What are the odds of a Liberal Pope?

[usregimechange]

Poll question: What are the odds of a Liberal Pope?

I'm not Catholic but I am reading about Pope Pius collaborating with fascist regimes and think it is clear that the Popehood has long term political implications.

[donco6]

1. No chance. eom

[patrice]

2. Popes may scold Liberation Theology priests publicly, BUT

I really hope they don't continue ignore the needs for land reform in Central and South America. And who should pay for writing off 3rd world debt. The IMF, thus burdening the other World-poor, or the G8 who have profited most from the World-poor.

[autorank]

3. My sci-fi scenario

They elect a real hard core guy who is, in fact, a plant and turns out to be a flaming liberal. Yeah, right. That's about the only chance; or maybe, a conversion or bolt from above the says, "Uh, God to Pope, forumlate your policies for the living, ease up on condoms and birth control, report back in 30 days. I'm watching! That is all."

[bullimiami]

4. how about one with integrity for a change.

one that wouldn't deal with sexual deviance by moving priests and paying off families.
the church and papacy has a history steeped in blood and greed.
the modern catholic church still has a failure of morality in my opinion.

Inexcusable.

[Kerrytravelers]

5. On this planet? In this lifetime? Maybe a parallel universe.

I'm Catholic. I don't see it happening in the church.

[tallahasseedem]

6. Will never happen...

Pope John Paul II made sure of it.

[LimpingLib]

7. Social liberal as in abortion? NONE

I care about the 3rd world though and hope a social justice progressive is selected.

Keep in mind its only Americans and other whites who give a flip about abortion.

[ReadTomPaine]

8. Ask the professionals!

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=pope+odds

Plenty of hardcore bookmaking going on, if you can believe it.

RTP

[China_cat]

9. You don't have an option for 2

slim and none.

[zooloobush]

10. John Paul II appointed all but 2 of the ones electing.

He Appointed ones who agreed with him. Liberal on rights of the poor and against war and such. Conservative on ideas like abortion and womens rights.

The new pope is almost certain to maintain the status.

[kweerwolf]

11. You'd have a better chance at finding ...

... a rabbi in Baghdad than seeing the conclave elect a liberal pope.

[bemildred]

12. "liberal Pope" is an oxymoron. nt

[zann725]

13. What are the odds of an Italian Pope?

I feel it's only proper.

[imenja]

14. Western bourgeois notions of liberal and conservative

Americans conceive of political ideology in cultural terms rather than class. You think the Church is conservative because of positions on gay marriage, a celibate clergy, and ordination of women. You can be quite certain a Pope will not be elected who would advance what you consider liberal positions on those issues. There is, however, a very good chance that the next pope will maintain strong concerns for social justice--of a kind no liberal politician in this country would imagine articulating. For most people in the world, poverty is their primary concern. Those concerns are reflected in the views of most of many of Latin America's archbishops. Most are not liberals: they do not see the marketplace as the ultimate arbiter of what is right. Liberalism in it's origin is the political corollary to capitalism. In the US we imagine liberal somehow means leftist, but that is because the left in this country is so weak, so conservative, that they don't challenge capitalism, as leftists in many other parts of the world due.


So if what you want is an American style liberal, who advances modern cultural ideals yet has little concern for the tremendous poverty and injustice around the world, you will not see a man like that become Pope.

[Bridget Burke]

15. What kind of "liberal"?

"Liberal" in relation to Church doctrine? Or in relation to politics?

And which Pope Pius have you been reading about? What sources?

[usregimechange]

16. The book is called "Hitler's Pope"

Hitler's Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII
by John Cornwell

Product Details:
ISBN: 0140296271
Format: Paperback, 448pp
Pub. Date: October 2000
Publisher: Penguin Group (USA)

Hitler's Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII

FROM OUR EDITORS
Sins of the Holy Father
Like almost all other men who ascended to the position of pope, Eugenio Pacelli was a clever Vatican politician. As his predecessor, Pius XI, alienated non-Italian cardinals, Pacelli carried out the Vatican's wishes abroad as nuncio (the Vatican version of an ambassador). He became known to foreign cardinals, who are essential to elect a pope, and a favorite of Pius XI and his not-insignificant band of supporters. Pacelli easily became Pius XII.

That level of political maneuvering is nothing new in the upper levels of the Catholic Church. Pius XII, however, was also skilled at high-level politics outside the Vatican walls, working to strengthen and expand the influence of the Church in the countries to which he served as nuncio. Hitler's Pope takes a long, deep look at Pacelli's role in the rise of Hitler in Germany and the negotiations the ambitious cardinal undertook with the Nazis to ensure the survival of the German Catholic Church. In return for a guarantee of the Church's survival, Pius XII played a crucial role in Hitler's success by removing the influential German Catholics from the public debate. This, author John Cornwell argues, was a critical step in bringing Hitler to power. In Cornwell's words: "No other non-German did more to contribute to Hitler's rise to power."

Apart from the detailed documentation of Pius XII's conspiracy with the Nazis, what makes Hitler's Pope extraordinary is the way it came to be written. Cornwell has long been a defender of the Catholic Church. He is respected by the Vatican and Church historians. He began researching the full story of Pius XII's diplomatic relations with Nazi Germany with the goal of correcting what he always thought was an undeserved slander on the World War II pope that he had not done enough to help Jews in the Holocaust. As he writes in the preface: "I was convinced that if his full story were told, Pius XII's papacy, and the Catholic Church, would be vindicated of a perennial libel."

With that supportive goal and his friendly contacts at the Vatican, Cornwell gained access to previously unseen Church archives. By 1997, as he neared the end of his research, Cornwell realized that the materials he had gathered on Eugenio Pacelli's life did not exonerate the pope of the charge of indifference, but implicated him in a much more damning charge of collusion. Cornwell discovered that Pacelli was a career anti-Semite, documented as far back as 1919, and gives greater detail than ever before of the pope's complete refusal to help the Jews of Rome as they were rounded up just outside the Vatican's walls.

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?userid=Tk5OBfJBUA&isbn=0140296271&itm=1

[Bridget Burke]

17. You do realize the author has had second thoughts?

As he admits, “Hitler's Pope” (1999), his biography of Pope Pius XII, lacked balance. “I would now argue,” he says, “in the light of the debates and evidence following ‘Hitler's Pope', that Pius XII had so little scope of action that it is impossible to judge the motives for his silence during the war, while Rome was under the heel of Mussolini and later occupied by the Germans.”

www.economist.com/books/displayStory.cfm?story_id=3471137

And you do realize that "Liberal" means one thing when interpreting Church doctrine & something else again in the political arena?