A day ago Mark Shea posted the story ...
Turns out it is fake news - which he and other commenters noted, but I speculated it would be picked up by the anti-papist news aggregates and Catholic bloggers who want to discredit the Pope. Voila! Today it's headlines at Pewsitters ... because it fits their narrative.
Pope Francis is not a man of God.
President Putin has slammed Pope Francis for “pushing a political ideology instead of running a church”, and warned that the leader of the Catholic Church “is not a man of God.” - Baxter DmitrySuch stories become embedded in social memory or consciousness, much like the false stories about Pius XII as Hitler's Pope. It is calumny and slander meant to divide and destroy. As Pope Francis said about gossip, it is an instrument of terrorism.
“The gossip is a ‘terrorist’ who throws a grenade - chatter - in order to destroy,” he added. “Please, fight against division, because it is one of the weapons that the devil uses to destroy the local Church and the universal Church.” - Pope Francis
This is why I check everything. I don't want to pass on incorrect information. If it sounds fishy, I check. The water is cold enough without throwing in icebergs of misinformation.
ReplyDeleteI try to - sometimes I miss.
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