Prof. Schlevogt’s Compass No. 17: Field hospital without surgeon general — Pope Francis’ cracks laid bare ...News

No sledgehammer against sinners on the fringe, yes—but what of the scalpel? Did the synodal pope cede the helm of his field hospital church?

An ancient ethical maxim, traditionally ascribed to Chilon of Sparta — one of the illustrious Seven Sages of Greece — and transmitted through the revered writings of Diogenes Laërtius, counsels that no reproach be cast upon the departed, enjoining a solemn silence where calumny might otherwise find voice. This august injunction was enshrined for posterity in the hallowed Latin adage: De mortuis nil nisi bonum dicendum est — “Of the deceased, naught but good is to be pronounced.” 

But shall we shy away from the truth simply because the subject has journeyed home? On the contrary — within the noble pursuit of leadership inquiry, it is not only appropriate but essential to cast an unflinching gaze upon the darker contours and missteps of those once revered.

Such clear-eyed scrutiny is not to be mistaken for condemnation but must be understood as an exercise in principled discernment: a means of lifting the veil, exposing the insidious patterns which — far from being modern aberrations — have emerged, reappeared, and entrenched themselves down the annals of human history. Echoing through time, Ecclesiastes’ memento rings clear: “There is nothing new under the sun.”

In apprehending these recurring faults, we equip ourselves to fortify the foundations and elevate the standards of leadership, thereby drawing nearer to breaking the cycles that have long impaired our collective progress.

One such enduring pattern resides in the very act of writing history. Creative revisionism — subtle in form, yet often deliberate in intent — persistently serves as a narrative mechanism by which the memory of the past is sculpted, recast, or repurposed to sanctify the present and pave the path for future control.

This theoretically grounded and empirically observed tendency invites a sobering reflection: that historical writing, in its most rigorous conception, discloses not the objective facticity nor the veritable substance of the actual events it purports to recount, but rather the power, perspectives and prevailing interests of the ruling elite at the moment of its composition. Against this backdrop, George Orwell’s trenchant insight retains its instructive force: “Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” 

Likewise, particularly within the spheres of religion and ideology, the full gestalt and profound richness of traditional teachings are seldom faithfully conveyed in their entirety. Rather, the intellectual patrimony is frequently fragmented and reshaped to conform to strategic aims of legitimization. The deleterious ramifications of such curated transmission poignantly echo the timeless parable of the blind men and the elephant — each apprehending but a portion and thus forging a distorted conception of the whole. 

The late Pope Francis, though hailed by many as an inclusive reformer, did not escape the perils of selective moral emphasis and partial judgment. Conspicuously, in his earthly ministry, he sought to embody the mercy of Christ, but his actions betrayed a troubling incompleteness and imbalance. A critical yet fair evaluation of his papacy reveals deficiencies that extend well beyond superficial and incidental missteps and need to be juxtaposed with his strengths.

This kind of vigilant examination assumes greater urgency beneath the prevailing progressive refrain of self-appointed narrative shapers, tastemaker, and gatekeepers who tirelessly exalt his supposed abundance of virtues — often echoed uncritically with near-liturgical zeal by an enthused and ecstatic throng within both popular and ecclesial discourse. 

Many erudite and discerning minds falter in reconciling this fervent dithyramb — one that smothers sober reflection and muffles measured dissent — with the ledger of history, a dissonance so strident that it warrants a reassessment, both searching and unsparing, in light of mounting countervailing evidence and truths long eclipsed.

The initial focus here centers on the pope’s foremost failing: to appease sin by diverting attention from repentance and redemption — favoring synods over spiritual surgery, and dialogue over doctrine. Metaphorically, the shepherd’s relinquishment of his crook, substituting conviction with compromise, bespeaks, as critics may assert, a grievous dereliction: not merely a forfeiture of authority, but a profound breach of the Holy Father’s solemn duty to cleanse his flock — not merely a failure of governance, but a profound betrayal of the Church’s prophetic and pastoral mandate.

