When one runs at the mouth, necessary distinctions may be missed. Mea culpa.

In being interviewed for “Mainers are feeling the ‘Francis Effect,’” (April 20), I should have made clear that I see Pope Francis laying a foundation for a church more concerned with living the Gospel in service of justice and the needy than overriding well-formed consciences regarding sex.

Still to be seen is whether Francis can end the alien monarchical governance system that came with Constantine and establish clerical accountability: Popes cannot dictate unsound sexist theology.

Bishops cannot continue ignoring abuses of the environment, workers, the helpless, and the victims of wholesale racism and wars while energetically bullying their flocks to deny civil rights to gays and lesbians.

Priests cannot tell a parishioner to “get out of my church” for questioning Knights of Columbus drawing swords at the Consecration, or deny a parishioner service in a ministry without cause.

Realizing the church of Vatican II requires that laity, too, see Christ in everyone and act accordingly.

My sign quotes Francis: “We must do everything to resist clericalism,” I picket outside the Cathedral and Sacred Heart/St. Dominic Church before Sunday Masses, not inside.

I see Catholicism in the South disadvantaged by its relative isolation but advantaged by an historical minority status which has occasioned a culture of cohesiveness and community — and children and young folks in the pews.

William Slavick, Portland