Two thoughts on this from the always engaging @semiduplex. 1) There is no question that many of the developments of the Francis era were anticipated in the internal contradictions and often-papered-over tensions of the attempted John Paul II synthesis.
semiduplex.com/2019/11/12/som…
semiduplex.com/2019/11/12/som…
@semiduplex 2) The fact that outside of propagandizing and special pleading, most JPII stalwarts *and* most of JPII's stalwart critics recognize a big shift, in terms of possibilities + permissions, under Francis suggests that as a parsimonious explanation we should assume the shift is real.
@semiduplex Put another way I agree with the author about many of his case studies (Francis's social magisterium, the death penalty shift) but not about Amoris Laetitae, which is the synecdoche for the return of a specific kind of liberalizing project that JPII halted and sought to reverse.
@semiduplex And the difficulty with all the intellectual attempts to read it primarily in continuity w/recent pontificates is that all the ecclesial actors clearly understand its liberalizing purpose and have responded accordingly, down to the UCCB fray this week.
@semiduplex (Sorry, USCCB.)
@semiduplex Yet another way of putting it is this: Just bc a papal synthesis was more unstable than it appeared to its strong adherents doesn't make it any less notable when another pope comes along and actively *pushes* on those instabilities, leading to transformation and/or collapse.
