Viva Il Papa!

          I’d like to send Jorge Bergoglio, the soon-to-be Pope Francis I, my best wishes in his new position. I’m excited about the change. I hope it can make lapsed catholics find their faith again. I hope it can help bring about some badly needed harmony amongst the world’s religions. And I hope it will be a force for good in society.

 Also, it goes without saying, that the Catholic Church itself needs an overhaul. Benedict XVI simply wasn’t the man to do it. He seems a devout and intelligent man, but his vision for the church was out of touch with the rest of the world, and he botched the handling of the sex abuse scandal.

          Francis I looks like a more engaging personality. Perhaps he could bring a touch or Latin sunshine to the Catholic Church.

          I wasn’t always a Roman Catholic. I was baptized in the Church of England, and that was the last time Inside a church until I joined the Scouts. I went through a devotional period when I thought I might like to become a vicar- this is common, apparently, among older children- but, on the whole, the religion didn’t do anything for me. Around the age of 12 or 13, I became an atheist. I changed my mind when I reached 16, but I still could not follow an established religion.

          My wife is Catholic, and it was her influence, really, which made me convert. Not that she was trying. Originally, when we were courting, I would sit outside the church whilst she attended mass. After some time (the weather might have had something to do with this) I went inside the church with her; and something happened to me whilst I was listening to the sermons. I was confirmed shortly after we got married.

          I was always defensive about this with my parents. My dad grew up Catholic, but when his dad left his mum, he took my dad’s faith with him. My dad used to profess atheism, although deep down I think he believed in something. My parents were both Conservative (large and small C) though, and Little Englanders, too; so it became another source of friction between us. Yet I think they saw it as doing me good, in a way that Yoga or Meditation might.

          I never, ever thought I’d join the Catholic Church, even at the age of 16. All that bowing and praying. All the gold and the fine cloth, all that money, all that bureaucracy. It still takes me by surprise now. In all other respects, I am left wing, bordering on Marxist (possibly, if I ever got to read Capital and understand it, I might become a Marxist). It comes down to this: I believe that there is a God, that there is more to life than material things, and that there are some deep-rooted problems with the human race which money cannot solve, only faith can. And Catholicism does it for me.

          I’m not the best Catholic in the world. I don’t go to Mass every week- silly, really, because I always feel better when I do. I’ve only ever been to confession once in my life. And I use condoms. I still don’t know the Mass by rote; and I wish the Catholic Church would allow priests to get married, priests to be women, and priests to be gay (not necessarily the same priests). I am opposed to abortion, though, and the commercialization of sex. I think it is wrong to kill, even in government-sanctioned armies. I believe Christ was the perfect man.

          Francis I is not going to change the church radically; but I hope and pray that he will be kind and compassionate, and move Catholicism in the right direction. Viva Le Papa!