A serious and mature Catholic must be critical of the hoaxes that, more and more frequently, circulate on the web and are attributed to the Pope.
- Xiskya Valladares
Religious of the Congregation of the Purity of Mary.
Lately, Pope Francis seems to be spilling his gourmand messages, surprisingly unbecoming of a pontiff. "We know God doesn't use Facebook.", "Christmas is you, when you decide to be born again every day and let God into your soul.", "We need saints without veils, without cassocks."... and a lot of "cheesiness" that can surprise anyone with two fingers in front.
It is about hoaxes (hoaxes) that circulate on the web, for example, by whatsapp or by email. Chain messages that contain some phrase that the Pope has said and to which someone has added the rest of his own harvest. The issue has become so serious that the Holy See has spoken out: "These types of texts circulating on the internet attributed to Pope Francis generally do not say on what date and with what occasion he said those words. Because in such a case it would be easy for anyone to go to the official website of the Holy See and check if they are really the Pope's words." (News.va, 3 December 2015).
Many people would like the Pope to really say those words, almost always because he can apply them to someone else. And so they have arisen: from someone who wants to impose his thought and attributes it to the Pope in order to give him more authority. But this is deception. As is the great number of calls for prayers that reach us as if they were from the Pope.
There are people who say that they do not do wrong by sharing prayers, vigil calls, and all kinds of hoaxes of the pope. False. Neither prayer is magic, nor can it contribute to deceiving people. This is sin.
This type of chain messages arose in ancient times associated with religious themes. No wonder atheists laugh at us and consider us primitive, we put it on a platter every time we are fearful, scrupulous or superstitious before these chains. It is difficult to understand that a serious and mature Catholic would fall for such emotional manipulations.
