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In a time of predominance of the culture of the image, Pope Francis has given back power to the spoken word. Never has a pope spoken like Francis: human and candid. How refreshing to hear a pope speak like us: informal, direct, simple and provocative. The Pope’s words nail us down and do not allow us to be indifferent.
Pope Francis’ style of communication promotes what he calls “the culture of encounter.” This original and striking approach to people by means of stunning words and gestures constitutes a pastoral turning point for the whole Church. Somebody has written: “Pope Benedict was classic music, Pope Francis is folk. Both are beautiful, but they are very different types of music.” If “style is substance,” then Pope Francis is disclosing to us how he wants the shape of the Church to become.
Christmas Season in the Philippines is in full swing with the joy of Mama Mary
holding the Baby Jesus in her arms at Bethlehem. It is the joy of Francis of Assisi,
the saint of the “Belen.” Pope Francis has made this joy the motif of his proclamation, a joy that he discovered as passion for Jesus in his family and in his youth, even through suffering and trials; as commitment to the poor and appreciation of community in his maturity and as fruit of contemplation in his ministry of unity as a pope.
Our priests and cathechists will have to find ways to change this perception that extravagance and prolonged wakes and funerals are “Catholic.” There’s room certainly for a more festive observance of wakes and funerals and November 1, but we need more solemnity, a time to reflect about our existence on earth, of the goodness of the deceased, and how we might want to carry on their legacy.
The document of Vatican II on the Laity, Apostolicam Actuositatem 7, says: “God’s plan for the world is that men should work together to renew and constantly perfect the temporal order” which includes “the good things of life, prosperity of the family, culture, economic matters, the arts and professions, the laws of the political community,” international relations and development and progress. In this endeavor, the Church’s concern does not limit itself to those of the members alone. On the contrary, Christian believers must join hands together with those of other persuasions and work “for the rightful betterment of this world in which they all alike live” (The Church in the Modern World, (GS 21). They must remain attentive to the diverse views of their times and learn to draw profit even from opposition (GS 44).
Brazil, despite so many changes in social, political, economic and religious sphere, is still a Catholic country largely with young members. The recent census of 2010 reports that, of the 200 million population, 123 million (64.6%) declare themselves Catholic. There is an outstanding growth among the Pentecostal groups (22.2%) over the past decade. The youth (15 to 24 years old) form 20% of the Brazilian population. The World Youth Day that was held in Rio de Janeiro, in July 2013, called the world´s attention to the current situation of the Brazilian youth and to the challenges they face.
The youth issue will surely be one of the major and enduring challenges for the modern Catholic faith. No doubt, modern technology will play a major role in the agenda but, above it all, the humility, sensitivity and creativity of the youth ministers will also prove vital. A carefully planned online strategy will be greatly instrumental but, in some cases, the little things such as a surprise birthday party for a friend or a casual personal invitation to a prayer meeting could spell the difference.
In jails we found many young minors behind bars without proper recreation, education, exercise, food, sanitation and legal assistance. This is the secret shame of the Philippines, hidden away from the media and the public; hundreds, if not thousands, of children suffer humiliation and deprivation of sub-human jail conditions every year.
They are so many, the hints and stimuli to reflection and conversion that come to us from Pope Francis, that it is almost impossible to keep up with the pace. Sometimes they are just gestures, more eloquent than an entire document. Sometimes they are half sentences thrown there as if en passant in the middle of a speech: but, as soon as you hear them, you understand that you cannot overlook them. Pope Francis often relies on homespun language to make his points. Once, for instance, he compared overly grim Christians to “pickled peppers.” On another occasion, he said that gossip in the Church is like eating honey: it tastes sweet at first, but too much gives you a “stomachache.” Indeed, he even told a worldwide assembly of women Religious: “A theoretical poverty is no use to us.” Pope Francis became visibly moved, speaking to a packed audience in St. Peter’s Square, saying that wasting food is like “stealing from the poor.” And to convince his priests to go to the people, he has repeatedly said that a “shepherd must carry on himself the smell of the sheep.” The following are some of the pearls of this extraordinary teacher. Inhabiting the frontiers – “We are created children in the likeness of God and the Blood of Christ has redeemed us all! And we all have a duty to do good. And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace. If we, each doing our own part, do good to others, if we meet there, doing good, and we do it slowly, gently, little by little, we will make that culture of encounter: we need that so much. We must meet one another doing good. ‘But I don’t believe, Father. I am an atheist!’ But do good: we will meet one another there” (homily of May 22). – “Poverty in the world is a scandal. In a world where there is so much wealth, so many resources to feed everyone, it is unfathomable that there are so many hungry children, that there are so many children without an education, so many poor persons. Poverty today is a cry. You can’t speak of poverty in the abstract: that doesn’t exist. Poverty is the flesh of the poor Jesus, in that child who is hungry, in the one who is sick, in those unjust social structures. Go forward; look there upon the flesh of Jesus. But don’t let wellbeing rob you of hope, that spirit of wellbeing that, in the end, leads you to becoming a nothing in life. Young people should bet on their high ideals, that’s my advice. But where do I find hope? In the flesh of Jesus who suffers and in true poverty. There is a connection between the two (To the pupils of Jesuit Schools, June 7). – “Your proper place is the frontiers. This is the place of the Jesuits. Wherever in the Church, even in the
Unlike his predecessors John Paul II, who labored to be the global shepherd and Benedict XVI, the theologian and the guardian of the Magisterium, Pope Francis, the mystic, wants to inject anew a Christ-like dynamism into the ministry. It is apparent to the Pope that the crisis of the Church today stems from its failure to use its imagination to be culturally visible, proactive and participative in the performance of the most fundamental, most powerful and the greatest commandment, that of Love. The Pope said: “The Church has appeared prisoner of her rigid languages. Perhaps the world seems to have made the Church like a shipwreck of the past, insufficient to face the questions of the present: maybe the Church had answers for humanity in its infancy but not for its adult age.” To this disillusioned humanity, the Pope wants us to respond bridging the many gaps that separate us, going to meet the poor who are everywhere on the increase lest they lose patience and do not wait for the announcement of the Gospel. Some thought Pope Francis had taken the world by storm in the interview by his Jesuit confrere Antonio Spadaro, editor of Civiltà Cattolica, when he said: “We cannot insist only on issues related to abortion, gay marriage, and the use of contraceptive methods.” Yet, it was not a new statement. In the plane, on his way back from Rio de Janeiro, the journalist Patricia Zordan had asked the Pope: “In Brazil, a law has been approved which extends the right of abortion and has allowed matrimony between people of the same gender. Why didn’t you speak about this?” The Pope answered: “It was necessary to speak about positive things that open the way to youngsters… The Church has already expressed herself perfectly about what you said. Moreover, young people know very well what the position of the Church is.” The journalist insisted: “What is the position of Your Holiness, can you tell us?” “That of the Church. I’m a child of the Church” said Pope Francis. The surprise of the media is sign of a certain amnesia of what Benedict XVI himself had said, speaking to the bishops of Switzerland on November 9, 2006: “I remember when I used to go to Germany in the 80’s and in the 90’s, that I was asked to give interviews and I always knew the questions in advance. They concerned the ordination of women, contraception, abortion and other such constantly recurring problems. If we let ourselves be stuck in those questions, we give the impression that we are moralists with a few somehow antiquated convictions, and not even a hint of the true greatness appears. I, therefore, consider it essential always to highlight the greatness of our faith which is a commitment from which we must not allow such situations to divert us.” Pope Francis explained that his re-evangelization praxis is not a game-changing scheme, but more of an attitude shift. To discard doctrines will be self-defeating. Pope
