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“Before Francis took ill in February, he criticized President Donald Trump’s mass deportation policy. ‘What is built on the basis of force,’ Francis warned in a letter to American bishops, ‘and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly.’”
I fucking hate you Vance, this is your fault!
Political extremists aren’t always the best at differentiating between correlation and causation. Let’s see how this plays out.
Conspiracy theorists are already making new theories about Vance killing the Pope for refusing to “Play ball” with the Trump Agenda
Well, that’s hardly a good excuse for pawning JD Vance off on some flunky. Seriously, popes these days…
Bring him back, take Trump instead
Guys. Joe Biden is Catholic. The Vatican has an opportunity to do the funniest thing ever.
They are really unlikely to support a non cleric. All the decision makers sacrificed a lot of typical life time activities to be clerics, they aren’t going to lift up sometime who hasn’t also made these sacrifices.
I didn’t say they would. I said they could. Jokes aside, I would be VERY surprised if old Joe got picked for this, both for the reasons you mentioned and because of the decline he’s been going through recently.
For the past 600 years, the pope has always been a cardinal.
The last time someone other than a cardinal was elected was 1296, they elected some monk who was something of a holy figure. It was a clusterf*"#, lasted 5 months and every decision he made was reversed by it’s successor except for one (the right for pope’s to abdicate). Which kinda sounds like Bidens term in office, but let’s not give him another chance at being useless, ok?
(There were some other non-cardinals after, but all of them clergy, and mostly during or shortly after the Avignon papacy)
Pope Brandon I
It’s a funny thought, but he’s not a cardinal or even a priest. Not just any Catholic can be Pope.
Edit: turns out, yes, any Catholic can theoretically be pope
Uhm, pretty sure being a baptized Catholic is pretty much the only requirement…
From Wikipedia:
The pope does not need to be a cardinal elector or indeed a cardinal; since the pope is the bishop of Rome, only those who can be ordained a bishop can be elected, which means that any male baptized Catholic is eligible.
They aren’t going to pick someone that isn’t in the room when they vote on it.
So just any guy, even if he isn’t Christian, can be baptised in the morning and then get appointed pope in the afternoon?
Technically. Being a cardinal is an unwritten requirement seeing as they, with very few exceptions, have preferred to elect a cardinal to be pope.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Non-cardinals_elected_pope
Let’s go. Pope Biden can be the seventh.
actually in theory yes any catholic can be pope.
in practice, however…
Actually officially any male catholic can be pope, it’s just in practice cardinals always choose one of their own
Psh, details, shmetails.
He is probably younger than most of the other candidates.
They once made a monk Pope I know, I’m not sure if he was also a priest. Certainly wasn’t a cardinal though I think that was one of the arguments in favor of him.
Oh shit.
Pope Fabian Ⅱ
I actually saw a headline yesterday about how the Pope “ghosted” JV Dunce. 😫👻
JD Vance: “How long have you worked here?”
“Have you said Thanks, even once?”
Is Francis really your name? What’s on your birth certificate?
His last words: “Dear Father in heaven, that unsufferable man!”
It was quite big in Latin America and perhaps the Philippines. The biggest left wing groups and anti-dictatorship movements in the 20th century was influenced by the Catholic church. I am no longer religious, but I would not be the person I am today had I not been brought up in a Catholic environment.
Same.
Pope is recovering;
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meets JD Vance
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dies a couple days later…
Hmm
Many people are asking “Did JD Vance have a hand in the Pope’s death?”
Did JD Vance murder the Pope? It could be. Hey, I’m just asking questions here…
Would YOU want to keep on living if you had to speak to JD Vance?
He died the very next day.
Hours later, even.
Isn’t it ironic? Don’t ya think?
I blame Alanis Morttisette for people confusing coincidence, weird juxtaposition, and shitty luck with irony.
But the whole song is the irony. She’s just playing chess while we’re all playing checkers.
Yes, Ironic’s lyrics contain no irony, which is ironic.
Isn’t it
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JD Vance asks to meet Pope
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Pope slights Vance, refuses to meet
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Pope dies the next day ???
Very sus
Well they did meet actually.
JD Vance is the impostor.
-
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I am surpringly annoyed about Americans somehow finding a way to make this about themselves.
In reality I’m much more worried about the likely counterreformist pushback that is likely about to happen. We’re about to find out if a remarkably powerful organization’s leader was able to seed enough support to secure a politically aligned successor, and if the answer is “no” a bunch of organizations are about to get even more ruthlessly conservative at a time when a new strain of fascism is seeking moral support. The Catholic Church has been here before. It didn’t go well.
