Solidarity HealthShare President and Co-Founder Chris Faddis joins The BS Show to talk about the election of Pope Leo XIV and what that could mean for Catholics around the world. Read the transcript or listen to the interview below.

Bob Sansevere (00:00):

We are joined by Christopher Faddis, co-founder and president of the nonprofit Healthcare Sharing Ministry Solidarity HealthShare, which is an ethical, affordable alternative to traditional health insurance and is faithful to the moral teachings of the Catholic Church. Chris, in that introduction I did for you, it talks about that your Solidarity HealthShare is faithful to the moral teachings of the Catholic Church. Will those teachings change now that we have not only a new pope, but a new Pope who’s from the United States and a White Sox fan?

Chris Faddis (00:30):

Yeah. Well, in the immortal words of President Trump, unfortunately he’s picked a loser on the baseball front. But no, I think it’s interesting. He chose the name Leo Pope Leo the 14th, to kind of harken back to Pope Leo the 13th, who was the Pope at the end of the 18 hundreds, basically. And one of the things that Pope Leo the 13th did that was really impactful and still has an impact today, is he wrote a very important document called Rerum Noverum, which is all about sort of the social teaching of the church. The thinking about it was coming, the industrial revolution was well underway. People were moving from small towns and farms to the cities. Workers were not being treated very well. All these child labor was an issue, all kinds of issues. And Pope Leo the 13th wrote a document on essentially all of these changes, all these beautiful things in the economy, and they’re all good, but how do we make sure that we take care of the dignity of the human person in light of them? And that document Rerum Noverum was all about the social teaching of the church, which actually even spoke to the word Solidarity, which is where we got our name from.

Bob Sansevere (01:43):

Oh, really?

Chris Faddis (01:44):

And some other parts of social teaching, which are a lot of people. Bob unfortunately misrepresents the Catholic social teaching as social justice or even almost socialism. That is not what it is at all, because it all respects personal autonomy, talks about personal human dignity, individual dignity, and the free choice of man and all of those things. So what I understand from what Pope Leo has already said since he was named Pope last Thursday, is that that’s why he chose the name. Because there’s such drastic changes happening in our society like AI and technology and all these things that he felt like it’s a new moment for the church to speak up and to be a voice for human dignity in the midst of so much change, which is, again, not a bad thing, but we need to speak truth into that and moral clarity into that.

(02:35):

So I think it’s going to be a great thing if everyone’s kind of on the fence, where does he stand on this or that, we don’t really know. But I think there’s some really good signs. And for us, of course, we believe our work is very important because we do think people have individual personal responsibility and autonomy over their healthcare, but also we have to maintain moral authority over healthcare. And so we think this is a really good moment. I think there’s a lot of great things coming from AI, but there’s a lot of questions about AI. Somebody needs to start speaking up and speaking truth into that. And so I’m excited to see what comes.

Bob Sansevere (03:09):

Well, it’s interesting that I did not know the history of Pope Leo. I mean, there’s been 13 of them before him. I don’t even- do you know? Is that the most by a Pope to be Pope Leo 14th?

Chris Faddis (03:22):

Pope? Pope Benedict was the 16th. Sorry. Yeah, there was more. Yeah, so there’s a lot. There is an interesting thing though. Pope Francis chose a non-traditional Pope name and there’s not as many, there weren’t any Pope Francises before him. There’s something to be said when a Pope chooses an existing name. Typically, they’re trying to sort of take from the predecessors. Every Pope Leo has been a great one. There’s been great things came from every Pope. In fact, there’s a Pope Leo that’s Pope Leo the Great that was, I’ve heard, very important to the church. Yeah. So it’s a good sign. I do think it’s very interesting that he’s an American. I think he’s probably the only American that could have gotten elected because while he’s American, he’s from Chicago, south side, all of that. (Yup)

(04:07):

He basically has lived most of his adult life overseas. I mean, he went to Peru to do missionary work, then became a priest. And he’s been back and forth, but most of his life has been spent in either Peru or now in the Vatican the last few years. So it’s interesting because he’s a product of America, but he is also sort of a product of the world. He’s been around. He’s got that. It’ll be an interesting thing. I do love that he speaks English. It’ll be really nice to have a pope to listen to that speaks English on a regular basis.

Bob Sansevere (04:40):

That’s good, boy. Alright, now here’s where I think he blew it though. His name is his given name, birth name Robert Francis Provost. I mean, as a fellow, Bob, why didn’t he go with Pope Bob the first?

Chris Faddis (04:56):

Right-

Bob Sansevere (04:57):

Right. Thought that would’ve been a great name.

Chris Faddis (04:59):

 That would’ve been good. Pope Bob, the first. I also heard that people are saying he’s a builder. He is going to build consensus, he’s going to build this, he’s going to rebuild this, whatever. And somebody said, so he’s going to be the first Pope Bob the builder, if you remember the cartoon. (Yes. Bob the builder.) Bob the builder. So there you go.

