I'm going off-message here for once because this post is not about technology or law, and I refuse to accept it as a post about limitations. It's about Pope Francis, the Catholic Church and Argentina's Dirty War. Allegations are arising now that Pope Francis may have been complicit in the murder of two priests during the Dirty War and, at a minimum, he was not a figure of any resistance to the murderous regime of the generals. Let's assume for argument's sake that he was not complicit in any murder and that his only offense is "not having done enough" (like Pope Pius XII). If so, was that defensible? A little history is in order - since the time of Charlemagne (and arguable since Constantine), the Catholic Church has been consistently aligned with the powers of state - they received money and legitimacy from being the official faith and performed quasi-governmental tasks (keeping the population in line, worrying about the afterlife instead of the here-and-now). Certainly the Church has produced extraordinarily spiritual and temporal leaders during that time (John of the Cross, Teresa of Avila, Joan or Arc, et al) but for the most part it was involved in protecting its position and its hide (as the recent pedophile scandals have amply demonstrated). So when an officially Catholic state (the President of Argentina must be a Catholic, leading to the conversion of Menem) engages in un-Christian evil, what is a Church devoted to goodness to do? Is it too much to expect that the Church (or the head if the Jesuit order in that country) will actively speak out against torture and murder? Some brave churchmen did (Oscar Romero in El Salvador, Leonardo Boff, the Brazilian archbishop during Brazil's dictatorship). My beloved rabbi Marshall Meyer did so at risk to himself and his family. Why not Francis? Even if he did not have much actual temporal power, would such a statement not have sent a message of hope to the victims? Quiescence, cowardice, following orders - I don't know what answer he would give, but a major world religion should ask more of its priests and certainly of its Pope. That's why beatifying Pius XII is so wrong - even if he could have done nothing as a practical matter, he had an obligation as a moral leader to speak truth. Neither he nor Francis did. The brilliance of John Paul II's papacy was to give up on the Church's quest for secular power and to focus on the Church as a moral power (yes, he was myopic about pedophilia) in the public square. I wish Francis well, but do not see in him a man with guts and vision.
Catholicism in Latin America (as in Western Europe) has always been a mile wide and an inch deep. That's why 25% of the Latin American population has shifted to other religious movements in the past 50 years. The Catholic Church has a lot of 'splaining to do, and sadly, I don't think Francis is the man to do it. The ultimate limitation is individual courage. You either have it or you don't.
