Fr. Malone: The Pope is going to challenge the American people

(Vatican Radio) Jesuit Father Matt Malone is the President and Editor in Chief of America Media, publisher of America magazine.

Christopher Altieri sat down with him in New York to speak about his take, his expectations and his hopes regarding Pope Francis' visit which Father Malone says "has generated an unprecedented amount of media attention". 

Listen to the interview: 

Fr. Malone says “no other Papal visit has generated this kind of attention on every conceivable media platform – print, digital, television and so forth”.

He says that Pope Francis is incredibly popular both amongst American Catholics and generally amongst Americans.

He points out that Francis’s open and direct style aligns very well with the culture of the United States which is plain-spoken, simple and less formal.

Fr. Malone explains that the American culture is deeply embedded in its political identity: “what that means is that we tend to understand things through a secular-political prism, and that becomes a problem when we are talking about the Church”.