The journalist Claud Cockburn
(pictured) once said that Catholics could and would never bet on the
election of the Pope because they believed it was all up to the Holy
Spirit. Whether Catholic abstinence reflected reverence or the absence
of a form guide, he did not say.
Cockburn was factually mistaken, of course — many Catholics then and now would place a bet on anything and everything. His reasoning also overlooked the Catholic understanding that human beings cooperate with the Holy Spirit. But his association of God's action with the election and the actions of popes provides a lens for looking at the recently concluded Synod on the Family.
http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=45621#.VjF1TGsUiUl
Cockburn was factually mistaken, of course — many Catholics then and now would place a bet on anything and everything. His reasoning also overlooked the Catholic understanding that human beings cooperate with the Holy Spirit. But his association of God's action with the election and the actions of popes provides a lens for looking at the recently concluded Synod on the Family.
http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=45621#.VjF1TGsUiUl