Pope Francis (left) Image: Fabrizio Maffei, Shutterstock; Pope Benedict XVI (middle) Image: Kancelaria Prezydenta RP; Pope John Paul II (right) Image: Gregorini Demetrio
CV NEWS FEED // Catholic scholar Anthony Esolen recently challenged who he referred to as “ecclesiologically” liberal Catholics by writing: “Tell me why I should obey and honor Pope Francis any more than you obeyed and honored his two predecessors, and Paul VI.”
Esolen is a professor, author, poet, and leader in the classical education movement. He is well-known for his English translation of Dante’s Divine Comedy and his books and essays on education and culture.
In a September 23 post on his X account, Esolen pointed out the hypocrisy of Catholics who are theologically “left” (meaning in the “ecclesiological” sense, not political sense).
“ALL MY LIFE, I watched you disobey, and that includes the time when I was young and stupid and thought your disobedience was all right,” he wrote.
He mentioned that one such act of disobedience was allowing girls to altar serve “before John Paul II was arm-twisted into conceding it.” He added that most religious sisters “mocked everything the Pope had to say.” He also lamented the general lack of respect towards the late Pope among “liberal Catholics”:
How often did I hear that John Paul II was just an old-fashioned or retrograde chap from behind the Iron Curtain — you might have added “a dumb Polack” too, and it would have been quite in keeping with how you treated him? And what you suggested about Benedict was worse.
Esolen argued that such liberal Catholics seem to only honor past religious leaders if their actions fit well with one’s present politics.
“Tell me, too, what great and vibrant orders of priests or religious sisters have you founded, since this disobedience began in the 1960’s? Liberal religious sisters and orders of priests say they are all about serving the poor,” he wrote:
How can you do that when there aren’t any more of you around? You have squandered the great inheritance bequeathed to you by your forebears; and you seem to honor them only if somehow you can harmonize their actions with your current politics, or if you can project back onto them your own disdain for church hierarchy. Otherwise they have nothing to teach you.
Esolen explained that he greatly respects people like Dorothy Day, with whom he can agree on some politics. “She was obedient, and obedience helped to make her wise,” he noted.
He remarked that he admires the “conservative man of the Left,” Malcolm Muggeridge, who converted to Catholicism late in life.
However, Muggeridge’s close friend Mother Theresa, Esolen recounted, was “belittled” by liberal Catholics when she spoke out against abortion.
“….when Mother Teresa called abortion the greatest of the west’s crimes against man, you belittled her,” he wrote,
or you set about un-focusing attention, using your opposition to capital punishment as a cover, and instead of giving CREDIT to Catholics who did all the dirty work of fighting abortion on several fronts (including giving free medical service to expectant mothers, etc.), you mocked them for not being REALLY pro-life.
Esolen restricted the comments on the post, writing that he did not want the post to spark “bickering” among people, and concluded instead: “If you want to answer me, you can find me pretty easily.”
