later passage read without mentioning
55:28
names or nations. Francis's death ends a historic chapter for
55:34
the world's largest Christian faith, silencing a champion of the marginalized.
55:38
At a time when nationalism, a concept long held in
55:41
contempt by the first Latin American pope, is once again
55:45
surging in the West, the Church now finds itself at
55:48
a cross roads, plagued by divisions and competing visions. After
55:53
the death of a spiritual leader who called out religious
55:56
hypocrisy as he sought to throw open the faith's doors.
56:00
As he put it to every one, every one, every one,
56:05
he still was a voice, a moral voice, moral in
56:09
the sense that he stood up for peace and justice.
56:12
And the dignity of people, said Brigitte Thalhammer, an Austrian nun,
56:16
who was standing next to a fountain in Saint Peter's
56:19
Square on Monday afternoon, and I wondered, who can be
56:24
that voice? Now? My hope and prayer is that the
56:27
church will be really different than what's going on with
56:30
the world leaders, where the bullies are on top. She said,
56:34
This is my prayer. Then in the conclave they will
56:37
find some one who can continue this way. During his
56:41
twelve year pontificate, Francis shifted the focus of the church
56:45
away from debates about bedroom topics such as divorce, homosexuality,
56:49
and contraception, and engaged more with modern issues including climate change, emigration,
56:56
and artificial intelligence. The Conclave, or the secretive assembly to
57:01
pick the next pope, is likely to be held within
57:04
twenty days. Packed with one hundred thirty five voting cardinals
57:09
from distant corners of the global church, including Tonga, me
57:13
and mar and Iran, It is poised to be the
57:16
largest in the history of the Church, as well as
57:19
among the most unpredictable. Several top Vatican bureaucrats, as well
57:24
as notable cardinals in Europe, Asia and Africa are seen
57:28
as contenters, but Francis has no true heir apparent, and
57:32
the likelihood of a surprise or a deadlock that could
57:35
see the event go on for multiple days is viewed
57:38
as relatively high. This concludes the reading of the Washington
57:43
Post for Today, Tuesday, April twenty second, twenty twenty five.
57:48
Your reader husband Cindy Fraser. If you have any questions, comments,
57:53
or suggestions concerning this program, please feel free to call
57:56
us at eight five nine four two two sixty three
57:59
nine zero. Thank you for listening, and now please stay
58:03
tuned for continued programming on Radio I