Pope Celebrates His Birthday With Homeless; Pope Removes Conservative Cardinal From Committee
HOLMES: Welcome back. Pope Francis, making another move that may not sit too well with conservative members of the church, what he's done is remove a conservative American cardinal, Raymond Burke, from the Congregation for Bishops. That is the powerful Vatican committee that chooses the bishops.</s>MALVEAUX: Burke has actually been an outspoken critic of abortion and same-sex marriage. The pope replaced him with another American cardinal who is considered to be more moderate in his views. Pope Francis, also marking his birthday today, he is 77. He did it by hosting four homeless men to a mass and a meal at the Vatican.</s>HOLMES: Nothing like it, doing it the right way. The pope's staff said that Francis wanted to celebrate his birthday with a family environment, so he got in some top aides and a couple of other people and these homeless men. Let's bring in Reverend Edward Beck, CNN religion commentator, host of "The Sunday Mass." We keep saying the same stuff. He's been revered as the "People's Pope" already. He's not living in the big papal apartment. He drives that used car, dropping the vestments or some of them, and now a birthday meal with the homeless. Obviously, that's probably why he was "Time's" Person of the Year. What do you make of all this? It's not surprising, given what we've learned so far.</s>REVEREND EDWARD BECK, CNN RELIGION COMMENTATOR: No, Michael, it's so consistent with the man we've come to know. And as the world gets ready to celebrate the birth of Christ, remember, a homeless teenager gives birth to the savior was what the Christians believe, so it's appropriate ,that as the pope celebrates his birthday, he invites the homeless in. These are the people he's extending himself to. He said it's where the mission of the church needs to be, so how appropriate. He invited them for mass. He gave a little homily. And he invited them to stay for breakfast. So it's just the man we've seen all along, doing what he does best.</s>MALVEAUX: So many people really like this pope. You have this move that he made that really surprised some people. This took a bit of guts here, because he removed a conservative cardinal. That is very rare actually for something like that to happen, and he picked else to replace him who's a little bit more moderate. What was that move about? What was it designed to do? And I guess he has the authority to do just that?</s>BECK: Suzanne, let's understand, this Congregation for Bishops is really important because it helps to suggest who the pope should name to be bishops throughout the world. And this pope is very intent on the principle of "subsidiary," meaning that, if you can handle it on the local level, bishops, do it; don't kick everything up to the Vatican. So, he needs guys in the trenches, namely, his bishops, who are in accord with his own thinking, his own ideology. So Cardinal Burke last week in an interview with EWTN said, "You could get the impression from the pope that we're talking too much about abortion and same-sex marriage. Well, I don't think we could ever talk too much about that." So he says publicly in an interview that he's not really in alignment with the direction the pope seems to be, and then we get word this week that he's out and a more moderate, Cardinal Wuerl from Washington, is in. So was it coincidence? Who knows. We'll never know the full story, probably, but it seems pretty apparent that there's something at work here in the pope's mind.</s>HOLMES: But is he, Reverend -- is that a sign that you know, if you're not a team player, that you're off the team, or is he open to a bit of dissent in the ranks?</s>BECK: Well, Michael, not everybody that remains on that congregation is flaming liberal or even moderate. Remember, from Sydney, we have Cardinal Pell, and he's still on that congregation, very conservative. So, it's not like the pope said look if you're not totally in accord with me, you're out. But it's important, particularly for the American church, because Cardinal Wuerl now will be the only American cardinal that sits on that congregation. So, if they're going to be naming the future cardinals, at least in that -- I mean bishops in the United States, Cardinal Wuerl is going to have the voice there and not Cardinal Burke. And so I think that Pope Francis is simply saying what he was going to do. He said he would shake things up a bit. He wants to reorganize the structure and he wants to make it a bit more balanced. But he wants to do it about a vision where he wants the church to go, not where others say it has been.</s>HOLMES: It's an interesting church that -</s>MALVEAUX: He certainly is shaking things up. Every week, there is something new.</s>HOLMES: Reverend Beck, thanks so much as always. Now, if the presidential race were held today -- it's not. It's still two years out.</s>MALVEAUX: But we're still going to talk about it.</s>HOLMES: But we're going to talk about it anyway. Imagine if it was Chris Christie and Hillary Clinton running? Who'd win?</s>MALVEAUX: So, we don't have a crystal ball, but we got something here. We do have a poll from a state that knows how to pick a president. We're going to bring that for you after the break.