Rembrandt revisited: Proclaiming the gravity of sin and urgency of repentance

Drawing upon Rembrandt’s chef-d’oeuvre “The Return of the Prodigal Son” as both a visual scorecard and hermeneutic key (see Figure 1), the ensuing contention advanced here stands on firm ground and thereby warrants due acknowledgment: Pope Francis has, at minimum, fallen short in directing the gaze of mainstream journalists towards the quintessential, transformative message embodied by the genuine movens of the Lukan parable of quest — the prodigal son himself. That figure’s epic penitential journey animates the entire tale of moral and relational renewal and propels the progression of the plot. Narrated with exquisite economy — wherein, as in the grand drama of salvation, no detail is superfluous — it reaches its consummate fulfillment in a redemptive nostos (homecoming).

The pope’s role as chief healer of souls: Retreat instead of remedy

Put in a nutshell, the Vicar of Christ extolled mercy yet understated the urgent salvific necessity of restorative justice. Though he envisioned the Church as a field hospital in the aftermath of battle, he surrendered his vital post and sacred duty as surgeon general, dispensing comfort without cure. He failed to consistently lay bare and confront the abhorrent nature and existential threat of sin and to insist on repentance as the thorned but ineluctable path to the mystery of redemption.

Called to be the Church’s chief healer of souls, Pope Francis ought to have discerned that a physician does not aid the gravely afflicted by neglecting to diagnose the condition — be it bodily, mental, or spiritual — nor by concealing its severity. To placate while suppressing truth, to assure wellness where there is disease, and to deny treatment at the hour of necessity, is to abandon the art of healing itself.

Sacred Scripture — complimentarily elucidating the narrative antecedent to the luminous instant immortalized by the renowned seventeenth-century Dutch master of chiaroscuro (the artful contrast of light and shadow) — serves simultaneously as both witness and corrective, casting penetrating light upon the pope’s doctrinal and pastoral lapse, thereby exposing what silence conceals.

The transformative journey of the prodigal son: An epic and dramatic biblical odyssey

The prodigal son, in the unfolding parsimonious trajectory of the eponymous Gospel parable, willfully sunders communion with his father — himself a figura Dei, an allegorical referent of God — by boldly and brashly demanding his inheritance ante mortem, as though preempting paternal death itself. In this hubristic move, he enacts a symbolic patricide, pronouncing his progenitor dead in his own heart as a precondition for asserting existential autarkeia (autonomy).

Mistaking rupture — a symbolic schism without institutional breach — for liberation, the son is ensnared in the illusion that severance constitutes selfhood. In this emblematic gesture of disrespect and estrangement, he presumptuously reenacts the primordial rebellion of man against God — an archetype of pride, autonomy, and fall, wherein sin manifests itself as an audacious self-willed rupturing of the covenantal filial bond with God. In the parable, the father — alive yet forsaken — bears the disunion with patient endurance, mirroring divine reverence for human freedom.

In forsaking the sacred demands of pietas — that classical foundational virtue of sacred devotion to both the divine and societal order — the son precipitates not mere geographical estrangement, but an abyssal spiritual fall — a dark, self-imposed exile and willful banishment from the grace that once sustained him. Unmoored from home, he embarks upon a peregrination of dissipation — at once truly epic and dramatic —squandering the unmerited bounty in a far-off land, and in true katabasis echoing the somber depths of classical Attic tragedy descends into spiritual and material destitution.

At the harrowing moment of peripeteia — the sudden reversal of fortune — the destitute son is seized by ravenous hunger, a visceral symbolic representation and allegorical reference to the spiritual barrenness wrought by sin. Famished and forsaken, he awakens to the stark and unvarnished reality of his transgressions: that in casting away not mere gold but grace, he has severed himself from the very source of life and love, and thus reaped the desolation that inevitably follows such a ruthless and cataclysmic rupture.