“Francis appointed nearly 80% of the cardinal electors who will choose the next pope, increasing the possibility that his successor will continue his progressive policies, despite the strong pushback from traditionalists.”
https://www.reuters.com/world/pope-francis-has-died-vatican-says-video-statement-2025-04-21/
The catch is that he did not appoint by ideology. His appointments were mainly based on the guys doing work for poor people, for migrants, and on them doing their jobs in the global south.
Quite a few of these he made cardinals are somewhat conservative in their views, especially regarding sexuality
It helps a bit that typically those that have more compassion tend to be more liberal, but in general even the more liberal Catholics tend to be somewhat conservative
I mean, there are catholic priests and officials that are very liberal - they do exist. But those people do usually not even get into a position as a bishop, so they are not on the table to potentially become cardinals.
Yeah. It’s more than annoying, especially as it’s the same old Vance joke again and again and again. Which isn’t even clever.
I am not a Christian by any means but I worked with them quite often. Francis did change a lot of things and while he wasn’t in no way perfect - he did have his drawbacks, for a fucking pope he was much better than anyone before him within the last few hundred years. People (especially on the internet)nowadays expect other people, especially political leaders to “check all their boxes” and if one thing is not going as far as they want, they are alienated.
Often I have the impression that as long as someone is not going “all the way” in the right direction they are seen as bad as someone who does not do anything at all or goes in the wrong direction. (Which is ironic because the church itself has evolved past the “saint or sinner” directive)
Francis has been going in the right direction probably 60% of the way and 10% in the wrong direction. Is the Catholic church there yet? No. Is there a big chance it might turn back? Yes. Would he been elected if he was so reformist it was sure he would topple everything and go 100%? Surely not.
But he did much more than any of his predecessors did.
Any much more most commenters do.
Besides: It’s okay to feel sorry for an old man dying. That’s called fucking compassion. I work in healthcare and have seen a lot of people die. I feel sorry for almost all of them.
In the end a human has died. Period.
As a non-Catholic American, I have the same worry for the global geopolitics. It just so happens that the united states is part of those geopolitics.
I don’t expect a conservative backlash, on the contrary Francis’s Pontificate has weakened the conservative wing considerably. Given that 80% of the voting cardinals were appointed by Pope Francis, I would expect them to elect a successor that continues in the same direction, perhaps even a more radical one.
During his pontificate Francis also made a lot of efforts to bring in new groups into the corridors of power. Not only by his appointment of cardinals, but also e.g. by reforming the Curia with Praedicate evangelium.
I am surpringly annoyed about Americans somehow finding a way to make this about themselves
Me too, bud. Me. Too. Alas, there is no escaping them for me. I do wish more Americans could travel abroad and see the world beyond our borders. I would wager fewer than 20% of Americans have been 50 miles from our borders and it can lead to a pretty insular world view.
It sure feels like the tides are turning conservative everywhere, but apparently a Filipino progressive is a favorite to be next
There is a roman saying, “the one who enters conclave as the pope [to be] leaves it as a mere cardinal”
Bummer. Then I guess it’ll be another Italian.
There’s an old saying in Tennessee — I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.
I can’t read this. The saying I know is probably Roman: “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me”.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushism
You can find the original quote in the examples section.
Ah, I didn’t knew there was a president in America that made the mistake of paraphrasing it like that. Shame on americans that keep bein’ fooled in that fake democracy :P
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/6436-there-s-an-old-saying-in-tennessee-i-know-it-s
As dumb as Bush was, he was smart enough to not say “shame on me” on camera.
I’m not Catholic, and i don’t follow this stuff closely, but I’ve seen a LOT of popes come and go, and as far as I remember, the chosen pope has NEVER been the early favorite. Anybody whose name is being knocked around right now is unlikely to be the final choice, recently-historically speaking.
A very old one indeed. It’s never certain how conclaves will go.
We’ll see where it goes. They aren’t exactly transparent about these things, and they’ve been arguing among themselves for a while. We’ll know with the white smoke, I suppose.
I think in terms of the church the term “conservative” does not necessarily align with the political understanding. The largest shift in the church is demographic. White Europeans are loosing power rapidly in the catholic church. Subsequently the catholic church will align less and less with “Western” conservatives, and their imperialist understanding of geopolitics.
I expect to see much more opposition of “christian conservative” politicians in Europe towards the catholic church.
