ROME – A few days ago, Pope Francis said something which, ironically, his most ferocious critics on the far Catholic right likely would be the first to endorse. Reacting to criticism of his rhetoric on women during a trip to Belgium, he bristled at the idea that it reflected a “conservative” mentality.
“If this, to those women, seems conservative, I am Carlo Gardel,” he said, referring to a famed French-Argentine Tango musician, which was a colloquially Argentinian way of saying he found the idea absurd.
