Pope Leo XIV on Pentecost Sunday: The Holy Spirit inspires us to ‘break down walls’

Vatican City, Apr 24, 2020 / 05:00 am (CNA).- Pope Francis prayed that God would give pastors the courage to be close to their people as he celebrated Mass Friday.

The pope asked that the Lord would “above all teach us not to be afraid of God’s people, not to be afraid to be close to them.”

Speaking from the chapel of the Casa Santa Marta, his Vatican residence, April 24, he said that pastors must avoid becoming mere “pastoral business managers” as Jesus wants every priest to have a “shepherd’s heart”.

“The power of the pastor is service,” he said. “He has no other power. When you begin to make mistakes taking other powers your vocation is ruined.”

In his homily, Pope Francis reflected on the day’s Gospel, John 6:1-15, in which Jesus used five loaves and two fish to feed a large crowd. He noted that the disciples were tired and did not want the crowd to come between them and the Lord. By contrast, Jesus sought to be close to the people and to teach the disciples how to become true pastors. 

Celebrating Mass before a small congregation due to the coronavirus pandemic, the pope said that the disciples saw themselves as “a privileged class, ‘an aristocracy,’ so to speak,” but that Jesus repeatedly corrected them. 

He gave the examples of when the disciples tried to prevent children from approaching the Lord and he rebuked them (Matthew 19:13-15), and when people on the road to Jericho ordered a blind man to stop crying out “Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me” (Luke 18:35-43). 

The pope recalled “a great pastor from a simple, humble neighborhood” who once told him that he wished he could have some rest from his parishioners’ demands. 

“But he realized he was a shepherd and had to be with people,” he said. “And Jesus … teaches the disciples, the apostles, this pastoral attitude that is closeness to the people of God.”

Pope Francis concluded the celebration with adoration and benediction, leading those following via livestream in an act of spiritual communion. 

Those gathered in the chapel then sang the Easter Marian antiphon “Regina caeli.”

At the start of the Mass, the pope prayed for teachers and students adapting to the new circumstances created by the pandemic.

He said: “We pray today for teachers who have to work so hard to lead lessons via the internet and other media channels and we also pray for students who have to take exams in a way they are not used to. Let us accompany them with prayer.”

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Vatican City, Jun 10, 2020 / 05:15 am (CNA).- Pope Francis appointed Wednesday Bishop Mitchell T. Rozanski to lead the Metropolitan Archdiocese of St. Louis.

Rozanski, 61, is the current Bishop of Springfield, Massachusetts, where he has served since 2014. He succeeds Archbishop Robert Carlson, who presented his resignation to Pope Francis at the age of 75.

“I am confident in the future of God’s strong Church in St. Louis with Archbishop-elect Rozanski as its shepherd,” Archbishop Carlson wrote on Twitter following the announcement on June 10.

A Baltimore native, Rozanski was born in 1958, and attended Catholic schools in the city. He attended seminary at the Catholic University of America, and was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of Baltimore in 1984. He served in parish ministry, the archdiocesan curia, and with its seminary, and was named a monsignor in 2003.

Pope John Paul II appointed Rozanski as auxiliary bishop of Baltimore in 2004. He oversaw one of Baltimore archdiocese’s geographical vicariates while parishes were merged, and served as vicar for Hispanics. He was vocal in supporting Maryland’s DREAM act, allowing some undocumented immigrants to receive in-state college tuition.

At the time of his episcopal consecration, Rozanski was the youngest bishop in the United States. He went on to serve as chair of the U.S. bishops’ conference committee for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs and as a consultant to the National Association for the Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities.

A Polish-American, Rozanski has co-chaired the Polish National Catholic – Roman Catholic Dialogue. The Polish National Catholic Church is an ecclesial community founded in the U.S. in the late 19th-century by Polish-American immigrants.

He is a member of the Knights of Columbus and a Knight Commander of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem.

As Metropolitan Archbishop of St. Louis, Rozanski will oversee the largest city in Missouri, with a population of 2.25 million people across the archdiocese, 509,280 of which are Catholic. 

The title of “metropolitan bishop” refers to the diocesan bishop or archbishop of a metropolis, namely, the primary city of an ecclesiastical province or regional capital.

Archbishop Robert Carlson led the Archdiocese of St. Louis since 2009.

“I am honored to have served as leader of the Archdiocese of St. Louis for more than a decade,” Carlson said following Rozanaki’s appointment.

