The retired Swiss Bishop Marian Eleganti worries: “The popes have become all too human in the exercise of their office. It is their personality, not their office, that now takes centre stage.”

Pope John Paul II had the charisma of a rock star. That was wonderful, except when it wasn’t. Bishop Eleganti notes that the Vatican treated the Pope’s poetry like magisterial teaching.

Pope Benedict XVI didn’t have that same stage presence, but his intellect made him seem authoritative, even when he didn’t intend to invoke papal authority. He took the unusual step of saying explicitly that his Jesus of Nazareth trilogy was not magisterial teaching.

Pope Francis wrote autobiographies— except that he didn’t write them himself, Bishop Eleganti notes. So where do they fit, in terms of teaching authority. What about his much-publicized friendly meetings with an atheist publisher and an Italian abortionist?

Papal interviews, once exceedingly rare, are now common, and include regular off-the-cuff sessions with reporters on papal flights. International travel is practically treated as a job requirement. Pope Benedict reportedly began considering resignation when he realized that his physical health would prevent him from attending the next World Youth Day celebration. Why was the presence of the Bishop of Rome considered necessary for the festival in Rio?

“For the Lord to shine through, however, other matters — the irrelevant, the overly personal — must take a back seat,” Bishop Eleganti writes. But non-stop media coverage makes that nearly impossible.