By Justin McLellan
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Members of the assembly of the Synod of Bishops are not gathered in Rome to implement a “plan of reformation” but to walk together as a church that discerns God’s will for the present moment, Pope Francis said at the assembly’s opening Mass.

With cardinals from across the world at his side, including 20 new cardinals from 16 nations created just four days prior, the pope urged people to avoid looking at the synod through the lens of “human strategies, political calculations or ideological battles.”

Asking “whether the synod will give this or that permission, open this or that door, this is not useful,” he said at the Mass Oct. 4 in St. Peter’s Square.

Instead, Pope Francis said the primary task of the synod is to “refocus our gaze on God, to be a church that looks mercifully at humanity, a church that is united and fraternal – or at least tries to be united and fraternal.”

The pope acknowledged that some people have fears about the synod, but he asked them to remember that it is “not a political gathering, but a convocation in the Spirit; not a polarized parliament, but a place of grace and communion.”

“The Holy Spirit often shatters our expectations to create something new that surpasses our predictions and negativity,” he said.

Through “synodal dialogue,” the pope said, “we can grow in unity and friendship with the Lord in order to look at today’s challenges with his gaze,” becoming a church “which does not impose burdens” and is “open to everyone, everyone, everyone.”

“The blessing and welcoming gaze of Jesus prevents us from falling into some dangerous temptations: of being a rigid church – a customs office – which arms itself against the world and looks backward; of being a lukewarm church which surrenders to the fashions of the world; of being a tired church, turned in on itself,” he said.

Lay members and ecumenical delegates to the assembly of the Synod of Bishops led the procession into St. Peter’s Square – still decorated with flowers from the consistory that created 21 new cardinals Sep. 30 – followed by priests, bishops and then cardinals. Synod members had participated in a retreat outside Rome Oct. 1-3, during which they reflected on ways to overcome differences of opinion and to listen to each other and to the Holy Spirit.

Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re was the main celebrant at the altar for the Mass; Cardinals Mario Grech, synod secretary-general, and Robert Prevost, prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, one of the new cardinals, joined him at the altar. The Vatican said some 25,000 people were present in St. Peter’s Square.
Celebrating the Mass on the feast of St. Francis of Assisi, a day when Pope Francis also published an apostolic exhortation on the environment, he recalled the story that Jesus told the medieval saint to “repair my church.”

“The synod serves to remind us of this: our mother the church is always in need of purification, of being repaired, for we are a people made up of forgiven sinners,” he said.

St. Francis lived in a time of “struggles and divisions between temporal and religious powers, between the institutional church and heretical currents, between Christians and other believers,” Pope Francis said. But the saint “did not criticize or lash out at anyone.” Rather, he took up the “weapons of the Gospel: humility and unity, prayer and charity.”

“Let us do the same!” urged the pope, noting that the “most fruitful moments of the synod are the moments and prayer and the environment of prayer in which the Lord acts in us.”

After the Mass, Pope Francis individually greeted the 20 new cardinals with him on stage, some of whom will remain in Rome to participate in the synod assembly while others were to return to their dioceses. Cardinal Luis Pascual Dri, a 96-year-old Capuchin friar from Argentina, did not travel to Rome to receive his red hat because of his health.

By Justin McLellan
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – While vocations to the Catholic priesthood and religious life are declining in developed countries around the world, prayers for vocations should not try to “convince” God to send more workers for the church but seek to better understand the needs of its people, Pope Francis said.
Meeting with a group of Rogationists and Daughters of Divine Zeal at the Vatican Sept. 18, the pope praised the example of their founder, St. Hannibal di Francia, who made praying for vocations central to the charisms of the congregations he began.

St. Hannibal, he said, “understood that the first thing to do was pray, certainly not to convince God to send shepherds, as if he did not care for his people, but to let himself be overwhelmed by the deep passion of his paternal and maternal love, to learn – by praying – to be sensitive to the needs of his children.”

The 19th-century Sicilian saint founded the congregations after drawing inspiration from a passage in St. Matthew’s Gospel, in which Jesus says, “The harvest is abundant, but the laborers are few; so ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest.” St. John Paul II called St. Hannibal’s desire to dedicate “unceasing and universal” prayer for vocations a “providential intuition” when he declared him a saint in 2004.