In that critical juncture of spiritual awakening, he steels his heart and vows to mend what was broken: With resolute heart and solemn intent, he turns his weary steps toward the hearth of home.

His protracted and arduous odyssey, marked by errant wanderings, cathartic trials, anagnoristic self-reckoning and metanoia (change of mind), finds its denouement and reaches its telos (end) in a humble and remorseful return to the paternal figure. Though compelled initially by fleshly urge rather than lofty virtue, his contrite confession in this pivotal soteriological and eschatological moment bears witness to genuine repentance.

Onus of repentance: The sinner’s agency in turning

What lends the parable profound poignancy is the delicate, elegant interlacing between the narratological fulcrum of focalization and agency — the perspective from which the story is seen and the power of a character to effect change — and the semiotic concept of structural dynamic — the interplay of opposing elements through patterns of tension and release, which generates meaning.

Crucially, it is the contrite and penitent sinner — through whose perspective the entire transformative journey is beheld — who, as the primary actant, ventures the initial, hesitant and fraught step toward conversion after his fateful, fathomless fall. Such initiative is the indispensable prerequisite for the precious, pivotal moment in which tension is released — when the son is met by his merciful father, who has watched him from afar. Overwhelmed by compassion, the earthly sire bursts forth in a swift sprint to embrace and kiss his returning offspring — seemingly unable to wait even a moment longer for the restoration of his beloved one.

Within this distinctive framing, it is noteworthy that the pericope is conventionally referred to as “The Parable of the Prodigal Son,” rather than “The Parable of the Merciful Father.” This conscious and conspicuous choice of focal point reflects a salient interest — indeed, a keen and definitive preference, almost Aristotelian — for the tragic arc of fall and catharsis, underscoring the thematic emphasis on rebellion and return, sin and repentance.

This nomenclature underscores that the actantial son’s waywardness carries substantial hermeneutic weight, even if it is, precisely against this backdrop of brokenness and the metanoia it elicits, in the final act that the true telos is revealed: In a genuinely felicitous conclusion, the nostic journey — transcending mere physical passage to encompass a profound spiritual, moral, and existential quest — ultimately culminates in the transformative and restorative return to the self and home, embodying both repentance and renewal.

This climactic consummation — God’s final, life-bestowing word to the contrite soul yearning for home — eschews retribution in favor of redemption in a divine reunion with what is truly essential: the paternal embracing of the penitent son, who still bears the vestiges of abject poverty wrought by sin — all fully and faithfully canonized in sacred oil by Rembrandt.

Call to conversion: Sin no more! 

In a parallel vein, the oft-told Johannine narrative of the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1-11) — the iconic confrontation between law and mercy — depicts Jesus as literally disarming the incensed crowd with a piercing challenge: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her” (John 8:7, KJV). Yet mercy is not license, but bears a charge — not to be squandered. Once the accusers have vanished, the Savior issues a final, stern and uncompromising injunction to the marital interloper: “Go, and sin no more” (John 8:11, KJV).

This laconic yet succinct command reveals mercy as but a prelude to profound personal and redemptive transformation in harmony with God’s sacred design, not a carte blanche to persist in licentiousness. Consequently, this pivotal moment — etched indelibly into the Gospel narrative — may be regarded as the true climax and crowning point of the episode, transcending and shining forth beyond even Christ’s terse rebuke of hypocritical judgment: a critical oversight by the progressive faction, which, in a self-serving manner that engenders interpretative bias, dwells exclusively on the suspension of both judgment and condemnation while minimizing, or altogether neglecting, the gravity of sin.

The logos incarnate: Truth proclaimed, not negotiated

Cast your gaze once more upon those hauntingly poignant gospel scenes, rich in both sacred and secular resonance. When the father sees his wayward son in the distance, does he convene a family council? Does he weigh opinions before embracing his offspring? When Christ stands before the adulteress, does he open the floor for negotiation?

