May 14, 2025 If this week taught me anything, it’s that I know nothing. As I was assembling the North Country Catholic late Thursday morning, I told a colleague, “I’m pretty sure we’re not going to have a pope today. I’m going to get as far as I can into everything else and hope I set myself up well for tomorrow.” Before lunch hour was over that day, probably two hours after I had made that claim, my phone started buzzing rapidly. Between text messages and social media messages, I had about a dozen people sending me the same two words: “white smoke.” We had a pope on Thursday. I had also proclaimed pretty confidently that our next pope would not be from the Americas at least a few times over the last week. I think you already know what the next round of messages said. “He’s an American!” I didn’t know what I thought I knew. It was one of those fun reminders that the Holy Spirit does what the Holy Spirit does, and what the Holy Spirit does – what God does – is outside understanding and expectations. Throughout Thursday afternoon and evening, and continuing into Friday, I saw hundreds of headlines cross our national/international wire service, pop up on my social media, and listed on my Google news feed. Pope Leo XIV, the first American pope, was everywhere news could be found (my son, Jake, found out there was a new pope via a media alert from one of his favorite sports analysts). As the news machine continued to churn, I started seeing all the stories declaring what kind of leader Pope Leo XIV will be. All the predictable words started being bantered about – liberal, conservative, progressive, traditional, unity, division… I closed my laptop and walked away from it. It’s not that I don’t care. I care deeply. I’m trying to trust the Holy Spirit, not various news outlets or pundits and certainly not my understanding and expectations, to tell us who Pope Leo XIV’s is and what kind of pope he will be. I trust God to know everything. |
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