Ironically just yesterday the president of the German federal parliament of the “christian conservative” CDU told the Churches to shut up about politics.It is not ironic, half of Germans are protestants.
Nope. Half of Germans (47%) don’t have a confession. 21% of Germans are protestants.
She is describing herself as catholic though and even studied catholic theology.Her attack was directed at all churches, not just the catholic church.
More specifically she said “the churches shouldn’t be another NGO” and then gave examples as to what they shouldn’t talk about. So the idea is already that "NGO"s are something bad and civil society voicing political stances is bad. But then religious institutions commenting on how politics are in violation of the values the religion teaches, seems to be particularly disdained. This is also historically worrisome as the churches in the GDR used to be hailed for taking a stance against the regime and there is a lot of stories, how the churches in the third Reich would have taken stance, although i am not sure if the ratio of opposition/silence/collaboration is accurately represented in those stories.
I’m waiting for someone to suggest that a it’s time for the first woman pope.
Haha I was thinking that, but there’s no way. And that’s a problem
Should we make it about a religion that’s known for pedophile priests and them being protected? Or about how religion is a long con scam of power and wealth that has been the leading cause of war and persecution for centuries upon centuries?
Granted, by all appearances, I believe he seemed to be a pretty good guy. Hopefully the next pope will be as good. Take what you can while religions still exist, I suppose.
I am surpringly annoyed about Americans somehow finding a way to make this about themselves
And turning it into politics, because there is no otger way to talk about things
Sure, discussing politics is important to some degree, but it isn’t the most important thing in our lifes
One of the most important persons in the world (atleast for catholics) has died. We shouldn’t laugh about it. We shouldn’t politicize it. We shouldn’t take it to any other context.
I’m surprised and sad at the same time. Even tho i like edgy memes and memes about Pope John Paul II (he is a legend in Poland and polish community do meme about him but in a very respectful way), i really find it bad to do so about Pope Francis right now - so i dislike any post like this
It’s just a religion, we strip it of any power if they misbehave.
I am very curious to know who “we” is in this context.
Europe. We have a history of stripping power from christianity, and we’ll continue till there’s nothing left if necessary.
So yeah, just be powerless, it’s just a religion.
Cultism is such a potent tendency of the human animal that new cults form spontaneously in the absence of established mythologies (or despite them). Fascism is a cult phenomenon, for instance, and the people vulnerable to such belief systems are unerringly broken in the same way that religious people are broken. It’s like someone scooped out the part of their brains responsible for maintaining epistemic norms and replaced it with oatmeal.
You should know that lots of countries and societies will not do this. Especially in the global south.
Unfortunately that’s not the way it works.
Gfdi. I’m not religious, but knowing that Catholics are going to choose a new Pope, I can only look forward to more bad news of comformity to godawful world news in the form of a shitty New Pope who inspires and empowers all the shitty people.
Great, one more thing to make the world even worse.
My sincere hope is that the Catholic Church looks at how they were perceived under Benedict—a staunchly conservative Pope that led to massive losses in respect, attendance, and relevance; and how they were perceived under Francis—an actually compassionate and humble servant of the Church and its people. And based on that, they choose another Pope who’s in the same vein as Francis to continue bringing the Church into this century. There is still decades of work to be done, but we absolutely can’t go backwards right now.
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Frances said some good stuff but did he do anything meaningful to bring the church into this century
Yes that is what they meant
Or, on the theory that we’re living in the stupidest timeline, they’ll go with “Pope Biden I.”
Lol.
There’s some hope… part of Francis’ papacy involved him promoting more open-minded cardinals (who are the ones who choose popes) but we’ll see
We can hope.
But also: “papacy”? Sounds like a dynamic I need in my life (:
This just in: the Catholic Church chooses Andrew Tate as their new pope
Im waiting for all the articles whe we he said something nice about gay people, so hes super progressive and we should be nice to the church cause they like us
Only to go to the comments where someone points out the next sentence he said was we are still going to hell
They’re the ones that invented hell in the first place. That’s being the gatekeeper of your own imaginative fuck-you land, you can do whatever you want since it doesn’t even exist in the first place.
Oh hey if you beat your children and don’t support people that support trans people you’re going to urusjsttisstiidtiyd after you die and it sucks and people punch you in the face and it smells like shit and jd vance sticks his fingers in your mouth randomly and it’s all the worst stuff you can imagine and it curses your family forever and if you do support trans people with everything and don’t worry i can read your thoughts i mean the super powerful all powerful everywhere all the time in everything force person called odyysiid5tditkxhck can read your thoughts and knows if you’re being bad or even considering it or thinking about anything bad.
