Pope Leo - a time of opportunity

The world is presumably as surprised as I am by the Conclave's choice this time around. Never before had an American been chosen pope.

I don't know anything about Robert Prevost, so I am hoping he'll be a good pope, wise and kind. It would not be going too far to say that I pray for that, as I am sure many, if not all, Roman Catholics are now doing. Not that it's exclulsively our business. He may only be the boss of Roman Catholics, but the papacy is a position of enormous influence in the world; it is hardly possible to overstate that influence, even today. So the type of man Prevost is will matter greatly to pretty well everyone.

My hope is that the cardinals were guided in their votes by earnest prayer, and not by any more political considerations. And I hope we've got ourselves a pope who will be as wise and kind as Pope Frances was. And I almost hate myself for what I'm going to say next.

Because I can't help wondering whether there is any connexion between this: 

And this:

I truly, truly hope I'm just being silly here, and that it's purely a coincidence that an American pope has been elected, for the first time ever, just a few days after Trump's very public remarks about how he would make a good pope and the White House's posting of this breathtakingly offensive picture. On the positive side, the Holy Father is a genuine priest, and he's had quite a history of posting the right kind of stuff on social media. He's supported refugees and so on. He's spoken out against some of the worst excesses of America's current administration. He certainly looks nice, if that's anything to go by, and he's a doctorate in Canon Law, so we know he is far, far from being stupid.

The only thing that raises a little worm of doubt, for me, is the startlingly civilised response from the White House to his election. For once, Mr Trump failed to embarrass himself, which suggests some positive feeling for the appointment - we already know he lacks the discipline to be courteous for its own sake. I'd really have felt more comfortable if Trump had railed against him, as he has been doing about Mr Buttigieg, but God forbid, and I mean that literally, I should start a consipracy theory. 

I suppose time will tell.