Talk:Theology of Pope Francis/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Doctorg (talk · contribs) 18:53, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

@Jzsj:I'm starting this review now, please reply to my comments below as you continue to work on the article so we can keep a good record of the communicaiton flow. Thank you for working so hard editing this article. I'll try to keep my review organized using the same headers as in the article. Doctor^G  (talk) 18:53, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Overall

Please do a complete review of punctuation; there ar many places where commas should be used. Doctor^G  (talk) 18:53, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

I've finished checking for commas throughout; I hope this satisfies. Jzsj (talk) 21:25, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Make sure quotations are used consistently throughout the article, and make sure that all qoutes have quotation marks around them. It appears that many of the indented sections are quoted without using quotation marks.  Doctor^G  (talk) 18:56, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

I only noticed a few, I think you took care of these.

I've used block quotes consistently. The indented quotes are block quotes in the Wiki style. Jzsj (talk) 21:25, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

I haven't come across block quotes very often on Wikipedia, thanks for teaching me something new.  Doctor^G  (talk) 00:51, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

Make sure references are used consitently throughout article.  Doctor^G  (talk) 18:58, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

I believe this is the case; please point out where it is not. Jzsj (talk) 21:25, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

I have addressed this below with the parethetical referencing discussion.

Considering NPOV, is there anyone in the Catholic church that disagrees with the views of Pope Francis or the changes he is making? These should be included to show all viewpoints. Doctor^G  (talk) 18:53, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

I think NPOV here has to do with what Pope Francis thinks, that it is properly represented, not what others think of his ideas. It goes without saying that there are all sorts of people who would disagree with various things he's said and done, but that seems to me to be matter for another article. @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 19:15, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

I beg to differ with the nominator here. To understand not only the nature, but the impact and influence, of the Pope's theology, explaining a little bit of how it has been received, both positively and negatively, would be very helpful. Display name 99 (talk) 21:53, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

If this must be done then I strongly advise that it be done in one section at the end. In general, it's Pope Francis who is disagreeing with the heavy brunt of Counter-Reformation traditions, many of which were revived during the previous 35 years. If you start welcoming anyone who wants to disagree on the basis of other theologies, I suggest it will ruin the article whose singular focus is on the newness of Pope Francis' focus on Jesus' example rather than on recent Church traditions. I suggest that another article might be written on the reception of Francis' theology in the Church, and to do justice to that would take a longer article than this one. I can write a small section for the end, but where will it end? @Display name 99: Jzsj (talk) 02:32, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

@Jzsj: I think there are a few ways you could do this. You could add a little bit of content at the end of each section where some dissent exists. Or, as you proposed, you could add one section at the end with some content on the reaction or response of the Catholic church as a whole. I agree that this page shouldn't turn into a theological debate, but the fact that Pope Francis is trying to turn the Catholic church in a new direction (at least partially) has almost certainly stirred up some dissent among some log time Catholics. So, some content that speaks to this would hlep provide the NPOV balance that is required on Wikipedia.  Doctor^G  (talk) 13:34, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

It doesn't all have to be dissent either. Just a little bit about the impact that his approach is having, how its affected the Church and the world, and how people have reacted to it in various ways. Display name 99 (talk) 15:03, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

What are all the numbers in parenthesis at the end of so many sentences? Are these references to something else?  Doctor^G  (talk) 19:02, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

The answer is at the end of intro and at the beginning of the references section, and it is explained in the intro. If you know of a better way of handling this, please let me know. I've bolded these if you think that helps, but was previously admonished to use less bolding in this article. Jzsj (talk) 21:25, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

May I suggest changing the citations to Evangelii gaudium from simple paragraph numbers (45) to appropriate refs (EG 45), this pattern is already used for citing Laudato si, as LS and could be readily extended to Amoris laetitia, as AL and other important examples of his theological writings. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 22:08, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

This would make it a little more clear. Sorry, I missed your note at the beginning of the reference section. Doctor^G  (talk) 00:45, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

Since most of this article is based on LG, I was hoping to get by without putting "LG" into the 58 times that LG numbers are listed. @SteveMcCluskey: Jzsj (talk) 02:32, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

