Soler, Wade and Ramos homer as the Giants beat the Braves 5-3

ATLANTA (AP) — Jorge Soler and LaMonte Wade Jr. hit back-to-back homers to help the San Francisco Giants beat the Atlanta Braves 5-3 on Tuesday night.

Heliot Ramos also went deep as San Francisco won for the sixth time in eight games. Mike Yastrzemski went 2 for 2 in his return from a strained left oblique.

Hayden Birdsong (1-0) pitched five innings of two-run ball in his first big league win. The right-hander struck out five and walked two in his second major league start.

“It is very special. Now I am in the books,” Birdsong said. “Can’t really thank this team enough for getting behind me and playing as hard as they can.”

Birdsong, an Illinois native who played his college ball at Eastern Illinois, had a crowd of supporters on hand for the performance.

“I can’t describe it,” he said. “It’s great. I had more people here than I had in San Fran last week. A lot more of my friends, buddies, and other family members. I can’t really describe it.”

Camilo Doval earned his 15th save with a perfect ninth inning.

Austin Riley and Sean Murphy hit back-to-back homers off Birdsong in the second. Ozzie Albies added an RBI single for the Braves in the eighth.

San Francisco trailed 2-0 before Soler and Wade connected in the fifth against Reynaldo López. It was Soler’s 10th homer of the season and No. 3 for Wade.

“(Soler) loves hitting leadoff. He’s done a good job,” Giants manager Bob Melvin said. “He had pretty good matchup numbers against (López). You’re seeing a little less chase and a guy that takes some pitches and takes some walks and in the meantime hits some home runs.”

The Braves put runners at second and third with one out in the fifth, but Birdsong struck out Jarred Kelenic and retired Albies on a flyball to left.

“You have to find a different gear to get out of a jam like that,” Melvin said.

The Giants pushed across another run in the sixth. Michael Conforto hit a leadoff double against Dylan Lee (2-2) and advanced on Brett Wisely’s sacrifice. Riley then misplayed Luis Matos’ pinch-hit grounder to third for an error, allowing Conforto to score.

Nick Ahmed drove in Wisely with a sacrifice fly in the eighth, but Albies responded with an RBI single.

Ramos got the Giants an insurance run when he hit a drive to right against Jesse Chavez in the ninth for his 11th homer.

López, who leads the majors with a 1.83 ERA, permitted four hits in 4 1/3 innings. He struck out six and walked four.

Riley and Murphy went deep with one out in the second. Adam Duvall nearly added a third consecutive homer, but he had to settle for a double when his drive hit high off the wall in center.

Birdsong managed to get out of the inning from there with a couple of flyouts.

Kelenic saved a pair of runs in the third inning with a stellar running grab of a deep line drive by Matt Chapman with two outs.

UP NEXT

Braves LHP Chris Sale (10-3, 2.79 ERA) will start Game 2 of the three-game series against Giants RHP Jordan Hicks (4-4, 3.36 ERA) on Wednesday.

AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

Atlanta Braves pitcher Reynaldo López (40) delivers in the first inning of a baseball game against the San Francisco Giants, Tuesday, July 2, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

San Francisco Giants pitcher Hayden Birdsong (60) delivers in the first inning of a baseball game against the Atlanta Braves, Tuesday, July 2, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

Atlanta Braves' Sean Murphy (12) hits a solo home run in the second inning of a baseball game against the San Francisco Giants, Tuesday, July 2, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

Atlanta Braves' Austin Riley (27) hits a solo home run in the second inning of a baseball game against the San Francisco Giants, Tuesday, July 2, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

San Francisco Giants' Jorge Soler (2) runs the bases after he hits a solo home run in the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Atlanta Braves, Tuesday, July 2, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

San Francisco Giants' Jorge Soler (2) hits a solo home run in the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Atlanta Braves, Tuesday, July 2, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

San Francisco Giants' LaMonte Wade Jr. (31) hits a solo home run in the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Atlanta Braves, Tuesday, July 2, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

ROME (AP) — The Vatican has excommunicated its former ambassador to the U.S., Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, after finding him guilty of schism, an inevitable end for the firebrand conservative who became one of Pope Francis ' most ardent critics and a symbol of the polarized Catholic Church in the U.S. and beyond.

The Vatican's doctrine office imposed the penalty after a meeting of its members on Thursday and informed Vigano of its decision Friday, a press statement said.

It cited Vigano's “refusal to recognize and submit to the Supreme Pontiff, his rejection of communion with the members of the church subject to him, and of the legitimacy and magisterial authority of the Second Vatican Council.”

