The Pope’s critics are feeling the pain after his patience runs out

As Pope Francis smiled warmly at the circus performers who twisted and turned before him during his weekly general audience at the Vatican on Wednesday, he seemed every bit the grandfather figure who has spent the past decade trying to make the church kinder, gentler and gentler. more inclusive place.

Except the people who feel his wrath.

There is a sense among some Vatican analysts and conservatives that Francis, suffering from pneumonia that forced him to forego his talks at the event and cancel a key trip to Dubai this weekend, is increasingly focusing his depleted energies on arranging the problems. scores and cleaning house.

In the past month he has turned his attention to two of his most outspoken and committed conservative critics in the United States, and in the year since the death of his conservative predecessor, Benedict accused of destroying the church.

While some have wondered whether his ailing health might be the driving force behind his actions, Francis, who said from the start he didn’t expect to stay in the job for long, has often rushed into action. And when it comes to workforce moves, analysts say, it’s always been that way.

“He has always acted like this,” said Sandro Magister, a veteran Vatican observer at the magazine L’Espresso, who cited cases of bishops Francis had frozen for publicly revealing private conversations or making him look bad or causing scandals. not they were actually to blame.

But Mr Magister said the death of Benedict

While conservatives have long complained that the publicly cuddly pope has effectively acted like a ruthless and impetuous autocrat, supporters of Francis, who turns 87 next month and is increasingly handicapped by the use of a cane and wheelchair, say he has exercised patience . far beyond that of his conservative predecessors.

But that patience, say people close to him, has limits. And after years of allowing criticism in the interest of allowing good faith debates, Francis has concluded that some of the name-calling is simply politically and ideologically driven.

Earlier this month, a Vatican investigation into the Bishop of Tyler, Texas, Joseph Strickland, who used his broad conservative radio and internet platform to sharply criticize the pope, resulted in his removal. Last week, after Pope Francis started feeling unwell, he told a meeting of church office heads that he would take action against another American antagonist, Cardinal Raymond Burke, by withdrawing his right to a subsidized apartment and salary in the Vatican because, according to one participant, the American was “sowing division” in the church. The conservative Italian newspaper that first reported the possible expulsion of Cardinal Burke, La Nuova Bussola Quotidianaalso claimed that Francis had called Cardinal Burke “my enemy.”

The Pope’s biographer on Wednesday afternoon Austen Ivereigh said Francis denied calling Cardinal Burke his enemy. “I have never used the word ‘enemy’ nor the pronoun ‘mine,’” Francis wrote in a note to Mr. Ivereigh.

Francis also told Mr Ivereigh that he had decided to strip Cardinal Burke of his Vatican apartment and salary because the American prelate had acted against the unity of the church.

A spokesman for Cardinal Burke said Wednesday that the prelate had not received a deportation order.

“His Eminence has not received any communication about this,” said Canon Erwan Wagner, secretary to Cardinal Burke.

But even if Cardinal Burke loses his lease, he won’t exactly end up on the streets. A conservative Catholic celebrity, his own guest appearances at churches and speaking engagements are often accompanied by promotions of his many books. He is close to well-funded conservative groups in the United States that support his campaigns. He also maintains the real instrument of his power in the Church: a vote in the next conclave to elect a pope.

“Taking away an apartment is not a sanction, it is a gesture of spite,” said Alberto Melloni, church historian and director of the John XXIII Foundation for Religious Sciences in Bologna. Bishop Strickland’s removal was more serious because, while Cardinal Burke’s punishment was “administrative, the other was sacramental.”

Mr. Melloni argued that Francis has long been wary of giving his opponents something to complain about, and that in the past he has been careful not to make martyrs of his opponents. But now conservatives would make a meal of his latest crackdown and eventually participate in the next conclave, the gathering of cardinals that choose the pope’s successor, with the words “never again.”

But while conservatives worry about Francis’ tough actions lately, liberals lament his inaction. Major church policies, such as allowing married priests, same-sex blessings or communion for divorced and remarried people, have been criticized by Francis time and time again.

A recent large gathering at the Vatican of bishops and laity led to the condemnation of Cardinal Burke, who portrayed it as a hostile and unlawful takeover of the Catholic Church by progressive interest groups. But the meeting ultimately achieved very little, disappointing forces pushing for meaningful change in the role of LGBTQ and female followers of the church. And Francis has strongly opposed efforts by the progressive German church to take action independently of the Vatican on issues ranging from priestly celibacy to same-sex blessings.

But after his more conservative predecessors cracked down on and even fired liberal theologians, Francis and his reform agenda were clearly better news for progressives in the church, and bad news for traditionalists who were used to getting what they wanted.

Cardinal Burke, who in many ways became a champion of opposition to Pope Francis for conservatives, also became perhaps the biggest papal punching bag.

In 2013, the year he was elected pope, Francis did not reappoint Cardinal Burke to his position in the Congregation for Bishops, and the following year he also dismissed him from his position as prefect of the Vatican’s highest court, the Apostolic Signature. named him Cardinal Patron of the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta, a ceremonial post for a medieval religious order. He eventually removed him from there too. For good measure, Francis later removed the cardinal’s ally, traditionalist leader of the Order of Malta, Matthew Festing, over a personnel dispute.

But Cardinal Burke is hardly the only one facing the pope’s wrath.

In 2014, Francis appeared to give a major promotion to Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah, a figure beloved by traditionalists, making him head of the church’s liturgy office. But critics argued that Cardinal Sarah was isolated at the top because Francis surrounded him with his own allies. Ultimately, he took the church’s prayer book completely out of Cardinal Sarah’s hands, accepted his resignation, and then cracked down on the use of the ancient Latin Mass. favored by Cardinal Sarah, Cardinal Burke and other conservatives, arguing that it was used to divide the church.

In 2017, Francis stunned Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller, then the church’s doctrinal watchdog, by ordering him to fire three conservative priests in his office. Then Francis eliminated Cardinal Müller.

The current occupant of that position is Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, a fellow Argentinian who called Mr. Magister “the direct opposite of Benedict,” the conservative pope often called “God’s Rottweiler” and who himself headed that post for decades. office when he was cardinal.

Earlier this year, shortly after Benedict XVI’s death, Francis effectively exiled to Germany Archbishop Georg Gänswein, Benedict’s personal secretary, who had served as prefect of the papal household. Archbishop Gänswein had published a book exposing tensions between Francis and Benedict.

Those measures attracted attention, but the punishment of the prelates from the United States, a country whose clerics have long been skeptical of the Argentine pope, has struck a conservative nerve. Close allies of Francis have said America, with its well-funded conservative Catholic media apparatus, has amplified criticism far and wide aimed at derailing the pope’s vision for a more inclusive church.

Asked at the papal table returning from Africa in 2019 about American conservatives attacking his pontificate through major media platforms, he seemed to shrug off the possibility of their split from the church.

“I pray that there will be no schisms,” he said. “But I’m not afraid.”

Elisabetta Povoledo contributed from Rome