Being named Time Magazine's person of the year is a big accomplishment. However, myself and so many other people may be wondering what the real reason is behind this award. Time Magazine initially wrote that "Pope Francis rejected some church dogma and teaching and brought many Catholics back to the church who had previously lost hope." Although they quickly corrected this mistake as Pope Francis does not reject any teachings or traditions, it kind of makes me wonder if that was the initial reason why they named him as "Person of the Year."
I can see Pope Francis receiving this award for renewing hope in Catholics by stating that he upholds the significant teachings of the Catholic Church, but was this rewarding him for what Time thought was a willingness to reconstruct the teachings of the church as a whole? My point is, the media just seems to feast on the Catholic church and anything their leaders say. When they listen to Pope Francis speak, they are not listening with earnest and sincere hearts, but are instead waiting for any sentence that they can twist around in order for a good story suggesting change or upheaval. We have seen this with Pope Francis' words against abortion, gay marriage and women priests.
One day I just want the secular media to reward a church leader, who is in good standing, for actually bring people closer to God through the church's great dogma and teachings, not because they want to twist certain words around.
-USA Today:
Calling him "The People's Pope," Time magazine on Wednesday named Pope Francis its Person of the Year.
"What makes this pope so important is the speed with which he has captured the imaginations of millions who had given up on hoping for the church," Time said in its cover story announcing the news.
Time's other 10 finalists were a mixed crew that included President Obama, NSA leaker Edward Snowden, Syria President Bashar Assad, Iran President Hassan Rouhani, Secretary of Health
and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, gay rights activist Edith Windsor -- and singer Miley Cyrus,Pope Francis, 76, was born Jorge Mario Bergoglio in Buenos Aires. He was named archbishop of Argentina in 1998, became a cardinal in 2001 and was elected pope by the papal conclave in Vatican City on March 13. He replaced Pope Benedict XVI, 86, who announced his resignation Feb. 11 citing a "lack of strength of mind and body" due to his advanced age.
Francis had earned a reputation for humility and commitment to the poor long before assuming leadership of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics.
"As Pope, he was suddenly the sovereign of Vatican City and head of an institution so sprawling—with about enough followers to populate China—so steeped in order, so snarled by bureaucracy, so vast in its charity, so weighted by its scandals, so polarizing to those who study its teachings, so mysterious to those who don't, that the gap between him and the daily miseries of the world's poor might finally have seemed unbridgeable," Time says. "Until the 266th Supreme Pontiff walked off in those clunky shoes
to pay his hotel bill."Obama was Person of the Year in 2012 -- and in 2008. He is the only person among last year's finalists to make the list again this year.
Time selected its first "Man of the Year" in 1927. The selection is based on the person who the magazine's editors believe most influenced the news this year, for good or bad. Time's readers, in a poll completed
last week, selected Egypt's General Abdul Fattah al-Sisi as their Person of the Year.
