Exhorting Aggression

"The Rome that you speak about does not exist."
--Alecto (King Arthur)

As I chewed through the Apostolic Exhortation recently authored by Pope Francis, it sometimes felt like I was re-reading sections of Marx and Engels (1848). This was particularly the case in early portions of Chapters 2 and 4.

As these pages recently observed, the Church, being composed of human beings, is influenced by the same proclivities that drive individuals, such as the desire to get more for less.

If the Pope would like to see more charity in the world, then he surely is in a position to ask that of Church members out of their own volition. But neither the Pope nor anyone else on earth has standing to force some to surrender resources for the benefit of others.

But that does not mean that even a pope will not be tempted to do so.

When the Pope invokes State power to do the Church's bidding, then the Church becomes principal to aggression.