Of course not. Instead, a consistent theological and pastoral pattern emerges: In both cases, truth is not debated — it is declared. It breaks forth with clarity, with authority, and without compromise. These are not moments of democratic dialogue; they are swift revelations — of celestial wisdom and moral certainty. 

Jesus, the rabbi par excellence, functions not as a facilitator of value-neutral, error-prone democratic discourse, but as prophet, priest and king — an infallible divine pedagogue whose authority derives from true and unassailable heavenly commission. He speaks not as a broker of compromise but as the Logos incarnate, whose majesty admits neither confusion nor contradiction. He does not offer terms but absolute, unambiguous and eternal truth — impervious to dissent.

In like fashion, as Pastor Bonus — the Good Shepherd, not elected by the vote of the flock but sent by the will of the Father — Christ does not follow but leads with sovereign purpose, regal resolve and unwavering command. For a true herdsman does not linger and trail behind his sheep; he goes before them as sure-footed guide. He does not parley with his fold, neither as to the road nor its reward — stooping to inquire where it imagines the pasture lies and deferring to it in choosing which ravine to brave or which cliff to scale. Left to their own devices, sheep scatter, stumble, and are lost.

A shepherd who surrenders his sacred charge to the caprice of the flock is not merely unfaithful or negligent; his dereliction surpasses administrative deficiency and rises to the level of moral collapse. In abdicating his duty, he becomes not a guardian but a hazard — an agent of peril, rightly subject to removal. The ramifications for ecclesial ministry are nothing short of dire.

Crucially, the image of Christ as the Good Shepherd stands as the definitive paradigm and authoritative model for priestly identity and conduct. The priest, as alter Christus — a living icon cast in His likeness — participates in this divine pastoral mandate, not as a hireling, but as one called to lead, guard, and lay down his life for the sheep.

Just as a true shepherd does not confer with his flock, soliciting its counsel on the path to green pastures, so too the spiritual tender of the fold is tasked with guiding, not yielding. To invert this hierarchical dynamic would be to court pastoral dysfunction; congregations left to their own devices are prone to peril, and a priest who defers leadership forfeits both vocation and credibility.

Shepherd steered by sheep: The pope as synodist harmonizer rather than surgical healer

Such definite and resolute divine authoritarianism and heteronomy — externally imposed norms which, in this particular instance, nonetheless resonate with the natural law engraved upon the human heart — stands in marked contrast to Pope Francis’ emphasis on what I term pastoral synodality.

Trend instead of truth: Neo-Protestant tendencies in the Catholic Church

The Bishop of Rome’s increasing deference to democratic modalities within ecclesial governance risks fostering a theologically erroneous and pastorally perilous impression. It may suggest that the Ecclesia is to be shaped in an adaptive manner by the transient values and shifting norms prevailing in secular society. This stands in glaring and haunting contrast to the Church’s true vocation as a transcendent spiritual and moral authority, prophetically calling the world to repentance and conformity to the divine will. Succinctly put, the Church is to stand as mater et magistra — Mother and Teacher — not a mirror to the age, but its corrective lodestar.

Faith betrayed: Protestants rallying to Hitler’s banner

This inversion of ecclesial mission — where the Church imitates the world rather than sanctifying it — bears striking resemblance to the distinctive Protestant proclivity for doctrinal malleability and unquestioned conformity with the mutable, and at times calamitous, zeitgeist. Historically, such a treacherous trajectory has borne spiritually and politically deleterious fruit. The Protestant endemic susceptibility to ideological capture was starkly revealed with apocalyptic effect when völkisch nationalism — arguably irreconcilable with the universalism of Christianity — spread like wildfire across Europe.

It remains a little-known yet well-documented fact that during the ascent of National Socialism, Protestant communities in Germany — frequently aligned with the political, social and cultural mainstream — were markedly more inclined than their Catholic counterparts to embrace Adolf Hitler, his creed, and his cause. By contrast, Catholics — fortified by the steadfast guidance of the Church hierarchy, buttressed by the unifying force of Catholic social institutions, and anchored in authoritative magisterial teachings such as the encyclical Mit brennender Sorge — mounted a more resolute resistance to Hitler and the broader neopagan, chthonic ambitions of the era.