Pope Francis said this type of prayer is particularly practiced in eucharistic adoration, where “docile and humble before God, one receives a specific understanding about the sense of his or her own life.”

The pope urged those walking in the path of St. Hannibal to be “specialists” in God, not through abstract theory, but in prayer and charity to communicate God to the world through their example.

“This is your mission,” he told them, “for even today the Lord is calling, and so many young people need credible witnesses and guides who, by showing them the beauty of a life spent in love, will help them to say ‘yes.’”

By Cindy Wooden
ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia (CNS) – Pope Francis ended his four-day visit to Mongolia where Catholic missionaries began – with charity.

Blessing the new House of Mercy in Ulaanbaatar Sept. 4, the pope insisted that while Catholic charitable and social service activities have attracted Mongolians to the church, the service is motivated by love alone.

Salesian Brother Andrew Tran Le Phuong, director of the House of Mercy, told the pope the facility would offer: a shelter for vulnerable people, especially women and children; a first aid center for the homeless; free laundry and shower facilities; a place where returning migrants and others in need could go for help in connecting to services; and a meeting place to coordinate the variety of Catholic charities operating in the city.

Naidansuren Otgongerel, who took the name “Lucia” when she was baptized, uses prostheses on her arms and legs. But, she told the pope, “I am the luckiest person in the world, because I made the decision to accept fully the love of God, the love of Jesus.”

Pope Francis used his speech to the charity workers and volunteers “to reject certain myths,” including one about why Catholics offer education and health care, feed the hungry, shelter the homeless and care for widows and orphans.

A big myth, he said, is that “the Catholic Church, distinguished throughout the world for its great commitment to works of social promotion, does all this to proselytize, as if caring for others were a way of enticing people to ‘join up.’ No!”

“Christians do whatever they can to alleviate the suffering of the needy because in the person of the poor they acknowledge Jesus, the son of God, and, in him, the dignity of each person, called to be a son or daughter of God,” the pope insisted.

The House of Mercy, he said, should be a place “where people of different creeds, and nonbelievers as well, can join efforts with local Catholics in order to offer compassionate assistance to our many brothers and sisters in the one human family.”

Throughout his stay in Mongolia, Pope Francis tried to reassure the government and suspicious Mongolians that Christians were there to help and not to colonize or undermine traditional Mongolian culture.

Works of charity that involve people of different religions or no religion at all, he said, help people see each other as brothers and sisters, giving them a sense of “fraternity that the state will rightly seek to protect and promote.”

“For this dream to come true,” Pope Francis said, “it is essential, here and elsewhere, that those in public office support such humanitarian initiatives, encouraging a virtuous synergy for the sake of the common good.”

The pope also rejected the idea that “only the wealthy can engage in volunteer work” because “reality tells us the opposite. It is not necessary to be wealthy to do good; rather, almost always it is people of modest means who choose to devote their time, skills and generosity to caring for others.”

By Cindy Wooden
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Having faith does not mean there will be no difficulties in life, either for individuals or for the church as a whole, Pope Francis said, but it does mean knowing that Jesus is there to give courage and to defeat evil.

“The Lord knows that the boat of our life, as well as the boat of the church, is threatened by headwinds, and that the sea on which we sail is often turbulent,” the pope said Aug. 13, commenting on the day’s Gospel story about Jesus walking on the water toward the disciples whose boat was being tossed about by the wind.

Jesus “does not spare us the hard work of sailing,” the pope told an estimated 15,000 people gathered in the square for the midday recitation of the Angelus. Instead, “he invites us to face difficulties so they too might become salvific places, so Jesus can conquer them, so they become opportunities to meet him.”

“In our moments of darkness, he comes to meet us, asking to be welcomed like that night on the lake” when the disciples were afraid until Jesus reassured them, Pope Francis said.

In biblical times, people thought that large expanses of water were “the haunts of evil powers that man was not able to master,” symbols of chaos and darkness, he said. The disciples probably were not just afraid of sinking but also of being “sucked in by evil.”

“And here comes Jesus, walking on the waters, that is, over the powers of evil,” telling the disciples not to be afraid, the pope said.

