“I’d not put much credence in statements of the unenlightened, calling him a leftist”
The writer seemed to be more “enlightened” about the context of Zacchaeus in Luke 19 than did the Roman Catholic Pope. In fact, the Roman Catholic Pope seems to have felt free to totally mischaracterize Zaccgaues to make his point. If your use of scripture is not true to the context in scripture then your argument is not true to the scripture either - regardless of well intentioned (or not) arguments.
Luke19:8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”
9 Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”
Please enlighten us on exactly where the good Pope mischaracterized Zacchaeus.