During Holy Week Pope Francis will once again demonstrate to the world’s priests and bishops how not to follow the rules of Catholic Mass.
Catholic Herald Reports:
Pope Francis will visit a prison in Rome to wash the feet of inmates of Maundy Thursday, the Vatican has announced.
The Pope will visit Rebibbia prison on April where he will meet inmates, and follow Jesus in washing their feet.
FOX News adds:
The Vatican said Wednesday that inmates from the Rebibbia prison and a nearby women’s facility will participate in the Holy Thursday service, which is meant to show Francis’ willingness to serve others as Jesus did.
Francis’ decision in 2013 to wash the feet of women and Muslim inmates at a juvenile detention center helped define his rule-breaking papacy just two weeks after his election. It riled traditionalist Catholics, who pointed to the Vatican’s own regulations that the ritual be performed only on men since Jesus’ 12 apostles were men.
Is it a fitting honor to Holy Thursday to compare Jesus and his Apostles on the night before he died to an assortment of male and female prisoners of various religions? The Pope seems to feel he’s acting like St. Francis, but if St. Francis were Pope he wouldn’t have done such things. Washing the feet of women prisoners is good to do, perhaps for a non-celibate man, but it’s not Mass yet. Can’t Pope Francis do that another time?
At 5.30 PM that evening, the Holy Father will celebrate the Mass of the Lord’s Supper at the prison, carrying out the act for which he has become famous.
Infamous.
Last year on Maundy Thursday Francis washed the feet of elderly and infirm people. The year before he washed the feet of 12 young people, including Muslims and young women, at a juvenile prison.
I remember. They looked as bewildered as one might expect. I wonder if many of these people ever feel like props?
Years ago I had a friend who would steal things from the common area of her school dormitory. When I asked her about it she just complained about the strict college rules, but I knew she was just acting like a thief.
It’s one thing to use authority to remove strict rules in the name of freedom, respect. It’s another to openly break good, necessary rules and deprive others of their rights. In the forward-looking FrancisChurch there are many such ‘rules’ that should be disregarded.
Is this mercy, or is it just thievery?