This week, Pope Francis arrives for his first visit to the US, so Monday, we’re talking to religion writer and biographer Paul Vallely. He says conservative and liberal Catholics try to claim the Pope as their own. Francis opposes divorce, but has made the path to annulment easier. He advocates equal pay for women, but won’t allow them to be clergy. We’ll talk about the Pope’s complicated past and why Vallely says that behind the icon of simplicity stands a steely and sophisticated politician.
Paul Vallely is a journalist and religion commentator. He is the editor of The New Politics: Catholic Social Teaching for the 21st Century [Amazon] and his most recent book Pope Francis: The Struggle for the Soul of Catholicism [Indiebound|Amazon]
