things i learned today
- the catholic church has over 2700 diocese, which report to a single smallish office in rome.
- a jesuit has never been elected pope. historically, this is attributable to the fact that they made it very clear early on that they did not want to be part of the church hierarchy.
- a 13th century pope, peter of morrone, was yanked from his hermitage and made pope. he resigned five months later, only to be locked up by his successor who considered him a threat.
- there is one cardinal participating in the conclave who is an open member of opus dei. there is a second cardinal whose sympathies lie in that direction.
- in the catholic church, a 400-year-old trend is considered “relatively new.”
i probably learned other things today as well, but those were definitely the most interesting.
April 12th, 2005 at 6:13 pm
From a friend, who is a Jesuit, he commented that this Pope, unlike nearly all before him, has basically ignored the Jesuit branch. My understanding is the Pope often used the Jesuits to help him understand things specifically because they were academic, intellectual and uninterested in the power of the Church (i.e. it’s machinations and structure).
This worried him, as did the fact that, perhaps because this Pope lived so long, he effectively surrounded himself with “yes men” who agreed completely with him.