I keep thanking God for our Holy Father Pope Francis

That is my prayer since the election of the Holy Father... ever since his blessing from the loggia of St. Peter's - which was an indulgenced blessing, a plenary indulgenced blessing - extended to those viewing on television, or listening on radio.  What a magnificent grace.

I must say I'm surprised by chatter from secular and religious venues, and the outrageous criticism against the Holy Father, analyzing and dissecting every move he makes, and the legends associated with his life and ministry.  The Holy Father was a priest, bishop like 99% of the clergy in the Roman Catholic Church.  Like the Pope before him, he celebrated the Ordinary Form of Mass, and promulgated the authentic teaching of Vatican II, implementing the reform perhaps much more generously than most bishops, taking his religious vow of poverty quite literally.  His faith is deeply Marian and above all Eucharistic.  His doctrine is totally Roman Catholic, entering into the Petrine office, he arrives with a clean record of upholding Catholic teaching in faith and morals. 

He has now been chosen by God to lead the Church.

Here is something I wrote to a friend the other day:

In response to something I wrote on my blog, a friend asked me:  "But how could the Church of 1972 have been good - that's when people began to leave and the scary stuff happened?"

I simply said "He will undo that scary stuff as he implements the reform." The good work initiated by the Council has been obscured by extremists and above all, by the Council of the media, as Pope Benedict noted. Benedict has restored the equilibrium of the liturgy and doctrinal teaching, and restarted the reform, Francis will continue it. I sense a wonderful freedom of spirit at work, tempered by a mature sense of authentic Ignatian discernment occurring, amidst a wonderful Franciscan simplicity and joy.

God is so good - he has done something beyond all our imagining.

 

And I might add, he will confound the proud, the haughty, the comfortable - just as Christ did, just as Francis of Assisi did. 

 It "is Christ who guides the Church through his Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the soul of the Church with its life-giving and unifying force: he makes one body of many, the Mystical Body of Christ. "  

"Let us never give in to pessimism, a bitterness that the devil offers us every day: Never give in to pessimism and discouragement, we have the firm conviction that the Holy Spirit gives the Church, with his mighty breath, the courage to persevere and also to seek new methods of evangelization, to bring the Gospel to the ends of the earth. Christian truth is attractive and persuasive because it answers the deep need of human existence, announcing convincingly that Christ is the only Saviour of all man and of all men. This announcement remains as valid today as it was at the beginning of Christianity, when the first great missionary expansion of the Gospel took place. " - Pope Francis

The hermeneutic of continuity remains unbroken.

But who am I?  I only write my personal impressions, and I'm a nobody.