Hot on the heels of yesterdays news that the Pope spoke to the effect that there are limitations on freedom of speech, that one shouldn't "insult" religion and should always speak for the common good, todays news brings two items that I will address below the tangled web.
In keeping with the idea of speaking only to further or promote the common good, the Pope spoke on two subjects today:
Firstly
Pope Francis issued his strongest defense yet of church teaching opposing artificial contraception on Friday, using a rally in Asia's largest Catholic nation to urge families to be "sanctuaries of respect for life."
...
"Be sanctuaries of respect for life, proclaiming the sacredness of every human life from conception to natural death," Francis exhorted the crowd. "What a gift this would be to society if every Christian family lived fully its noble vocation."
He then deviated from his prepared remarks to praise Pope Paul VI for having "courageously" resisted calls for an opening in church teaching on sexuality in the 1960s. Paul penned the 1968 encyclical "Humanae Vitae" which enshrined the church's opposition to artificial birth control.
link
Now if that ain't furthering the common good, I surely cannot imagine what ever could be.
Secondly
Pope Francis says he will declare that Junipero Serra, one of the founders of modern California, is a Roman Catholic saint.
link
Serra, for those who don't know, was one of the key territorial, political and spiritual imperialists sent to conquer California and "civilize" ie subdue, subvert, enslave and convert the existing indigenous population.
He was quite successful, establishing a chain of 9 missions serving as focal points for said subjugation and conversion and way stations for invading troops, explorers and colonists.
In the roughly 80 years between the founding of the Mission San Diego de Alcala and the Invasion by the USA, this blessed civilizing had pretty much entirely destroyed Native American culture in California and cut the population by half.
This was a sufficiently holy and glorious endeavor that the Pope
said he had waived the requirement that candidates for sainthood had been involved in verifiable miracles.
(Same citation)
Truly the announcement of such good news must also be classified as being in furtherance of the public good.