Czytaj książkę: «Pope Francis in his Own Words»

INTRODUCTION

‘I’ll just go with the guys on the bus.’

What the newly-elected Pope told his limo driver and security driver after his initial introduction to crowds in Rome

With the election of Argentina’s Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio as the new Pope of the Catholic Church in March 2013, attention has turned worldwide not only towards what he will do as Pope but how he has lived – and preached – in the past. So far, it’s very clear that compared to other Popes, he has led a humble and unconventional life. For instance, as a cardinal, instead of asking to be addressed as ‘Your Eminence’, he preferred to simply be called ‘Father Jorge’.

Some of the first photos to be published after he was introduced to happy throngs of worshippers in St Peter’s Square reveal that humility and the desire to serve the poor is deep in his blood. One in particular showed him kneeling to wash the feet of a woman, while other news reports had him performing the same service for AIDS patients. It’s hard to imagine his predecessor at the Vatican doing likewise.

It’s clear that his humility and desire to meet with the people on their level – whether they’re Catholics or not – has already won him huge numbers of fans. He cracks jokes, doesn’t hesitate to challenge his country’s leaders on their inequities, and pushes away chauffeurs and luxury transport in order to press the flesh with commoners. And numerous news stories have shown that he offers great compassion towards those who have long been ostracized by churches of all stripes.

At the same time, he shows that he’s a real person, with human desires that he wholeheartedly indulges (well, at least a few…). After all, when’s the last time you heard of a Pope who admits to loving tango and who’s pledged his undying loyalty to one Buenos Aires football club since childhood?

He also walks the walk, which instantly won him respect and admiration around the world. During his tenure as a cardinal in Buenos Aires, Bergoglio refused to live in the luxury accommodation in the palace that previous cardinals called home. Instead, he rented a Spartan one-bedroom apartment where he cooked his own simple dinners and took the bus to work, and persuaded the diocese to allow a group of poor missionaries to live in the official residence.

When the Conclave met in mid-March 2013 to elect a new Pope, the Catholic Church essentially crossed three first-evers off the list when they chose Jorge Mario Bergoglio to be pontiff.

First of all, he is the first Jesuit ever elected to the office. Jesuits have a reputation as one of the more rebellious Catholic orders – often standing in direct conflict with traditional Church doctrine – while also being known for their intellectual rigour.

Second, he is the first Pope to come from the Americas, and indeed, the first to come from Latin America, a region that holds the largest percentage of the worldwide Catholic population, at almost 40 per cent.

Lastly, he is also the first pontiff to select the name of Francis, in homage to St Francis of Assisi, an Italian who devoted his life to the poor and formed the religious order of the Franciscans.

To Catholics, accustomed to stern and authoritative Popes like Benedict XVI, the Conclave’s election of Jorge Mario Bergoglio is heart-warming and joyous, harkening back to the more personable days of John Paul II. And since the Pope is essentially a world leader, on the same footing with presidents and premiers, there’s no doubt that other world leaders are already lining up for an audience with him.

In just a short time, Pope Francis has made an indelible impact on Catholics, making them feel optimistic about their faith, and in turn, their lives.

The best way for Catholics and others who are curious about the new Pope to learn more about him is through his own writings – he has written a number of books and countless letters and sermons – and past interviews. Pope Francis in his Own Words will allow readers to do just that, with his views and thoughts condensed down into neatly concise bite-sized bits so everyone – Catholic or not – can immediately learn more about ‘Father Jorge’.

POPE FRANCISIN HIS OWN WORDS

ON AGE AND AGEING

Old age, they say, is the seat of wisdom. The old ones have the wisdom that they have earned from walking through life, like old Simeon and Anna at the temple whose wisdom allowed them to recognize Jesus. Let us give with wisdom to the youth: like good wine that improves with age, let us give the youth the wisdom of our lives.

