he has an awareness that, if he hell to scalfari about will make headlines around the world. way of the pope's dealing with these powerful constraints on the office. brian: what do you think of this idea of talking with scalfari, who is an atheist and doesn't take notes? lord,my reaction is, oh, help us. not again. toon't think it is helpful the catholic faith to have a pope sort of doing this. introducee wants to different theological ideas about hell, t should be open enough to do it publicly and -- he should be open enough to do it publicly and risk the backlash. credit, has to his do that on divorce and marriage and whether catholics remarried without annulment can take communion. that is a central controversy of his pontificate. francis did push for a certain change. out inthem argue it these two senates in rome. the reaction from the bishops put limits on what he could do. but his response to those limits was similarly a kind of ambiguity, where he issued a long document on marriage that included a small footnote that seemed to open the door to communion for the remarri

scalfari is probably getting part of what francis says wrong. that is a reasonable assumption.the same time, the holy father has conducted five separate conversations with him, in which consistently he floats theological speculations that skirt the boundaries of catholic orthodoxy. what you see is a pope trying to find ways, in some cases, to explicitly change the church. in other cases, to introduce a kind of ambiguity and openness for conversation and debate around official teachings, and using this kind of informal -- catholics use the word "magisterial" to describe formal papal teaching. the papal magisterium is what the pope has always taught and said. he is stepping outside that role in these interviews. francis is many things, but he is very media savvy. he has an awareness that, if he talks to scalfari about hell what he says will make headlines around the world. so there is a kind of it intention outlet t about this intentionality about this that is the pope's way of dealing with these powerful constraints on the office. brian: what do you think of this idea of talking