“By walking on the water, he wants to say, ‘Do not be afraid. I put your enemies under my feet’ – a beautiful message – ‘I put your enemies under my feet’ – not people! – not that kind of enemy, but death, sin, the devil – these are the enemies of the people, our enemies,” Pope Francis said. “Jesus tramples on these enemies for us.”

In the Gospel story, Peter gets out of the boat and starts walking on the water toward Jesus, but then gets frightened and starts to sink.

Peter cries out, “Lord, save me!” which Pope Francis said is a “beautiful” prayer that “expresses the certainty that the Lord can save us, that he conquers our evil and our fears.”

Pope Francis asked the people in the square to repeat that prayer together three times: “Lord, save me! Lord, save me! Lord, save me!”

By Justin McLellan
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Only by shedding feelings of personal greatness and regaining a sense of wonder in God’s love can people welcome Jesus into their hearts and lives, Pope Francis said.
With some 15,000 visitors gathered to pray the Angelus in St. Peter’s Square July 9, the pope reflected on the day’s Gospel reading from St. Matthew in which Jesus praises God the Father for hiding “things” from the wise and revealing them to the childlike.

Those things, Pope Francis explained, refer to Jesus’ miracles – restoring sight to the blind and healing lepers – which are “signs of God acting in the world” that are overlooked by the prideful.
God’s love, as reflected through Jesus’ miracles, “is not understood by those who presume to be great and manufacture a god in their own image: powerful, unyielding, vengeful,” he said.

“These presumptuous ones fail to accept God as Father; those who are full of themselves, proud, concerned only with their own interests: these are the presumptuous ones, convinced that they need no one,” Pope Francis said.

The childlike who are open to receiving God’s love, however, “have hearts free from conceit and self-love,” the pope explained.

“The childlike are those who, like children, feel needy and not self-sufficient; they are open to God and let themselves be astonished by his works,” he said. “They know how to read his signs, amazed by the miracles of his love.”

Pope Francis urged Christians to ask themselves whether they let themselves stop and be amazed by how the signs of God are working in their lives or if they notice them only in passing.

“Our lives, if we think about it, are full of miracles, full of signs of love, of signs of God’s bounty,” he said. “Before these, however, our heart can also remain indifferent and become set in its ways, strangely unable to be amazed.”

Pope Francis suggested that Christians draw attention to the signs of God’s love in daily life in by “photographing” them in their minds and “printing” them onto their heart to then develop them in their lives through positive actions, so that the “photograph” of God’s love “becomes brighter in us and through us.”

After praying the Angelus the pope recalled “with pain” the recent bloodshed in the Holy Land, where on July 3 Israeli forces launched a two-day ground and aerial attack on the city of Jenin in the West Bank. The Palestinian government reported that 12 Palestinians were killed in the raid and at least 120 were wounded.

“I hope that the Israeli and Palestinian Authorities can resume a direct dialogue in order to end the spiral of violence and open paths of reconciliation and peace,” the pope said.

By Justin McLellan
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – To recognize and address the poverty of others, Christians must become poor like the figure of Tobit from the Hebrew Bible, Pope Francis said.

Tobit, a blind and elderly man who dedicated his life to the service of others, “can show practical concern for the poor because he has personally known what it is to be poor,” the pope wrote in his message for the November celebration of the World Day of the Poor.

The papal message was published June 13, the feast of St. Anthony of Padua, patron of the poor.  
Christians are called to “acknowledge every poor person and every form of poverty, abandoning the indifference and the banal excuses we make to protect our illusory well-being,” Pope Francis wrote. “Regardless of the color of their skin, their social standing, the place from which they came, if I myself am poor, I can recognize my brothers and sisters in need of my help.”

The theme for World Day of the Poor 2023 is a passage from the Book of Tobit: “Do not turn your face away from anyone who is poor.”

“When we encounter a poor person, we cannot look away, for that would prevent us from encountering the face of the Lord Jesus,” Pope Francis wrote.