Address to cardinals, The Vatican Today, 15 March 2013

The old person is the transmitter of history, he who brings us memories, the memory of our people, of our country, of our family, culture, and religion … he has lived a long time, and even if he’s done so as a fool, he deserves serious consideration.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

The bitterness of the old person is worse than any other because it is without return.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

ON HIS APPOINTMENT AS POPE

I don’t want to keep the people waiting. (Before appearing on the balcony to greet people in St Peter’s Square.)

13 March 2013

Brothers and sisters, good evening. (His first words to the crowd after his introduction as Pope.)

13 March 2013

ON ARGENTINA

Is it true that Argentinians don’t want to dialogue? I wouldn’t put it that way. Rather, I think we’ve become victims of attitudes that don’t permit us to dialogue: arrogance, the inability to listen, an exasperation with language … and so many others.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

Our painful political history has all too often courted silence. The use of euphemisms has often anaesthetized us.

Homily, Easter 2008

Argentina has arrived at a moment of critical decision-making … the decision to continue as a country, to learn from its painful experiences of the past and initiate a new path, or to drown in misery, chaos, the loss of values, and decomposition as a society.

Annual Message to Educational Communities, Easter 2002

I dare to say it still: we Argentinians have a long history of mutual intolerance.

Homily, Easter 2005

We live in the most unequal part of the world, which has grown the most yet reduced misery the least. The unjust distribution of goods persists, creating a situation of social sin that cries out to heaven and limits the possibilities of a fuller life for so many of our brothers.

Address, CELAM conference, 21 May 2007

ON ARGENTINA’S DIRTY WAR

In the Church, there were Christians from both camps: Christians who died as guerrillas, Christians who helped save people, and Christian oppressors who believed they were saving the homeland.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

We believe that the steps taken by the justice system in clarifying these events must serve to renew the efforts of all citizens toward reconciliation, and are a call to distance ourselves not only from impunity but from hatred and rancour as well. [Any Catholic who participated did so] on his own responsibility, erring and sinning gravely against God, against mankind, and against his own conscience.

Interpress Service, 11 October 2007

The horrors committed under the military governments were revealed only drip by drip, but for me they are still one of the worst blights on this country.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

ON ART AND ARTISTS

Artists know well that beauty isn’t solely consoling, but that it can also be disturbing. The grand masters have known how to present with beauty those realities of the human condition that are most tragic and painful.

Dissertation of the Archbishop in ADEPA, 6 April 2006

Argentina has given the world many writers and artists of quality … in every genre, from the most traditional to those that express the views of the youngest generations – all saying something about who we are and who we want to be!

Annual Message to Educational Communities, Easter 2006

The White Crucifixion by Marc Chagall. (His favourite painting.)

El Jesuita, 2010

ON ASKING CATHOLICS FOR THEIR PRAYERS

I would like to give you a blessing, but first I want to ask you for a favour. Before the bishop blesses the people, I ask that you pray to the Lord so that he blesses me.

First Blessing as Pope, 13 March 2013

ON ASPIRATIONS

No one can grow if he does not accept his smallness.

Homily, 25 May 2006

ON ASSISTED SUICIDE

In Argentina there is clandestine euthanasia. Social services pay up to a certain point; if you pass it, ‘die, you are very old’. Today, elderly people are discarded when, in reality, they are the seat of wisdom of the society. The right to life means allowing people to live and not killing, allowing them to grow, to eat, to be educated, to be healed, and to be permitted to die with dignity.

LifeSiteNews.com, 5 October 2007

A culture of discarding the elderly.

Speech, Aparecida Document, 2 October 2007

ON ATHEISTS

I don’t say that [the atheist’s] life is condemned [to Hell], because I am convinced I don’t have the right to pass judgment about the moral uprightness of that person.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

Not everyone present belongs to the Catholic faith and others do not believe. I respect the conscience of each one of you, knowing that each one of you is a child of God. May God bless you.

Vatican press conference, 16 March 2013

[I] know more agnostics than atheists; the first is more undecided, the second, more convinced.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

ON BAPTIZING THE CHILDREN OF SINGLE PARENTS

The child has absolutely no responsibility for the state of his parents’ marriage. And often a baptism can be a new start for the parents as well.