@Jzsj:You'll have to forgive me, I am ordained on the Protestant side of the house, so I am not as familiar with Catholic terminology. That being said, Parenthetical_referencing is perfectly fine if you want to use it. The confusing part for me, initially, was that there was just a number without any association to the overall document that was being referenced. Your note in the lead and reference sections cleared this up for me, but it may confuse other readers as well. Might I suggest you do something like, (Evangelii Gaudium 2013, para. 20). I think this would be more accurate to the Wikipedia parenthetical referencing style. You could also remove the note in the lead and reference sections if you make these changes. Most of the changes could be made with copy/paste and only take a few minutes.  Doctor^G  (talk) 14:05, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

In interest of keeping this organizaed, let's keep this conversation going at the end of this section. Doctor^G  (talk) 20:30, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

I wouldn't mind withdrawing my nomination of this article if it needs substantial changes for becoming a "good" article. I think the breadth of the topic requires a concise style, to keep the article within bounds for proper length. Admittedly, one needs to read all this matter slowly and thoughtfully, since there are so many different ideas to present. It's a huge topic! @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 19:15, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

@Jzsj: This is a very well written article, I would not withdraw it. I think you already addressed some of my initial thoughts. This is only the second review I have done so I am learning along with you about this process.  Doctor^G  (talk) 13:42, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

I still think that NPOV deals with properly representing what the article is about, what Pope Francis has said and done, not what others think about what he has said and done. That said, I can add a section at the end which mentions the most disputed points in his theology, but a lot of this is hinted at in his own statements and my intros. The chief areas of dispute would be on sex matters, with some emphasizing the "intrinsic evil" of abortion as if it trumped all other voting issues. Also there's Cardinal Burke and others who oppose Communion for remarried Catholics. And there are more fundamental differences like whether to rely more on scholastic theology or on the Bible for one's theology. But here we're opening a whole new can of worms. I don't think we need to get into any of this if we limit this article to what is proposed in the introduction: entirely about Pope Francis, a neutral point of view presenting his understanding of the various topics that are most distinctive of his thought. As to further labelling of EG quotes, if there's a consensus that we need to put "LG" into all the inline citations then I'll do this but doing more the 58 times these occur would make a mess of the article. @Display name 99: @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 18:08, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

Regarding the citations, Wikipedia does have a policy that different styles of referencing should not be used in the same article; see Parenthetical referencing for the details. This article currently has footnotes and parenthetical citations, which is probably the real root of this discussion. I realize it is a little bit of work to standardize it throughout the article, but changing everything to one style or the other would really be the best way to address this issue. Doctor^G  (talk) 20:16, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

Please tell me where there is a rigid policy expressed by Wikipedia that one can never use any in-text references when endnotes are also used. I do know that this would add 58 footnotes and this seems to me to go against their "common sense" policy. @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 22:22, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

The place where different methods are discussed is Wikipedia:Citing sources, and I read there: "imposing one style on an article with inconsistent citation styles (e.g., some of the citations in footnotes and others as parenthetical references): an improvement because it makes the citations easier to understand and edit", but it uses an argument from easy of reading, not from rigid policy. I suggest that the dual method makes for easier reading here so that one does not constantly have to check the endnotes for the two main sources in the article (EG; and LS limited to one section). On a limited check I've found some support for my "mixing styles" in a couple "featured articles": Ode on a Grecian Urn, Conatus#In Spinoza, and Ten Commandments in Catholic theology. @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 09:54, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

@Jzsj: Unless I misundersood everything I have read (which is very possible), I see this mentioned in item 2 under the "assessing the article and providing a review" section of Wikipedia:Reviewing good articles, the lead section of Wikipedia:Scientific citation guidelines, and in the lead and consistency sections of Parenthetical referencing. There is also a mention in Citing sources that full citations, listed as footnotes, are the most commonly used citations in Wikipedia articles. I am happy to help you do some copy/paste operations in the artilce to standardize these if you like, just let me know. Doctor^G  (talk) 13:35, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

