The Francis Factor: How Much Will Affect Joe Biden …

Those who know him best in his private life assure that Joe biden, born into a family of Irish descent, is a practicing Catholic who does not miss weekly Mass and usually wears a Rosary as part of their own religious liturgy. To those who want to hear him, he says religion has been his support in dealing with personal tragedies such as the deaths of his first wife and first daughter, who died in a traffic accident, and the deaths caused by the cancer of another of her children. “My Catholic faith has helped me through the darkness,” Biden said at a fundraising dinner for Catholic charities, which was also attended by Donald Trump.

On November 7, when Biden spoke about Delaware as president-elect, his speech was loaded with religious metaphors and biblical imagery. He closed his speech with an allusion to a Catholic hymn “On the wings of the eagle” (On the wings of the eagle).

But the same sources mentioned above point out that beyond their religious convictions in politics Biden acts freely, respecting women’s rights to abortion and the use of contraceptives, something the Catholic Church rejects. Last Thursday when Donald trump The alleged ‘fraud’ continued to argue and threatening to discuss the Democrat’s victory in court, Biden and Pope Francis had a phone conversation as confirmed by the director of the Holy See’s press office, Matteo Bruni. It can be read as a gesture of support for the president elected by Jorge Bergoglio, who last October refused to receive Donald Trump’s secretary of state at the Vatican, Mike Pompeo, to avoid the political use of the meeting by the Republican in his race for re-election.

Catholics in America

In the air and despite maintaining divided positions on their political alignment, through the President of the Bishops’ Conference, the Archbishop of Los Angeles José H. Gómez, the North American Catholic bishops have hailed the president-elect “in thanking God for the blessing of freedom the American people have expressed in these elections” and asking to work together for “a nation under God, where the sanctity of all human life is upheld and freedom of conscience and religion is guaranteed ”.

The phone conversation between Biden and Bergoglio was not the first exchange between the current president-elect and a pope. In the past, Biden has met with Karol Wojtila, now Saint John Paul II, four times, and once, in June 2011, with Benedict XVI when Joseph Ratzinger was in office and the current president-elect was vice-president of his country during Barack Obama’s tenure. Biden was also with Bergoglio in the Vatican on March 19, 2013, in the United States in 2015 on the occasion of Francis’ visit to that country and in 2016 again in the Vatican, when the current president-elect attended a seminar at the Holy See. .

It has taken sixty years since the election of John F. Kennedy for a Catholic to become the second President of the United States to adhere to Catholicism.. In an article titled “The End of the Trumpian Captivity of the American Church” , published in La Croix on November 12, Villano University professor Massimo Faggioli asserts that “the presidency of the United States is not just a political office. It is also a position with moral and religious aspects. And Joe Biden will take over the portfolio at a time when the country’s political identities have taken on a theological and dogmatic intensity ”. Therefore, one cannot lose sight of the fact that during the American election campaign Trump, who defined himself as Presbyterian and who publicly marked his differences with FrancisLike Biden, they challenged the religious vote, and in particular Catholic suffrage, sending direct messages and generating advertising campaigns for this segment of voters, especially in states where the struggle seemed more fierce. Trump tried, by all means, to garner the most conservative religious vote, and Republicans in general were in favor of anti-abortion campaigns. The right to abortion is an issue that generally divides the American electorate and also creates differences among Catholics.

One fact to be aware of is that in the midst of the election campaign and using all the resources at his disposal, Trump decided to fill the post that remained on the Supreme Court of Justice following the death of Justice Ruth. Bader Ginsburg, calling for this post Judge Amy Coney Barrett, Conservative Catholic.

Some estimates claim that in 2016 the majority of the Catholic vote, a quarter of the voters, was in favor of Donald Trump. According to a study by the Pew Research Center, unlike other religious groups, such as white evangelicals who vote in bloc for Republicans or black Protestants who vote for Democrats, American Catholics are politically divided in two.

Francisco will he influence?

Compared to the sixties, when Kennedy was president, we can say that today the American Catholic Church is more divided, crossed by internal conflicts and its image severely damaged by the sexual abuse committed by the clergy. Despite this, the religious institution continues to be an important power factor on the northern scene.

During his campaign, Biden insisted on his intention to “unify the American people and overcome divisions,” an intention that Francis also holds and that the American bishops underscored in their greetings to the new president. We will also note the recurrence that the elected president makes of the biblical reference to the book of Ecclesiastes to affirm that “everything has a time: a time to build, a time to reap, a time to sow. And a time to heal. Now is the time to heal in America. “

The underlying question, however, is whether this religious stance of Joe Biden will translate into political positions of the new president that bring him closer to some of the premises that Pope Francis held in his pontificate. and in his encyclicals like rented and the recent All brothers , both with strong political and social implications. After this week’s telephone dialogue, Biden spokespersons said the president-elect told Bergoglio his “desire” to agree on initiatives based “on the dignity and equality of all mankind.” . However, we must not forget that in Francisco’s preaching, the situation of the poor, refugees and immigrants occupies a central place, without forgetting that these situations, as well as the question of the environmental sustainability of the ecosystem, are a direct consequence of the global economic model. for which the United States, as the major power, is directly responsible. And to this we must add that, Whether Republican or Democratic presidents, American policy has invariably been aimed at protecting their interests in the world..