30 Giorni, August 2009

In our ecclesiastical region, there are priests who don’t baptize the children of single mothers because they weren’t conceived in the sanctity of marriage. These are today’s hypocrites: those who clericalize the Church, those who separate the people of God from salvation. And this poor girl who, rather than returning the child to sender, had the courage to carry it into the world, must wander from parish to parish until her child can be baptized!

New York Daily News, 14 March 2013

ON BEAUTY

Few things are more moving than the human need for beauty that all hearts have.

Dissertation of the Archbishop in ADEPA, 6 April 2006

Because it is human, sometimes beauty is tragic, surprising, moving; on some occasions, it compels us to think about what we do not want or it shows us the error of our ways.

Dissertation of the Archbishop in ADEPA, 6 April 2006

ON BEING CHOSEN AS POPE

As you know, the duty of the Conclave is to give Rome a bishop. It seems that my brother cardinals went almost to the end of the world. But here we are.

First Blessing as Pope, 13 March 2013

May God forgive you. (At his first dinner with the cardinals after his election as Pope.)

ON BEING RIGHT … AND WRONG

I don’t have all the answers. Nor do I have all the questions … I confess that, in general, because of my temperament, the first response that occurs to me is the wrong one … It’s curious, but that’s the way it is with me…

El Jesuita, 2010

ON BIRTH CONTROL

[Anti-condom zealots want to] stick the whole world inside a condom.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

ON BRIDEZILLA WEDDINGS

In some churches – and I don’t know how to remedy this, honestly – there is a fierce competition between bridesmaids and brides. These women aren’t observing a religious act; they’re just showing off. And this weighs on my conscience; as priest, I am permitting this and I haven’t found a way to put a stop to it.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

ON BUENOS AIRES

Distracted city, dispersed city, egotistical city: cry. You need to be purified by your tears … Let this scatterbrained, superficial city be purified by its grief.

Homily, 30 December 2005

For many, Buenos Aires is a factory of slaves … a meat grinder which destroys their lives, breaks their will, and deprives them of freedom.

Vatican Insider, 15 December 2011

At school they taught us slavery has been abolished, but do you know what? It was a fairy tale! Because in Buenos Aires, slavery is still common in various forms. In this city workers are exploited in clandestine workshops and, if they are immigrants, they prevent them from leaving; and in this city there are children who have been living on the streets for years. In this city women are kidnapped and are submitted to the use and abuse of their bodies, destroying their dignity. There are men here who abuse and make money from human flesh. Dogs are treated better than these slaves of ours! Kick them out! Get rid of them!

Homily, 23 September 2011

This city does not know how to weep. All is fixed with anaesthetics … virtually all of them were earning their daily bread. With dignity! Father, let us not get used to the idea that to earn your daily bread you must travel like cattle. (After 52 commuters died when a train crashed into buffers at a railway station in Buenos Aires.)

Homily, 23 March 2012

How lovely it is to walk this way, slowly, feeling the presence of others, singing, looking forward, looking at the sky, praying for those who aren’t with us in Buenos Aires!

Homily, 24 May 2008

When I pray for the city of Buenos Aires, I give thanks for the fact that it was the city where I was born.

Address to the First Congress of Regional Urban Parishes, 25 August 2011

ON CARDINALS

The cardinalate is a service; it is not an award to be bragged about.

Vatican Insider, 24 February 2013

Cardinals are not NGO representatives, but servants of the Lord, inspired by the Holy Spirit, which is the one who is really able to differentiate charismas, unifying them in the Church. A cardinal must be able to differentiate between charismas and at the same time look towards unity, aware that the creator of difference and unity is the Holy Spirit itself. Cardinals who do not enter this frame of mind, in my view, are not cardinals in the way Benedict XVI would like them to be.

Vatican Insider, 24 February 2012

ON CATECHISTS

I hope that there is no room among you for apostolic mummies … please, no! Go to a museum – mummies look better there.

Address at Archdiocese Meeting, 12 March 2005

ON CATHOLIC LIFE

When one does not walk, one halts. When one does not build on stone, what happens? That happens which happens to children on the beach when they make sand castles; it all comes down, it is without substance.