The ballot box bore witness to the stark confessional cleavage: while the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (NSDAP) thrived in staunchly Protestant regions —

routinely garnering over 60% of the vote — its electoral traction proved markedly weaker in Catholic strongholds, where its popular support rarely rose above 20 to 30 percent at the polls.[i] Moreover, as evidenced by party membership records, Protestants were overrepresented within the ranks of the NSDAP relative to their share of the general population.

As if such displays of docile accommodation had not already proven abundant, the 1933 Protestant church elections delivered a staggering verdict: two-thirds of voters cast their lot with the nationalist “German Christians” — a Protestant faction closely aligned with the NSDAP, zealously promoting unwavering submission to the party’s ideological line, including the expulsion of baptized Jews. Its aim was nothing less than the institutionalization of “Positive Christianity” — that vague, pliable creed enshrined in the party program — within the official Protestant churches of Germany, which were to be recast as racially purified vessels of an Aryan faith.

The Protestant pursuit of ideological conformity — where fads trump facts, and meek docility slips into outright complicity — lays bare the hazardous repercussions of forsaking theological orthodoxy and moral constancy in favor of cultural assimilation.

One unprecedented papal experiment in collegial governance and ecclesial deliberation — evocative of Protestant practices — stands out as a landmark embodiment of the piercing maxim, Scalpel shelved, sinners spared.

The Synod on Synodality: Global multi-tier consultation process 

On 7 March 2020, Pope Francis formally convoked the Synod on Synodality — a visionary initiative conceived to reimagine the Catholic Church as a more participatory, inclusive, and mission-oriented communion, animated by the guiding principle of “journeying together.”

This ecclesial initiative endeavored to engage the entire People of God in far-reaching discernment concerning the Church’s mission and its unfolding destiny. It aspired to transcend the traditional confines of hierarchical decision-making in favor of cultivating a more participatory and inclusive ecclesial ethos.

Central to its vision were the interwoven themes of communion, participation, and mission — each enunciated not merely as ideals, but as imperatives for the Church’s renewal in the modern age. 

The multi-year process unfolded in carefully delineated phases, ascending from the grassroots upward: commencing with local consultations at the parish and diocesan levels, it advanced through national and continental assemblies, ultimately culminating in a convocation of bishops and ecclesial delegates in Rome.

Framed in the aspirational rhetoric of structured dialogue and shared responsibility, the methodical schema encompassed parish assemblies, diocesan surveys, and global listening sessions — each designed to draw forth input from every stratum of the Church.

The Synod’s vast scope and lofty aspirations reflected Pope Francis’s vision of a Church that listens with attentiveness and walks in communion. Yet as the process unfolded, it gave rise to profound and still-unsettled questions touching the very nature of reform — penetrating inquiries that transcend superficial considerations of formal and stylistic veneers and modalities, implicating substantial matters central to the foundational pillars of magisterial authority, ecclesial unity, and the integral coherence of doctrine.

From revelation to roundtable: Discerning feelings, diluting faith

Central to the operational-procedural critique of this synod resides the observation that, over time, it appreciably assumed the semblance of a meticulously choreographed ecclesial outreach campaign — a theatrical pageant, some may deem a charade, marked by consultation bereft of true compass. More often than not, it bore the hallmarks of a managed descent from theological abstraction to pastoral anecdote, all under the guise of inclusivity. Notably, the initiative deployed mechanisms more apt for the curated harvesting of sentiment than to authentic theological discernment. Particular solicitude was granted to those styled as “marginalized voices,” whose indeterminate status only heightened the process’s ambient vagueness.