Bob Sansevere (05:16):

 He blew it. The Pope blew his first shot. But you know what? When you give me the history of Pope Leo, actually that’s kind of neat.

Chris Faddis (05:25):

Yeah, I think it could be good. Now, obviously people’s interpretation of Catholic social teaching is always what it is. So we’ll see. Hopefully, I think the early signs looking at things he’s written and said before are that he likely has a reason to view. I think he probably disagrees with a lot of Trump Republicans on the immigration. But overall, I think on social teaching, he seems to be fairly reasonable. And yeah, it’ll be interesting already everyone’s trying to point out that he’s on their side. So you know how that goes.

Bob Sansevere (05:55):

Yes, I do.

Chris Faddis (05:56):

 I don’t think he’s going to be what we want him to be as hopefully, I’m hoping as it should be. I’m hoping he’s going to be what we need him to be.

Bob Sansevere (06:02):

Yes. Now, speaking of being on the side, the Supreme Court of the United States sided with health and human services in a hospital payment case involving low income seniors that they should get higher Medicare reimbursements. I mean, if you are a senior listening or, I mean, everyone is related to a senior if they’re not one themselves. So this is good news for especially low income seniors.

Chris Faddis (06:31):

It should be the hospitals and HHS and Centers for Medicare services are really responsible for all of that payment of Medicare to hospitals. And essentially they’re questioning that the hospitals were challenging the formula that HHS used and making those payments. And again, this is something that effects all of us. It certainly affects seniors. We want to make sure our seniors are taken care of, but

(06:59):

Our tax dollars are largely funding Medicare these days. And our payroll taxes for Medicare are funding that. So it’s really important to us that we keep these things under control. And I think the fact that HHS, it looks like was applying the payments correctly, it is following the law. This is actually a very good thing, and I’m glad that SCOTUS weighed in. There’s a lot of issues obviously around overbilling and overpayment. And that’s going to bring up, there’s some other cases that are going to come up very soon where some of these systems, healthcare systems, were taking advantage of the Medicare system. So we’ll see. I don’t know that those will make it to Supreme Court, but we’ll see what happens in those cases. But I think keeping these guys honest is very important.

Bob Sansevere (07:43):

Obviously. Yes. And now you know what HHS also released the comprehensive review of the evidence and best practices for promoting the health of children and adolescents with gender dysphoria. And the review revealed serious concerns about medical interventions that attempt to transition children away from this sex, such as puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries. Here’s the question I have for you though. There are people on the other side who will say, well, this is just Trump pushing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Is there an objective view of this? Or, I mean, some people will take this very seriously and some will say, ah, it’s just Trump trying to push an agenda. That’s the danger, right?

Chris Faddis (08:23):

Right. They’re going to accuse, accuse it of this move of being political. But the reality is, I mean, you and I have spoke about this topic before, and the reality is that it’s actually the opposite. The Biden administration was choosing politics over science this entire last four years. So much of this, none of this is new studies, right? They basically did an actual review of the studies, which was being avoided by the Biden administration. We basically had people writing PR releases and calling them a study and not releasing the real data. So when you look at the real data, it does show that there’s a drastic negative effect from these procedures and these hormone treatments. There’s a great study that came out of the UK last year that really blew the lid open. In fact, the United Kingdom shut down their gender clinics after the study because when they actually looked at the numbers, they were causing more harm than good.

(09:19):

And that’s the truth. And so I don’t think it’s political. Certainly, obviously, there’s a lot of people in the Trump world that maybe see it that way or want these things to happen. I actually think they’re looking at the science. And one thing that RFK Jr. promised is that they will actually follow these things to their ends and make decisions with this study. This piece, I’m not exactly sure who it was, but I remember when this first came out a week or two ago, it’s bonafide people who are reviewing the data and giving their input. And so they’ve decided, made this call. I don’t think it’s political, but yeah, you’re right. Everyone’s going to think that. Everyone’s going to call it that way. But the evidence I don’t think is there. I think the evidence was there, unfortunately, under the Biden administration, which it should never be that way. No matter what administration, we should HHS and FDA and all these groups should really be looking at the science and the latest data, not relying on something they like from 20 years ago, but continuing to follow the science. Remember, science isn’t a one-time thing, which is what we kept being told during Covid, Bob, right? Trust the science. No, you’re actually supposed to question the science. Science is supposed to keep questioning itself. That’s what a hypothesis is. And they’re supposed to continue studying and looking for answers. And I think that’s the most important thing here.

Bob Sansevere (10:39):

Yep. And don’t question this Solidarity. HealthShare. Great alternative to traditional healthcare. Like that? (I like it. Transition) Solidarityhealthshare.org for more information. Take a quick break. The BS Show’ll be right back.