Francis Is Magic!
Everyone keeps talking about the Francis Effect. The pope has captured the world’s imagination with his warmth, apparent merriness and palpable affection for those who are poor and imprisoned, in whatever way—jail, loneliness, illness, disability. An American cardinal smiles and shakes his head when he tells me that nowadays his seminaries are full.
Boy, that really is some effect. Francis assumed the throne of Peter on March 13, 2013 and just 13 months later, the “seminaries are full.” This suggests three possibilities:
(1) The Francis Effect is so powerful that within weeks of his ascension, a generation of young men suddenly decided to enter the priesthood because of him.
(2) A rising wave of vocations has been nurtured and seeded in the American Church by other, hardline, pontiffs who led the Church for the vast majority of these young men’s lives.
(3) Or, once again you have Catholics who should know better talking nonsense.
If there was a Francis Effect, it wouldn’t be hard to measure. Look at Church attendance year over year, from March 2012 to March 2013 and so on. Do the same thing with giving. Then look to enrollment in the vocations, numbers of baptisms, etc.
The fact that no one touting the Francis Effect actually shows any of these elementary numbers is pretty suggestive.
Update: Rod Dreher notes a particularly silly tweet from Pope Francis, who may or may not be angling to become the patron saint of Vox Dot Com.
And remember, I’m one of the bleeding hearts who thinks that “inequality” is a real problem.
