In the Church of Francis there are heads to be chopped off, preferably successful Catholic bishops whose dioceses are doing well, who attract vocations and who have strong support in the diocese.
According to PaixLiturgique.fr (10 December), the figure who is doing the dirty work for Francis is Archbishop Antoine Hérouard, 68, of Dijon.
He is hardly present in his own diocese, which is deeply divided. His priests complain of his repeated and long absences. But it is not his head that Francis wants to cut off.
Monsignor Hérouard made a "fraternal visit" (warning: irony) to the diocese of Bayonne under the excellent Bishop Marc Aillet, 67.
The standard argument for the removal of Catholic bishops is that their dioceses are "divided", whereas in the deeply divided dioceses of anti-Catholic prelates there is never such thing as "division".
The anti-Catholic La-Croix.com writes that the "mass opposition" to Monsignor Aillet consists of "more than 400 faithful" who call themselves the "Catholiques 64 collective", a name reminiscent of the old Communist nomenclature.
The diocese of Bayonne has around 600,000 Catholics, with 200 priests, 450 religious, 10 permanent deacons, 130 employees and 10,000 volunteers, and 70 parishes. The number of parishes is the result of the unification of the original 523 parishes in 2001.
With the arrival of Mgr Hérouard, it was possible for everyone to air their grievances or slanders against the Bishop of Bayonne. It is a truism that the Vatican only listens when heretics and anti-Catholics complain.
So far, Mgr Hérouard has twice spent a week in the diocese, at the beginning of June and again at the beginning of July, with seven interviews a day, each lasting about an hour, which means that he received about 80 out of 600,000 Catholics.
He presented his report with recommendations at the end of July, saying that the stage of an apostolic visit had not yet been reached.
Mgr Aillet said on 2 October on Radio Présence that he had been received by Mgr Hérouard "for two and a half hours".
"It would take something very serious to activate an apostolic visit. But I don't have the impression that these are very serious matters, even if we have to listen to the little things that are said," he explained.
In any case, Francis is not doing all this to keep Mgr Aillet in place.
Picture: Marc Aillet © wikicommons CC BY-SA, #newsZzrtqcchpm