In his message for the world day, which will be celebrated Nov. 19, Pope Francis listed an array of cultural phenomena that prevent people from caring for the poor: greater pressure to live affluently, a tendency to disregard suffering, virtual reality overtaking real life and a sense of haste that prevents people from stopping to care for others. He offered the parable of the Good Samaritan, who stops to help a man in the street beaten by robbers, to counter the hangups many people have against helping the poor.

The parable “is not simply a story from the past; it continues to challenge each of us in the here and now of our daily lives,” he said. “It is easy to delegate charity to others, yet the calling of every Christian is to become personally involved.”

The pope thanked God for the men and women “of every age and social status” who devote themselves to caring for the poor and excluded, the “ordinary people who quietly make themselves poor among the poor.”

Pope Francis also called for a “serious and effective commitment on the part of political leaders and legislators” to defend the rights enjoyed by all people to food, clothing, shelter, medical care, rest and social services as outlined in St. John XXIII’s 1963 encyclical “Pacem in Terris” (Peace on Earth).

While recognizing the need to pressure public institutions to defend the poor, the pope praised volunteers who serve the common good in a “spirit of solidarity and subsidiarity,” saying “it is of no use to wait passively to receive everything ‘from on high.’”

The pope also pointed to the way poverty is exacerbated by inhumane working conditions, inadequate pay, the “scourge” of job insecurity and by workplace accidents resulting in death. Young people, he said, are also afflicted by a cultural poverty that destroys their self-worth and leads to frustration and even suicide.

He urged people not to fall into “rhetorical excess” or merely consider statistics when speaking of the poor, but to remember that “the poor are persons; they have faces, stories, hearts and souls.”
“Caring for the poor is more than simply a matter of a hasty handout,” Pope Francis said, “it calls for reestablishing the just interpersonal relationships that poverty harms.”

Calling for a care for the poor marked by “Gospel realism,” the pope invited Christians to discern the genuine needs of the poor rather than their own personal hopes and aspirations.
“What the poor need is certainly our humanity, our hearts open to love,” he said.

(Editor’s note: The text of the pope’s message in English can be found at https://bit.ly/2023WDP-PopeMessage)

By Carol Glatz

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Christians have no need to be afraid or hopeless because Jesus always tells the faithful where they are going and how to get there, Pope Francis said.

“At times, especially when there are major problems to face and there is the sensation that evil is stronger, we ask ourselves: What should I do, what path should I follow?” he said May 7.

Jesus says, “I am the way, and the truth and the life,” which means “Jesus himself is the way to follow to live in truth and to have life in abundance,” the pope said.

Before reciting the midday “Regina Coeli” prayer with about 20,000 people gathered in St. Peter’s Square, Pope Francis spoke about the day’s Gospel reading, John 14:1-12, which is among Jesus’ discourses at the Last Supper before his death.

“The disciples’ hearts are troubled, but the Lord speaks reassuring words to them, inviting them not to be afraid,” the pope said. Jesus “is not abandoning them but is going to prepare a place for them and to guide them toward that destination.”

Jesus tells his disciples that “there is space for you, you are welcome, you will always be received with the warmth of an embrace, and I am in heaven to prepare a place for you,” the pope said. Jesus also “prepares for us that embrace with the Father, the place for all eternity.”

This is a source of consolation and hope for the faithful, he said. “So, when we experience fatigue, bewilderment and even failure, let us remember where our life is headed.”

“We must not lose sight of the destination,” he said, which is the “greatness and the beauty” of heaven.
Pope Francis said that once the faithful understand where they are going and what they are living for, the next question is “how can we get there, what is the way?”

Jesus says he is the path to follow, the pope said. “He is the way and therefore faith in him is not a ‘package of ideas’ in which to believe, but rather a road to be traveled, a journey to undertake, a path with him,” which “leads to unfailing happiness.”

The faithful are invited to follow Jesus and imitate him, “especially with deeds of closeness and mercy toward others, Pope Francis said. “This is the compass for reaching heaven: loving Jesus, the way, becoming signs of his love on earth.”

By Carol Glatz

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – The life and ministry of the Catholic Church is enriched by listening to everyone, especially those who are often excluded by society, and by including their experiences and perspectives, Pope Francis said.

