2 weeks Ago
Faithful attend a Rosary in homage to Pope Francis in Saint Peter’s Square on Monday in Vatican City. I awoke on Easter Monday to very sad news. Like all Catholic priests, I had gone through the marathon of Holy Week, with all of the various liturgies, which are spiritually and emotionally moving, but also physically exhausting.
Easter Sunday night, after the parish masses, I relaxed, watching the classic Cecil B. DeMille film "Ben Hur," then settled in for a good night's sleep. After waking Monday morning, I dressed and prayed, fed my cats and made my morning coffee, then turned on the television, only to be met with the news that Pope Francis had died.
The Rev. Patrick O’Neal I was stunned, yet I could see it coming. I had watched the recorded Easter Sunday Mass from the Vatican, and the Urbi et Orbi blessing following the Vatican Mass on Sunday, once I had celebrated Easter Masses at my two parishes.
I was struck by how tired Pope Francis looked when he came out to be driven through the crowd in St. Peter's Square, and when he gave the Pontifical Blessing from the loggia of the basilica. In seeing him, I thought of how St.
John Paul II looked in the last days of his pontificate. Both he and Francis looked so very, very tired. Both men were beset by multiple health issues as well as old age, yet continued to serve to the best of their abilities.
The weight of the papacy is deadly, indeed. The late Pope Benedict XVI, in his old age and frailty, decided to lay down that burden and resigned, living the remainder of his life in praying for his successor, Pope Francis, and for the worldwide church. Pope Francis arrives in his Pope mobile to officiate mass at the Plaza de la Revolucion in Havana, Cuba in 2015.
Many news commentators have, and will comment on Pope Francis' legacy. Some will use the political terms of "liberal" or "conservative" to try and define him. Those terms are ill-suited for use in any religion, but especially in terms of a papacy.
More traditional elements in the church and the world have seen Pope Francis as too "progressive," and more progressive elements will complain that he was too "traditional." What either side fails to see is that Francis, and any pope for that matter, cannot change the doctrine of the faith. That being said, what Pope Francis did for the church was to remind us all that yes, doctrines are important, but people are of paramount importance.
Without watering down any doctrine, Francis did not shrink from letting everyone know that whatever their state in life, whatever their faults and failures, they were beloved children of God. He was not afraid to speak "off the cuff," from the heart, as it were. Sometimes that was confusing for some.
Pope Francis blesses faithful as he delivers the ‘Urbi et Orbi’ blessing for Rome and the world from the balcony of St. Peter’s basilica after the 2013 Easter Mass at the Vatican. Perhaps that's why some people were so opposed to him and his methods.
For centuries, the world was used to hearing strictly defined and elegantly worded decrees from the popes. Those are important to the Catholic faith, and necessary. But, we must remember that first and foremost, Pope Francis was a pastor.
From his days as a Jesuit scholastic, and later as a priest, he gave himself to working with ordinary people, especially the poor. He continued that as the Cardinal Archbishop of Buenos Aires. He lived simply, used public transport and even filled in for his parish priests when they needed to take a holiday.
As a Jesuit, a member of the Society of Jesus founded by St. Ignatius of Loyola, he had taken the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. He continued to live these as an archbishop and a cardinal (once called the "princes of the church").
There was nothing princely about him, even during his papacy. I remember watching him come onto the loggia of St. Peter's Basilica after his election 12 years ago.
Rather than wearing the lace rochet (a type of shortened alb, which is a liturgical garment) and the red mozzetta (a liturgical garment signifying jurisdiction), he appeared wearing only the white papal cassock. Unlike previous newly elected popes who came out with a beaming smile, Francis looked a bit shy, if not stunned. Nuns stand in St.
Peter’s Square to watch the first Mass by Pope Francis on a giant screen in 2013 at the Vatican. Then he did something I had never witnessed before — he asked the crowd in St. Peter's Square, and those watching around the world, to pray for him, and bowed his head in silence.
That profoundly moved me, seeing that humility. From day one of his papacy, he changed how things were done at the Vatican. He paid his hotel bill at the Casa Santa Marta in person; he chose to remain living there, rather than in the spacious, but rather cold, institutional Apostolic Palace.
He chose to continue wearing his black orthotic shoes rather than the oxblood papal slippers. He made it clear to the world that the pomp and splendor of the papacy was not dear to his heart. Hopefully, those things helped us all to ask ourselves if we could live more simply and humbly.
He inherited many problems that previous papacies had faced, and tried his best to answer them: the issues of scandals in the church, the rise of extremist religious violence, the reform of the Roman Curia (the various Vatican organizations), inter-religious dialogue, continuing conflicts in the world, climate change, among other issues. Did he do so perfectly? No. No one man could; but he did his best.
He chose to reach out to the "peripheries" as he called them — to countries where Catholics were a minority, to the poor, the homeless, the imprisoned, the sick, the migrants, the overlooked and despised. He reminded the Church that governance and pastoral care should be done first by listening, and that has upset many. If nothing else, in his own person, he reminded us all that we are imperfect persons who are loved by God, and called to live holiness by loving one another.
He did not ignore human sin, but proclaimed that God's mercy and grace is far greater and those can change us. Mourners gather Monday at St. Patrick’s Church in New York to pay respects to Pope Francis.
() History will evaluate his papacy with more clarity than you or I could do, since it has the advantage of time and impersonal distance. Yet, I think, we can all say that Pope Francis was a true pastor, a true bridge-builder, which is what the title Pontiff means. It seems clear to me, at least, that he did his best to mold his heart after the heart of Christ and shared that mercy and compassion to those who needed it most.
He comforted the afflicted, and afflicted the comfortable, and that is what Christianity should do. His 12 years as Vicar of Christ and successor of St. Peter will has lasting effects for many years to come.
May God reward this humble shepherd and grant him eternal life, happiness and peace. Rest in peace, Your Holiness..