I don't find any "consistency section" in the article on Parenthetical referencing and in the article on Wikipedia:Reviewing good articles item 2 doesn't say that mixing methods of citation is entirely ruled out, while the intro there gives the main matter to be checked: "Good articles meet a set of minimum standards (the Good article criteria) for quality of writing, factual accuracy and attribution, broadness of coverage, stability, and appropriate use of images." I see nothing here about method of citation, but the strongest argument in my favor is that the featured articles I list do somewhat mix the two types of citation: please note that, and the criteria for good articles are less than that for featured articles. Again, I repeat what I said above that without incontrovertible evidence that there is never any reason for mixing citation methods I would like to maintain the in-text citations just adding an "EG" in each of them and thus making it clear to the reader from the start what is being cited. The alternative would be to mention before all 58 EG quotes that the quote is from EG, and I don't see many people arguing that this is preferable to what I have now. Please check out the following: Wikipedia:Ignore all rules and Wikipedia:Common sense on courtesy. Thanks! @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 14:33, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, I mis-linked the parenthetical referencing one, didn't realize there were two, try this one: Wikipedia:Parenthetical referencing. Though, it does seem we are at an impasse, so maybe bringing in someone else for their opinion would be a good idea. Display name 99 (talk · contribs), any thoughts on the way citations are used in this article?  Doctor^G  (talk) 18:50, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

I believe that the use of footnotes for the Evangelii Gaudium citations is the best solution, as the current format seems remarkably inconsistent and tedious. It also makes for difficulties and inconsistencies when citing parts of other encyclicals. Also, there are no authors listed for any of the citations. For any article, especially a good article, I strongly recommend that they be added. Otherwise, the citations look fine. Display name 99 (talk) 19:34, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

I don't know why you call it "remarkably inconsistent" and "tedious" and overlook the three "featured" articles I mention, in which the two styles are mixed. What I am proposing is like inline-attribution-plus-page in parenthesis, as recommended in Wikipedia:inline citation#In-text attribution. Far from being tedious I find this the most elegant way to handle such a huge volume of references. What if I respond to your objections by placing all quotes from Pope Francis' own works (no commentary) in parenthetical parentheses and give complete citations for these in a section "Direct citations" before the endnotes section. I agree that this should be done at least for the EG and LS citations, and would be willing (but not anxious in cases of singular references) to add all citations that pertain to his own works rather than someone else's commentary-with-quotes (like Vatican Radio). @Display name 99: Jzsj (talk) 12:16, 2 September 2017 (UTC)

@Jzsj:I'm not sure what else to say about this piece of the discussion. I asked someone else to step in, just in case I was way off base, but we seem to be in the same place as before. I saw the featured articles you referenced, and your argument there is a good one. But we also don't know when the parenthetical citations were added or if they existed before it was a featured article (I didn't take the time to dig into it). Standards have also changed over time and it's possible they became featured before some of the attempts at stadardization were undertaken. At any rate, we still need to resolve the concerns about this article. I don't think it is unreasonable to suggest that the article use the same stylenof references throughout and I think the Wikipedia pages I previously cited say the same thing (or at least allude to it). Doctor^G  (talk) 00:32, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

Please note what it says about Wikipedia:Featured articles. If you don't think these article remain as exemplars then it seems to me that you should propose their demotion, not disallow others from imitating them. I don't think we're going to resolve this without going to a higher authority. While you say your references allude to an absolute I say they are not speaking about an absolute, and we happen to have a special case where their generalities don't apply. @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 01:31, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

I'm not the Wikipedia police, I'm just trying to help as much as I can. Your suggestion isn't a bad one, maybe someone will take the time to look at those articles later. Perhaps the best thing to do, since we have beaten this dead horse for quite some time now, and one second opinion has not helped to resolve the impasse, is for me to fail the article, then you can immediately re-nominate it for someone else to review it. Let me know your thoughts on this and I will take care of it. Doctor^G  (talk) 13:30, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

Could I just withdraw the proposal rather than presenting it as a failed article? If not, then please do fail it and if possible give your reason as simply the dual method of referencing: that's all that really divides us in the end. Thanks. @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 13:40, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

I think the proper method is to go the fail route so we have a complete record and so the next reviewer will know to look at the complete discussion here. I will cite the referencing disagreement as the reason. Doctor^G  (talk) 14:54, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

Regarding the NPOV, I see your point and partially agree with you. I think the goal of the article is a great one and I don't want it to turn into a theological debate. Can we really say it is a neutral point of view about what he has said without including the responses/reactions of others? I think adding the section at the end that covers the topics you proposed is a perfect way to do this.  Doctor^G  (talk) 20:19, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

I will devise something for the end if no one else responds to this, but I still don't agree that we need to include criticism of what he says with accurate portrayal of what he said. It still seems to me that we are confusing two issues here, and the criticism by others is not the primary thrust of NPOV, which concerns more the fact that I am impartial and back up everything I attribute to him. Do you not see the critical difference here? @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 22:22, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