Perspicacious and judicious detractors might espy therein a curious spectacle: a hierarchy of herdsmen consulting the flock not for veritas (truth), but for vibes — a dynamic tension evident in some tenderly phrased and gently meandering yet pastorally skewed lines of inquiry. For instance, the wise in spirit may find illustrative sample questions — such as “What experiences of Church life bring you joy?” — bathetic in their earnest and reductionist simplicity, casting a faintly sentimental hue over a process ostensibly aimed at serious and momentous structural reform. 

At times, the effect bordered on the parodic and profane, with the ecclesial initiative taking on the character of administering a trivial and mundane wellness survey rather than representing a solemn act of sober-minded ecclesial discernment and erudite theological self-examination bearing on the Church’s identity and mission.

This dynamic pattern reveals the disjunction between the Synod’s liberal approach — marked by relativist and affective, some might say emotive, consultation, which crowdsources consensus and reduces both engagement and discernment to the mere solicitation of sentiment unmoored from objective value — and the Church’s sacred vocation to proclaim the truth with doctrinal fidelity and unequivocal clarity.

From hierarchy to havoc: Where bishops whisper, babel rings

At a higher, strategic level, unity through division seems to have become the Church’s disquieting new logic and latest innovation — epitomized by the tautologically termed ecclesial consultation process. Though commended for transparency and participatory ethos, the unfolding synodal endeavor exacts a grave toll: ecclesial fragmentation and a profound erosion of episcopal authority — as the crozier slips from grasp, the crowd usurps the altar, and the multitude overshadows the wise and prudent. Most pointedly, the papal venture dilutes the bishops’ magisterial role by dispersing responsibility through decentralized, quasi-democratic lay-driven processes, often buoyed by ersatz spirituality.

In its zealous pursuit of pastoral responsiveness, the unparalleled venture risks subverting, some may say obliterating, the very foundations of the Church. Principally, it jeopardizes doctrinal integrity and clarity, fostering corrosive relativism by supplanting immutable divine truths with ephemeral secular opinions. Such shades of thought are warped by virulent and insidious progressive political ideology and liberal social agendas rather than grounded in rigorous and authentic theological and spiritual discernment. This raises a pressing question: can a house of truth truly stand on the shifting sand of opinion?

Conclusion: Pontiff’s retreat unmoored the Church

To revisit Pope Francis’ guiding metaphor of a field hospital is to witness a perplexing paradox: the papal surgeon general appears to have stepped away from the operating table of his faltering ecclesial infirmary, abundant in compassion yet deficient in cure, leaving the wounded to wait and bleed without the blade — untended by the very hand ordained to minister restoration.

It is fitting to acknowledge that the Vicar of Christ may arguably have exercised wise and prudent pastoral caution and discretion in eschewing the heavy and blunt sledgehammer of harsh public censure against sinners exiled to the moral edges of society. Yet in his overwrought, some might say affected, gentleness, he let fall into disuse, of all things, the very scalpel entrusted to him — both archetype and apex of his vocation — that precise, exacting and incisive implement of definitive, primal and pure truth, whose keen edge wounds not to harm, but to heal.

Though outwardly cast as a cordial exercise in dialogue and participation, the synodal experiment progressively and perilously assumed the contours of an aggressive populist powerplay and calculated and methodical mobilization of the masses. Over the arc of this insidious crusade, Pope Francis’s emphasis on inclusion seeded instability, while the rhetoric of empowerment, at length, ushered in tangible upheaval and uncertainty.

The unvarnished gravity of this trajectory grows ever more apparent under closer scrutiny, inasmuch as what once passed for a mere reform of ecclesiastical governance upon reflection unveils its true countenance, its full dimension, and its far graver stakes: far from constituting a solely surface-level administrative adjustment, the synodal offensive has been quietly and deftly interwoven with the threads of a Vatican-style color revolution.

[To be continued]

This article is the second part of a series on the reign of Pope Francis.

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READ MORE: Prof. Schlevogt’s Compass No. 16: Rembrandt reveals blessings of Pope Francis’ reign

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