^ religion, my new one that you should follow, also you go to the good place where all your dreams come true and you can be with all your loved ones forever and there’s all the things you want trust me bro you want this and not the bad forever ending. It’s called RaulingSucksDurt-ism and it’s real and all the other religions aren’t real and they’re all actually going to urusjsttisstiidtiyd for not even believing. The best thing you can do actually is to show them the light and save them from urusjsttisstiidtiyd because that’s bad and you want to be good right? The other religions just lie to you and it’s actually the leader of urusjsttisstiidtiyd whispering in their ear and they’re all victims bro, help them bro before it’s too late, they’re all bad bro help them with your love
I think with the current zeitgeist we’re in for a Battle Pope this time.
Battle Pope! With flying “Rocket Papal Punch” action! Only $12.25 at your nearest Vatican.
Looks like it’s time for another pope race. I would like to throw my hat in the ring. As a lapsed Catholic trans woman who’s never so much as visited a seminary, I know I’m an unorthodox choice. But maybe it’s time to mix things up. My central campaign planks? We’re going to bring back indulgences and try to make the Papal States a thing again. Also, expect skits and improv sessions to have a big place in Catholic mass in the future!
I know I’m an unorthodox choice.
There’s a joke somewhere in here
My partner added “as someone who can’t even say the word 'seminary” without giggling…"
Your candidacy would put the Church in quite a predicament, for sure. They could either embrace a trans woman as a leader (confirming that there’s nothing wrong with trans people) or reject her for being a woman (therefore admitting that one can, in fact, change their gender).
Of course, this is a false dichotomy, but a good PR team could spin it as a human rights win either way.
“As a lapsed Catholic trans woman who’s never so much as visited a seminary, I know I’m an unorthodox choice.”
As someone in the same position good luck
As new Pope, I promise to repeat the Cadaver Synod. I promise to dig up the corpse of Pope Benedict XVI and put him on trial for his homophobia and transphobia! And I may not stop at him…I may have to set up a whole special court just for putting former popes on trial.
Only guys can be Pope.
But according to TERFs and fash, she is a guy though
So we should thank TERFs for having a trans women Pope? Watching TERFs meltdown over these would be hilarious.
I promise to spend the entire papacy dressed in dresses that look like they belong in the White Tower scenes in the Wheel of Time series.
This, in the Catholic Church, transwomen actually do count as women. Recent ruling, they’re against “Gender Ideology”, whatever the fuck that means, but make exceptions for transpeople due to Francis ruling gender dysphoria a geniune medical issue that is exempt from rules against whatever “Gender Ideology” is
Eh. Rules are arbitrary and can be changed.
Hey, hey, hey… there’s always Pope Joan. ;)
Without going into spoilery details, the film Conclave raised a very interesting question about pope eligibility. Recommend checking it out, not just for the topical relevance but also simply because it’s a good movie.
You’d have to call uno reverse trans
Pretty sure the church doesn’t recognize trans people
Checkmate
athiestsCatholics.
Any signs of plutonium poisoning?
He was the raddest pope ever. They say his coffin practically glows
RIP Pope Francis. Glad you put Just Dumb in his place.
The child in me kind of wishes he had passed on 4/20 Easter, but alas.
That being said, while I’m not religious I appreciate a lot (not all) of what this Pope has done. His Apostolic Exhortation on the Idolatry of Money, and the gross inequality wrought by capitalism is worth a read.
For the time he had, the distance he brought the Church is pretty impressive. I will go to my grave believing that organized religion does more harm than good, nothing they ever do will change my mind. That said, he really was an agent for positive change, especially compared to Darth Benedict, who preceded him.
Some gold from that document:
In this context, some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naïve trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system.
Would be funny to make a quote collection titled “Who said this? Pope Francis or a socialist?”
Not to mention his stance against zio terrorism. That’s probably why he’s being replaced.
He’s being replaced because he dead yo.
Good pope tho.
I like the implication that they interrogated a dead body about its opinion on terrorism lmao
It wouldn’t be the first time!
oh I forgot about that, you win this comment section 😂
Don’t worry. If I’m elected pope, you’ll get to see the return of the Cadaver Synod, bigger and better than ever! In fact, I’ll set up a whole special court just to try former popes I have a theological beef with! They’ll have several cases going on simultaneously. I’ll put dozens of former popes on trial!
He was like man this guy sucks, I don’t want to live in a world where this guy has power, then dies. I feel the same dude…