The Vatican excommunication means that Vigano is formally outside the church, and cannot celebrate or receive its sacraments, for having committed one of the gravest crimes in canon law: schism. A schism occurs when someone withdraws submission to the pope or from the communion of Catholics who are subject to him.

It is considered particularly dangerous to the faith because it threatens the unity of the church, which is built on obedience to the pope. And Vigano had created a following of like-minded conservatives and traditionalists over the years as he delved deeper and deeper into conspiracy theories about everything from the coronavirus pandemic, to what he called the “Great Reset” and other fringe ideas.

His dire pronunciations about the current state of the Catholic Church, amplified on Catholic social media sites and by ideologically friendly bloggers on both sides of the Atlantic, were an exaggerated version of the chasm between U.S. ultra-conservatives and Francis. While the Italian prelate enjoyed mainstream support among conservative bishops early in his public career, many distanced themselves as his ideas became more and more extreme.

Vigano, who hasn't been seen publicly since before 2018, knew the schism declaration was coming after the Vatican informed him that it was launching a penal process against him last month. He defiantly called it “an honor” and refused to appear in person or in writing to defend himself.

Vigano issued a lengthy public statement last month justifying his conduct and refusing to recognize the authority of the Vatican's doctrinal office “that claims to judge me, nor of its prefect, nor of the one who appointed him.”

But he didn’t directly respond to the schism declaration Friday on X, his usual forum. About an hour before the Vatican decree was made public, he announced he would be celebrating a Mass on Friday for those who have been supporting him and asked for donations.

Vigano first burst into the public's awareness in 2012, during the first Vatileaks scandal, when Pope Benedict XVI’s butler leaked the pontiff’s private papers to an Italian journalist to try to draw attention to corruption in the Holy See.

In some of the leaked letters Vigano, then the No. 2 in the Vatican City State administration, begged the pope not to be transferred after exposing corruption in the awarding of Vatican contracts that cost the Holy See millions of euros (dollars).

The entreaties didn’t work: By the time the letters were published, Benedict had transferred Vigano to be the Vatican’s ambassador to the United States, certainly a prestigious post but one that took him far from Rome and out of the running to one day be a cardinal.

Vigano reappeared on the scene during Francis’ 2015 visit to the United States, which as nuncio Vigano helped organize. Everything was going fine until Vigano arranged for Kim Davis, a Kentucky clerk at the center of the U.S. gay marriage debate, to be among a small group of people at the Vatican residence to greet Francis.

Davis had risen to prominence for refusing to issue all marriage licenses rather than be compelled to issue licenses to same-sex couples. She became a hero to the conservative right in the U.S., with whom Vigano had increasingly identified during U.S. culture wars over gay marriage and religious liberty issues.

After the visit ended, Davis and her lawyers claimed the encounter with Francis amounted to an affirmation of her cause. The Vatican later turned that claim on its head when it released footage of what it said was the “only” private audience Francis had in Washington: with a small group of people that included a gay couple.

Vigano’s deception in inviting Davis to meet the pope, who had wanted to steer clear of the U.S. culture wars during his visit, appeared to put the two on what would become a collision course that exploded in August 2018.

At the time, the U.S. church was reeling from a new chapter in its clergy sex abuse scandal: One of the most senior U.S. churchmen, Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, had been accused of molesting a minor and a Pennsylvania grand jury had issued a devastating investigation into decades of abuse and cover-up.

As Francis was wrapping up a tense visit to Ireland, Vigano published an 11-page screed accusing him and decades of U.S. and Vatican officials of covering for McCarrick. Specifically, Vigano accused Francis of rehabilitating McCarrick from sanctions imposed by Benedict, and called on him to resign.

The accusations were explosive and helped create the greatest crisis of Francis’ then-young pontificate.

Francis quickly authorized an in-house investigation to determine who knew what and when about McCarrick’s penchant for sleeping with his seminarians.

The report, released in 2020, confirmed that a generation of church officials, including Pope John Paul II, had turned a blind eye to McCarrick’s misconduct. It largely spared Francis who eventually defrocked the churchman.

But the report also faulted Vigano for not looking into new claims against McCarrick or enforcing Vatican restrictions on him when specifically ordered to do so by the Vatican.

At that point, Vigano’s claims against Francis began to become more unhinged. He endorsed conspiracy theories about the coronavirus vaccines, appeared at far-right political rallies in the U.S., backed Russia in its war and, eventually, refused to recognize Francis as pope.

FILE - Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, Apostolic Nuncio to the U.S., listens to remarks at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' annual fall meeting in Baltimore, Nov. 16, 2015. The Vatican has excommunicated its former ambassador to the U.S., Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, after finding him guilty of schism, an inevitable end for the firebrand conservative who became one of Pope Francis' most ardent critics. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File)