Damian Thompson

Nazi-inspired conspiracy theories are gaining popularity among liberal Facebook users who think of themselves as 'spiritual but not religious'. That's the claim made by the Rev Ravi Holy, a Church of England vicar from Kent, in the new episode of the Spectator's Holy Smoke religion podcast. He's alarmed and depressed by the anti-Semitic conspiracy theories that his own middle-class friends are trying to force on him. And it also awakens uncomfortable memories. As a young man, Ravi was a punk, an anarchist, a drug user – and a passionate conspiracy theorist who (unaware of the Nazi roots of some of his ideas) believed that the world was controlled by the Illuminati.

Cristina Odone, former editor of the Catholic Herald, is encouraged to receive Holy Communion in one Kensington parish but not allowed to do so in another. And she says Pope Francis has made her situation worse, by hinting – but only hinting – that Catholics like her, married to a divorced partner, can make up their own minds about receiving the sacrament. Speaking on the verge of tears, she explains her dilemma in our second Holy Smoke religion podcast, which asks: is the Catholic Church changing its line on divorce? What emerges from our very frank discussion, in which we're joined by the moral theologian Fr Alexander Lucie-Smith, is the ghastly pastoral mess created by the Pope.

Pope Francis has just given implicit permission for many divorced-and-remarried Catholics to receive Holy Communion. But he's done so surreptitiously. Effectively, Francis has pulled a fast one on conservative cardinals who didn't want the rules changed. Very fast, in this case. On 5 September, he received a copy of draft guidelines, written by the bishops of Buenos Aires, on giving communion to people in 'irregular' marriages. They were extremely liberal – off the charts in Catholic terms. The Pope gave them a ringing endorsement on the same day. That's a big deal. But the whole business of communion for the divorced-and-remarried has become so complicated that this latest twist has gone largely unreported.

 'Oh please not more lies from the LibLabCon BLIAR propaganda machine!’ ‘If the author of this article had read the documents of the Council of Chalcedon in the original Greek, then he might not throw around the word “monophysite” with such casual abandon.’ ‘Only one way to stop the Caliphate capturing every village hall in this once green and pleasant land and no I don’t mean green as in Ms Caroline Lucas – Vote UKIP!’ I’ve just invented these comments, but if you’ve been anywhere near a newspaper website over the past decade they’ll sound familiar. These days, however, they’re a bit harder to find.

On Tuesday morning, an 85-year-old man was forced to his knees while his throat was slit by Islamic fanatics. The murder of Father Jacques Hamel in the church at Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray, near Rouen, has been recognised by western public opinion as an act of unspeakable barbarity. One could say that the facts speak for themselves. But for Catholics, this atrocity possesses a special horror. Father Hamel was killed while re-enacting the death of Jesus Christ on the cross. That is the essence of the Catholic Mass, which — unlike Protestant commemorations of the Last Supper — is presented to the faithful as the same sacrifice offered by Jesus.

Last week we reached the beginning of the end of the pontificate of Jorge Bergoglio — the ‘great reformer’ of the Catholic church who, it appears, has been unable to deliver the reforms that he himself favours. This despite being Pope. On Friday, he published a 200-page ‘exhortation’ entitled Amoris Laetitia, ‘The Joy of Love’ (or ‘The Joy of Sex’, as English-speaking Catholics of a certain vintage immediately christened it). This was Francis’s long-awaited response to two Vatican synods on the family, in 2014 and last year, which descended into Anglican-style bickering between liberals and conservatives. At the heart of the disputes lay the question of whether divorced-and-remarried Catholics could receive Holy Communion.

Here's the beginning of the Guardian's report on Amoris Laetitia (Joy of Love), Pope Francis's response to the Synod on the Family: Pope Francis has called for the Catholic church to revamp its response to modern family life, striking a delicate balance between a more accepting tone towards gay people and the defence of traditional church teachings on issues such as abortion. In a landmark papal document entitled Amoris Laetitia (Joy of Love), Francis outlined his vision for the church on family issues, urging priests to respond to their communities without mercilessly enforcing church rules: “Each country or region, moreover, can seek solutions better suited to its culture and sensitive to its traditions and local needs,” he wrote. Can you spot what's missing?