Homily, First Papal Mass, 14 March 2013

To walk, to build, to confess. But the matter is not so easy, because in walking, in building, in confessing, at times there are shocks, there are movements that are not properly movements of the journey: they are movements that set us back.

Homily, First Papal Mass, 14 March 2013

ON CELIBATE PRIESTS

Yes, hypothetically, western Catholicism could revise the theme of celibacy … But for the moment, I am in favour of maintaining celibacy, with the pros and the cons it has, because we have ten centuries of more good experiences than bad ones.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

ON CHARACTER FLAWS

Isn’t it fickle, mediocre vanity that makes us build walls, whether they are walls of riches or power, or violence and impunity?

Homily, 25 May 2011

It astonished and perplexed me when I asked an acquaintance how he was doing and he responded, ‘Bad, but used to it.’

Homily, 22 February 2012

ON CHILD LABOUR

The promotion and strengthening of work for adults will make it possible to avoid [the phenomenon] of child labour. It’s very difficult for a child to go out and look for work if his parents have meaningful work that allows them to provide for their family’s needs.

Letter for the Youth, 1 October 2005

ON CHILDREN

What world are we leaving our children? Maybe it would be better to ask: ‘What children are we giving this world?’

Homily, 1 September 1999

We have, in our hands, the responsibility and also the possibility of making this world much better for our children.

Homily, Easter 2005

We should be cognizant of the emergency facing our children and our young people.

Letter for the Youth, 1 October 2005

So many children don’t know how to pray!

Homily, Ash Wednesday, 25 February 2004

Children are mistreated, and are not educated or fed. Many are made into prostitutes and exploited. And this happens here in Buenos Aires, in the great city of the south. Child prostitution is offered in some five-star hotels: it is included in the entertainment menu, under the heading ‘Other’.

Speech, 2 October 2007

ON CHOICES

Each day, we all face the choice to be Good Samaritans or to be indifferent travellers passing by.

Homily, 25 May 2003

ON CHOOSING THE NAME FRANCIS

The man of the poor. The man of peace. The man who loved and cared for creation – and in this moment we don’t have such a great relationship with the creator. The man who gives us this spirit of peace, the poor man who wanted a poor Church.

Vatican press conference, 16 March 2013

Francis is also the man of peace. That is how the name came into my heart: Francis of Assisi. For me, he is the man of poverty, the man of peace, the man who loves and protects creation.

Vatican press conference, 16 March 2013

He brought to Christianity an idea of poverty against the luxury, pride, vanity of the civil and ecclesiastical powers of the time. He changed history.

Sobre El Cielo y La Tierra, 2010

ON THE CHRISTIAN LIFE

The Christian truth is attractive and persuasive because it responds to the deep needs of human existence, convincingly announcing that Christ is the only Saviour of the whole person and of all persons. This announcement is as valid today as it was at the beginning of Christianity when there was a great missionary expansion of the Gospel.

Address to cardinals, The Vatican Today, 15 March 2013

[Living] the Christian life [means] giving witness with joy, just as Jesus did.

El Jesuita, 2010

The Christian life is always a walk in the presence of God, but it is not exempt from struggles and trials.

Homily, 11 March 2006

In the life of every Christian … there will be the experience of the desert, of interior purification, of the dark night.

Homily, 11 March 2006

ON CHRISTMAS

What is the spirit of Christmas? Over the years the world of culture has tried to express it in a thousand ways and has managed to take us closer to the meaning of the Christmas spirit. How many Christmas stories bring us closer to this?

La Nacion, 23 December 2011

ON THE CHURCH

We have to avoid the spiritual sickness of a self-referential Church. It’s true that by straying from its path, as can happen to any man or woman, accidents can happen. But if the Church stays enclosed within itself, self-referential, it will grow old. And between a Church that accidentally strays off its path and one that is sick because of self-reference, I have no doubt: I prefer the former.

El Jesuita, 2010

If, throughout history, the Church has changed so much, I do not see why we should not adapt it to the culture of the [our] time.