Letter from the Editor
Pope Francis “Doesn’t Do Fashion”
But we sure like his (actually!) Jesus-y, gay-loving, cooler-than-thou style
BY JIM NELSON
December 2014
You know who had a pretty infallible 2014? Pope Francis. I’ve already invited Him to our Men of the Year party, the big bash we do at the Chateau Marmont in L.A. to celebrate the issue—what pontiff can resist the Chateau Marmont?—but I haven’t heard back. I think that means he’s coming. I kept it all very…Latin.
Sure, I fibbed a little. I tried to make it sound like a Holy Day of Obligation that only people in California observe. You could say that I beckoned him. I believe I used the words “The Feast of the Men of the Year.” Threw in a little “Sollemnes Homines Anni.” Pretty sure I nailed it.
I’m told by the Vatican that the Pope “doesn’t do fashion,” but I say He does every time He sashays down the aisle. And I sure hope His Holiness decides to come to L.A. to hang out with Steve Carell and Chris Pratt and the rest of us Homines because, in all honesty, I like this pope a lot. He’s kind, humane, engaged, not like that last grump who walked off the job. Unlike Pope Geezer III, Francis is someone you can relate to. You look at him and you think: That guy just might have a secular agenda.
Did you know he tweets? He tweets! If you need a break from all the snark in the world, follow his feed. It’s the gentlest Twitter feed ever invented. One of my favorites: “Dear young people, do not be mediocre.” (Good advice! And think about it: He’s practically imploring you to subscribe to GQ.) Sometimes he’ll just tweet to spirits, like this one: “Come, Holy Spirit.” How cool is that? Like, he just wants to hang out. If I were the Holy Spirit, I’d retweet that shit a thousand times.
But the real reason I’m declaring Him our Holy Man of the Year is that he’s trying to push the Catholic Church into the twenty-first century, where it doesn’t seem to want to live, trying to open its creaky leaden doors to the realities of the world. And here’s the doctrinal shocker: Francis doesn’t think divorced people, or couples shacking up together, or gays and lesbians are evil. He believes they should be welcomed, not shunned. In the Catholic Church, this makes him close to a heretic. In October, he even had a committee declare that there are “positive aspects of civil unions and cohabitation,” that gay Catholics have certain “gifts and qualities,” and that everyone should “experiment with three-ways.”
Okay, I made up that last part about threesomes. But still! Theologically speaking, that’s rad. (Or is it? We did our own calculations here at GQ and found that tens of millions of Americans have divorced, lived together, or failed to pray the gay away. If welcoming that many people is considered radical, we’ve lost our sense of radical.)
Well, God made His decision: Lightning did not strike the Vatican!
What did strike the Vatican was panic. Hard-line bishops got their vestments in a bunch and managed, in a sense, to overrule the Pope. (Which I don’t get, since I thought He was infallible.) They watered down the final report, changed words in translation, and generally acted like it was 1572. They dropped language about “welcoming” gays and even changed the phrase homosexual “partners” to the dreaded “these people.” (As in: Some of my best friends are “these people.”)
It won’t last. This pope is too cool, too charismatic, and too righteous. And Jesus, who welcomed all, rolled with prostitutes, and got pissed at people with “stubborn hearts,” is on His side.
So am I.
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