Here’s the headline:
‘We don’t want your dirty money’, pope tells rich patrons
Except that’s not what he said.
Here’s the actual story in which he is quoted as saying a number of things including reportedly:
“I think of some benefactors of the Church that say ‘take this offer for the Church’, and it is profit from the blood of those abused, treated as slaves, workers with poorly paid jobs,” he told the faithful on Saint Peter’s Square.
“I say to these people: ‘Please, take back your cheque, burn it’. The people of God, the Church, does not need dirty money,” he said at the end of his weekly general audience at the Vatican.
The Argentine has repeatedly denounced those who profit from slavery, corruption or exploitation, including several heated attacks on the mafia, from Italy to Mexico.
So what the pope said is not a blanket condemnation of “rich patrons” as some in the media would have you believe.
Fox News Latino had a more responsible headline:
Pope Francis to church benefactors: We don’t want your money if it’s dirty
Look, Pope Francis says some things that make me cringe a little bit (or a lot of bit) but I can’t stand when the media twists his words to fit their own agenda. They do this all the time.
I mean, c’mon media, at least wait until Pope Francis says something outrageous. You don’t have to force it. It’ll happen.
