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Why does Francis kiss boys on their mouths?

Take a close look on the picture above, from the papal visit to Rio. A security agent - his head appears at the bottom right corner - hands over a boy to be kissed by the Pope. The boy puts his arms around Francis' head and goes straight for a mouth-to-mouth kiss. Instead of preventing the boy from doing this, the Pope purses his lips and prepares to receive the kiss. One of his hands is already embracing the boy and the other hand, which could easily be used to move the boy away from this inconvenient gesture, instead reaches out to fully embrace him.

If this were the first time for a mouth-to-mouth kiss with a boy, one could say that it was an unfortunate incident. But it is not. We have another case in which the initiative clearly was taken by Francis.

Given these two precedents and adding the unbelievable number of papal kisses to children, a common Catholic can raise some questions. Why is Francis adopting a policy of kissing children in proportions unequaled by any other world leader - either in the temporal or the spiritual sphere? Even the theatrical kissing of children by John Paul II and the awkward kisses of Benedict XVI were limited to one of two children during public appearances. Now, with Francis, such public kisses have increased tenfold.

Why are we witnessing this increase of kisses? Is it a new policy of the Vatican that thinks Catholics will fall for a demagogue just because he kisses their children? Or is it because of some unbalanced attraction Francis has for children?

We are not affirming the latter is the reason. We are just warning our audience to be watchful. Indeed, if we were to witness any other Bishop or Cardinal doing something similar, it would raise suspicions of a pedophile tendency, would it not? So, why not take a similar caution regarding the behavior of the Bishop of Rome?

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Posted August 25, 2013

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