“For the church is like a rich tapestry, made up of many individual threads that come from various peoples, languages and cultures, yet woven into a unity by the Holy Spirit,” he told a delegation from Catholic Extension.

The pope greeted the delegation during an audience at the Vatican April 26. The group included: U.S. Cardinal Blase J. Cupich of Chicago, chancellor of the organization’s board of governors; retired Arizona Bishop Gerald F. Kicanas of Tucson, vice-chancellor; and Sister Norma Pimentel, a member of the Missionaries of Jesus, who received Catholic Extension’s “Spirit of Francis” Award this year for her work providing care to hundreds of thousands of people at the U.S.-Mexico border.

“I congratulate Sister Norma Pimentel,” the pope said, “for her service to the many men, women and children arriving at the southern border of the United States.”

Speaking briefly in Spanish, the pope said the border was “caliente caliente,” that is, a hotbed of activity with so many people “in search of a better future.”

He thanked Catholic Extension, which had a delegation in Rome April 23-28, for its work “providing assistance to missionary dioceses, particularly in the United States, and in caring for the needs of the poor and most vulnerable,” especially in Puerto Rico “following the various hurricanes and earthquakes which brought such devastation to the island in recent years.”

“By giving a voice to those who are frequently voiceless,” he told the delegation,”you bear witness to the God-given dignity of every person.”

As the entire church is journeying together on the path of synodality, the pope said, “listening to and including the experiences and perspectives of all, especially those on the margins of society, enriches the church’s life and ministry.”

“I am pleased to know of your concern to place those who are often victims of today’s ‘throw-away culture’ at the heart of the church’s pastoral activity; in this way, their voices can be heard, and all can benefit,” he said.

Pope Francis encouraged them to serve others with “God’s style,” that is with closeness, compassion and tender love so that “God’s loving mercy becomes visible, and the fabric of society is strengthened and renewed.”

By Cindy Wooden

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Sharing the Gospel requires literally “going out,” witnessing to the joy of faith in person and not just sitting at home, being “keyboard warriors” who argue with others online, Pope Francis said.

“One does not proclaim the Gospel standing still, locked in an office, at one’s desk or at one’s computer, arguing like ‘keyboard warriors’ and replacing the creativity of proclamation with copy-and-paste ideas taken from here and there,” the pope said April 12 during his weekly general audience in St. Peter’s Square.

Holding the audience during the Octave of Easter, with tens of thousands of daffodils and tulips still decorating the square, the pope continued his series of audience talks about “evangelical zeal,” looking at how that differs from pretending to share the Gospel while really just seeking attention or pushing one’s own ideas.

At the end of the audience, before leading prayers for peace in Ukraine, Pope Francis noted that April 11 was the 60th anniversary of St. John XXIII’s encyclical, “Pacem in Terris” (“Peace on Earth”).

The encyclical, he said, offered humanity “a glimpse of serenity in the midst of dark clouds” of high tension between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

The document, published in 1963, is as relevant as ever, Pope Francis said, reading one line as an example: “Relations between states, as between individuals, must be regulated not by armed force, but in accordance with the principles of right reason: the principles, that is, of truth, justice and vigorous and sincere co-operation.”

In his main talk, the pope focused on the need for missionary disciples to be ready to set out and to be open to exploring new paths as they seek to share the Gospel through word and deed.

Departing from his prepared text, Pope Francis told people in the square, “I exhort you to be evangelizers who move, without fear, who go forward to share the beauty of Jesus, the newness of Jesus, who changes everything.”

The pope imagined someone replying to him that, “Yes, father, he changed the calendar because now we count years as ‘before Jesus’” and after.

But, even more, the pope said, Jesus “changes one’s heart.”

“Are you willing to let Jesus change your heart?” he asked those in the crowd. “Or are you a lukewarm Christian, who doesn’t move? Think about it a bit. Are you enthusiastic about Jesus and go forward? Think about it.”

“A herald is ready to go and knows that the Lord passes by in a surprising way,” the pope said, so one cannot be “fossilized” by human calculations about what is likely to be successful or by thoughts that “it has always been done this way.”

Being a missionary disciple means “not letting pass by the opportunities to promulgate the Gospel of peace, that peace that Christ knows how to give more and better than the world gives.”