https://international.la-croix.com/news/the-progressive-catholic-spring-and-its-predecessor/4187?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=e-mail&utm_content=11-11-2016&utm_campaign=newsletter__crx_lci&PMID=3d4bff6e21bd8a4c42e60d5186400d8e
The progressive ‘Catholic Spring’ and its predecessor What is the relationship between the progressives’ desire for a “Catholic spring,” the converts’ “Catholic spring,” and Pope Francis’ pontificate? Massimo Faggioli United States November 11, 2016 a.. A slight majority (52 percent) of Catholics helped to elect a president whose policy proposals (among other things) are in exact opposition to the message of Pope Francis. That could make the next four years interesting in terms of the relationship among the US Catholic Church, the Vatican, and the administration of Donald Trump – for whose candidacy “the Catholic question” loomed a little larger than it did for Hillary Clinton’s, even with the pre-election WikiLeaks dump of the Podesta emails. That members of Clinton’s team had used words like “backward” and “medieval” to describe the Catholic Church sparked indignation among church officials like Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput, outgoing USCCB President Joseph Kurtz, and others. Some saw it as evidence of deep hostility toward Catholicism. But as numerous commentators soon explained – from E. J. Dionne Jr. to Michael Hollerich (writing at Commonweal) and even to Ross Douthat – the emails were actually reflective of the fiercer intra-Catholic debate going on for some years now. What could have been more significant from a political perspective is that Clinton never visited the Vatican or met with Pope Benedict XVI in her four years as secretary of state, as Robert Mickens noted in his latest Letter from Rome. She was the first holder of that office to snub the Holy See in more than forty years, dating to the tenure of William Rogers in the first Nixon administration. That might have suggested a potential “Catholic problem” for her administration, with the Podesta emails being used to “confirm” some otherwise unproven antipathy on the part of Democrats.
