Pope is redressing the imbalance between regime and mercy

FRANCIS has been Pope for just over six months and he has already ushered in what can only be described as a kind of ecclesiastical perestroika. It’s a message that may well find resonance in a country like Ireland where many people describe themselves as Catholics but no longer attend Mass regularly.

Not that the Argentine pontiff has given a signal that the Church is about to take a dramatic lurch to the left: on the contrary, many of his pronouncements on controversial issues like women’s ordination and sexuality mirror those of his immediate predecessors.

But Pope Francis understands the art of communication and the golden rule that what is heard is the message. And too often what people have been hearing is a list of negatives: The Church is against this, or the Vatican opposes that. The Pope is calling Catholics to concentrate a bit more on what the Church is for and less about what it is against.