Last month, a Fox News commentator openly called on Francis to resign, saying it's time to put an end to his "ill-advised and arrogant papacy." This week, pro-life and pro-family activists released a video, featuring an auxiliary bishop from Kazakhstan, pleading with Francis to "end the confusion" they believe his statements have created on matters such as marriage, divorce, Communion, and sex education.
On the other hand, Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington, D.C., in a recent Crux interview said that in his experience there's tremendous enthusiasm for the pontiff's pastorally oriented approach, and that those "threatened" or "unhappy" amount to "very few."
A WIN/Gallup global survey of people in 64 countries in March, for example, found that Francis had an 85 percent approval rating among Catholics, with just 6 percent saying their impression is unfavorable. If we project those numbers for all the worlds 1.2 billion Catholics, that would be 1.02 billion giving the pope a thumbs-up and just 72 million opposed.
Naturally, 72 million is still a big number - if those folks constituted their own country, it would be the 20th largest in the world, right behind Germany - but measured against the total Catholic population, it's tiny.
Moreover, you could probably get 6 percent of Catholics to disagree with almost anything at any given time whether the earth revolves around the sun, for instance, or that 2 plus 2 really equals 4.
As a historical matter, every pope has faced resistance, including from their own bishops. That was true of St. John Paul II and Benedict XVI, just as it was true of St. Peter himself. Today there are more than 5,000 Catholic bishops in the world, and the idea that they're always going to be in lockstep on everything is a delusional fantasy.
If all that's the case, then what accounts for the sense one often gets, either from press coverage or social media, that there's something novel or remarkable about the opposition to Francis? Perhaps three factors help explain it.