@Jzsj: So maybe not criticism, because that could certainly lead down a very long path. Maybe just some general reaction and impact would provide the needed balance. It could even include good reaction and impact; i.e. There has been some mixed reaction to Pope Francis' thoughts on X, some Catholics have said... Doctor^G  (talk) 13:39, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

I'll do something in this regard when I have time and when we get the citation issue resolved. @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 14:33, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

I've gone over the article with a view to adding some evaluation of his theology and I don't think this can be done without raising POV questions and welcoming endless debate as to what "people" think of his theology. I suggest that his own remarks quoted in the article again and again imply that there is much that is a reversal of direction here, and that he is in disagreement with very much of what has gone before (and persists in the Church: people are not likely to change in mid-life). Time magazine, quoted in the article, may put it best to respond to the question of reaction: "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 at all. People weary of the endless parsing of sexual ethics, the buck-passing infighting over lines of authority when all the while (to borrow from Milton), “the hungry Sheep look up, and are not fed”. In a matter of months, Francis has elevated the healing mission of the church – the church as servant and comforter of hurting people in an often harsh world – above the doctrinal police work so important to his recent predecessors." It goes without saying that many have not just turned around and changed, but to estimate the extent of pushback and evaluate opposition seems to me to be a topic for another article: this is simply an article on his theology, regardless of what people think of it. The original suggestion here that this violates NPOV seems to me to be a misunderstanding of what NPOV means. Thanks for your careful consideration of this! @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 18:13, 2 September 2017 (UTC)

@Jzsj: I think I understand your point, but the reason why this balance is so important is because of the weight his statements carry. His words have an impact on over a billion people. Adding some content that references some general reaction and impact would be helpful. I would expect the same for articles about any other major leader in the world. Also, please don't get upset with these discussions, I know it can be frustrating having your work critiqued, but talking this out makes the articles better. As a side note, I really like what Pope Francis is doing and I have personally ministered with some charismatic Catholic leaders who also love what he is doing. I hope he is able to accomplish much of what he is trying to do. Doctor^G  (talk) 00:23, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

I'm mulling over the possibilities. As you say, the evaluation would have to be balanced and present both sides. I'm not against exposing the push-back he's experienced within the Catholic Church, to the extent that this is necessary in an article about his thinking, not about his supporters and adversaries. I suppose if the pros and cons got out of hand we could turn it into a separate article. But I want to settle the issue of the two distinct kinds of references before settling on evaluative comments. @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 13:33, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

Morality as a vehicle of God's mercy

Should change "gay" to homosexuality or something similar.  Doctor^G  (talk) 19:04, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Francis has used the term "gay" several times, so it doesn't seem inappropriate to use it here. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 22:11, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

I don't think it is innapprorpiate, and since the focus of the article is on the theology of Pope Francis, using his language is probably the best way to present it.

Church leadership

I suspect this is an area where there are some dissenting views.  Doctor^G  (talk) 19:06, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Again, this article is not a debate about his theology but simply his own, distinctive views. One could take exception to just about any of them, but the article is already quite long and I question whether dissent must be registered in the article. Jzsj (talk) 22:43, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

We're discussing this in other sections so I'll strike it out of this section to keep things organizaed.  Doctor^G  (talk) 20:10, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

You got me at a busy time when I'll be travelling the next couple days. Please give me a few days to respond to corrections. @DoctorG: Jzsj (talk) 19:18, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for helping with this. I await specific directions on further changes. I see my original ellipses had been changed, and the punctuation around quotation marks is consistently British style, so I'll leave those alone. I've bolded the two explanations of in-text references to Evangelii Gaudium, but please remove the bolding if it seems inappropriate. I favor succinctness, on references and in general, but am open to exigencies. Jzsj (talk) 20:30, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Article has been failed due to the inability to gain consensus on whether or not parenthetical references and footnotes should be used in the same article. I recommend, for any future reviews, that the referencing style be looked at to determine if it is within Wikipedia standards or if it needs to be modified. There was also some minor disagreement on NPOV, but that seems to have been settled. Overall, this is a well written article that I think is very close to GA status. Thank you, @Jzsj: for working to make Wikipedia better. Doctor^G  (talk) 15:00, 4 September 2017 (UTC)