Black or White

"And that brings me to a second reason for my name. Francis of Assisi tells us we should work to build peace. But there is no true peace without truth! There cannot be true peace if everyone is his own criterion, if everyone can always claim exclusively his own rights, without at the same time caring for the good of others, of everyone, on the basis of the nature that unites every human being on this earth.” - Pope Francis to the Vatican Diplomatic Corps, March 22, 2013

Pope Francis seems to be picking up where Benedict left off on moral relativism.  I like in particular the part where Francis says "There cannot be true peace if everyone is his own criterion, if everyone can always claim exclusively his own rights."  This to me is saying basically what Benedict said before becoming pope, which was simply this:  The Truth is not determined by a majority vote.  In other words, your opinion isn't in line with what we know as the Truth, then it's probably wrong. 

That's one of the reasons why the ABC report about Francis giving the thumbs up to civil unions as a cardinal doesn't make sense, as it contradicts what he said to the Diplomatic Corps today, and also what he said in his first papal homily about you're either serving God, or your serving Satan.  The ABC report doesn't seem to mesh with what we've seen from Pope Francis thus far, as it suggests that then-Cardinal Bergoglio said that there could be some gray area (the place where a lot of the seeds of moral relativism seem to fall and sprout) in between what is defined as a marriage and a civil union.  With Francis, everything seems to be either black or white without any room for gray.  And yet, he does so while still considering every angle and aspect of an issue.  Showing someone love and compassion is not the same as giving ascent to their actions.  

In other news, Dave Flitton figured out to leave comments on my blog.  It was, in fact, a problem with his Chair to Keyboard interface.