Papal Throne Gone -- Reducing the Size of his Apartment

(Vatican) Some inside and outside the church are cheering the spending review of Pope Francis. Every gesture simplifies the institution and more on the Papststum to the faithful. The political and religious leaders of the world pay tribute to the "revolution" of the new Pope and offer their "respect". Obama informed in writing of his willingness to cooperate. Brazil's state president, also politically left listing, speaks of a "great Pope" and joking after the first audience: "If the Pope is Argentinian, then God is Brazilian.”

The others, especially within the Church, observe with reticence and concern that the new pope might confuse poverty with pauperism and his person with the papacy. He has stripped and depleted his person, all the more to welcome and honor him. He has stripped in self-centeredness, however, misconstruing Peter, the Vicar of Christ on earth, then he stripped the composition expressed by the Office of the Lordship of Jesus Christ, the visible Church and of its mission to serve God and to glorify him.

Bergoglio's style between joy and sorrow

The new "Bergoglo Style" as journalists call it euphorically, will also gain entrance to the papal apartment. As Curial Archbishop Georg Gänswein among others introduced the new Pope to the premises of the Pope on the top floor of the Apostolic Palace where from where Sunday's Angelus was to be prayed, the first reaction of the new master of the house was: “There’s room here for 300 people." The house will now be reduced by conversions. Whoever knows the pictures of the apartment from the times of John Paul II and Benedict XVI., knows that it is set up so modestly that it is more of a simple service apartment than similar to a royal palace, than the living quarters of the king.

Yesterday, however, was quite different, a "far-reaching break with protocol," said Vatican insider. Francis received the representatives “of the Churches and Ecclesial Communities and different religions" in the Clementine Hall, the papal audience hall," who had come to Rome to his inauguration. But he left the papal throne and the platform on which it was to remove it from the floor and replace it with a simple chair. The Pope met with the sectarian and religious leaders on the same level as an equal among equals, though, as primus inter pares. It is not yet clear whether the “throne disposal", according to the Italian media reports, is permanently or as circumstances required, was to deal with the religious leaders.

Throne without equal among equals The Chief Rabbi of Rome, Riccardo Di Segni, is preparing meanwhile for the Pope's visit in the town synagogue. Di Segni had repeatedly lashed out during the pontificate of Benedict XVI., especially in the context of Pope Pius XII., but also because of the Good Friday prayer and the Williamson case. The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, has invited Francis to a joint pilgrimage to the Holy Land to the 50th 2014 Anniversary to commemorate the embrace between Patriarch Athenagoras (1948-1972) and Paul VI. (1963-1978). Several common points between the two were discussed, the patriarch suggested theological discussions, where the pope would address a common commitment to preserving the environment. In November, a visit of the Pope in the Phanar, the Orthodox Vatican in Istanbul was also discussed. On the 25th of November 2009, Benedict XVI. wrote to Bartholomew: "The Church understands the Petrine ministry as a gift of the Lord to His Church." The Ecumenical Patriarch was yesterday at the audience a place of honor was assigned to be the first among the delegations to the right of the Pope, but clearly distinct from the others by a distance.

There was criticism of the participation in Communion by the abortionists Biden and Pelosi.

But there is no lack of criticism: U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and the faction leader of the Democratic Party in the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi, both Catholics, were present at the inauguration ceremony on St. Peter's Square for Holy Communion. From various quarters, particularly from the U.S., there was fierce criticism. Both politicians are pro-abortion. The Catholic priest Frank Pavone, founder of the movement of Priests for Life, who strives for the full protection of life, especially where it is most at risk in the womb by abortion, in old age by euthanasia had, even before the inauguration, had made the Vatican aware that the two representatives of the U.S. government and the U.S. Parliament should be excluded from communion. "The Holy Communion means union and they are not in communion with the Church on key issues such as the right to life," said Father Pavone.

The exclusion from receiving communion has troubled the Church, if only for logistical reasons. In 2008, during the visit of Pope Benedict XVI. to the U.S. Pelosi, then Speaker of the House, the former Senator and current Secretary of State John Kerry and Senator Chris Dodd, all Catholics and pro-abortion were introduced to Communion. According to Catholic understanding someone commits a sacrilege receiving the Communion, though he would not receive them.

Jesuits Ask Pope to offer "any help" because he now "will need advice, ideas and people"

Father Adolfo Nicolas Pachon, the Superior General of the Jesuits, to whom the new pope listened, offered Francis "every means which the Society of Jesus has, as it will certainly need in his new position, advice, ideas and people.”

"Humility guarantees the presence of the Lord: if someone is self-satisfied and has all the answers for all the questions, then that is proof that God is not with him. Complacency will be present in all false prophets among the religious leaders who are in error, who use religion for their own ego, "Jorge Mario Cardinal Bergoglio writes in the book Above the Heavens and the Earth, which he wrote with the Jewish Rabbi Abraham Skorka in 2010 in Argentina.

Is there a "government program" in common with Rabbi Abraham Skorka in the book?

Within Bergoglio speaks of politics, religion, interfaith dialogue, fundamentalist atheists, Holocaust and capitalism. An anticipatory sketch of his pontificate: the relationship to political power, the dialogue with other religions and non-believers while opening up to remarried divorcees and other irregular forms of life, no openness to gay "marriage", euthanasia and abortion. And the reorganization of the Roman Curia, which should be leaner and performed collegially.

In 2009, he wrote the foreword for a thriller, which is set in the first century in Jerusalem. He will already be travel there as the successor of the Apostle Peter, in the next year with the Successor of the Apostle Andrew, whom he yesterday called "my brother". Bergoglio is already used to a close relationship with Jews in Buenos Aires. Of Muslims, the new pope said at a reception in the Sala Clementina without a throne: "I greet [...] especially the Muslims, who adore the one, merciful God, and call living in prayer.”

The Pope presented himself to them as an equal among equals. A new phase of dialogue seems to have begun.

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