“This large and generous community of faithful Catholics will continue to encourage me in my faith journey, and I know that Bishop Rozanski will cherish his new ministry.”

Pope Francis also appointed Fr. Bruce Lewandowski as an auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Baltimore June 10.

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Vatican City, May 3, 2018 / 04:01 pm (CNA).- On Wednesday, three Chilean survivors of clerical sexual abuse held a press conference to discuss their meetings with Pope Francis about the circumstances surrounding their abuse.

Juan Carlos Cruz, along with James Hamilton and Jose Andres Murillo, were sexually abused by Fr. Fernando Karadima, who in 2011 was found guilty by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith of sexually abusing minors during the 1980s and 1990s. Karadima was sentenced to a life of prayer and solitude.

Karadima’s abuse has drawn recent attention because of long-rumored reports that his one-time friend, now-Bishop Juan Barros, helped to cover up the abuse, or was a participant in it. Barros was appointed to lead the Diocese of Osorno in January 2015, despite considerable protest in Chile, and despite objections from some of Chile’s bishops. Barros’ appointment has been a matter of serious controversy over since.

In January of this year, Pope Francis visited Chile and publicly defended Barros, saying that accusations against him were “calumny,” and that he had seen no proof of the bishop’s involvement in Karadima’s abuse. Those remarks drew serious rebukes, including one from Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston, chair of the pope’s commission on sexual abuse, and the pope apologized for the tone of his remarks, while insisting on the innocence of Barros.

After Francis visited Chile, he sent Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta, a highly regarded canonical expert in clerical sexual abuse, to investigate the claims against Barros.

Shortly after Scicluna was dispatched to Chile, the Associated Press reported that in February 2015, Cruz had sent Francis a letter detailing accusations that Barros was complicit in Karadima’s abuse. Barros was installed as Bishop of Osorno in March 2015, a little more than a month after Cruz’ letter was sent. O’Malley was said to have delivered the letter to the pope in April 2015.

After his visit to Chile, Scicluna filed a 2,300 page report on the matter, which has not been made publicly available.

On April 11, Francis sent a letter to Chile’s bishops saying that he had made “serious errors in judgement regarding the matter,” which he attributed to “a lack of truthful and balanced information.”

The pope invited the three abuse survivors to meet with him, and summoned Chile’s entire episcopate to meet with him in the Vatican; that meeting will take place later this month.  

During their May 2 press conference, the abuse survivors said Francis had apologized to them for “being part of the problem,” and they said the pope was “very attentive, receptive, and very empathetic” while they spoke “frankly and respectfully” with them.

Cruz told reporters that “it was clear that the pope was misinformed.” The survivors mentioned that Archbishop Ivo Scapolo, apostolic nuncio to Chile, was part of the problem, along with Cardinal Francisco Errazuriz, Archbishop Emeritus of Santiago and a member of Pope Francis’ council of cardinal advisers.

Hamilton told reporters that Errazuriz failed to act on abuse reports, saying that the cardinal “was covering up for more than 5 years the criminal of Karadima and all of his acts.”

It is is possible that at the time Francis appointed Barros to Osorno, he was indeed misinformed, especially if Errazuriz and Scalpo failed to adequately inform the pope of any credible reports against Barros.

But the lingering question is whether, and how, Pope Francis remained misinformed after Cruz wrote a letter to the Pope.

In the first place, it is possible that O’Malley did not deliver the letter to Pope Francis.

In April 2015, Marie Collins, then a member of the pope’s sexual abuse commission, delivered to O’Malley Cruz’ letter, and asked him to the deliver it to Pope Francis.

The Archdiocese of Boston declined to comment on this matter to CNA, referring questions to the Vatican. The Vatican’s press office declined to answer questions on the letter.
   
However, the Associated Press reports that O’Malley later told both Collins and Cruz that he had delivered the letter to the pope and communicated their concerns about Barros.

In February, Boston Globe columnist Joe Cullen also said that O’Malley’s spokesman, Terry Donilon, “did confirm to me that O’Malley, in fact, delivered to the pope a letter from Juan Carlos Cruz in which Cruz accused Barros of knowing that a notorious priest named Francisco Karadima routinely molested boys, including Cruz himself.”

O’Malley’s credibility on sexual abuse matters is unimpeachable, and he seems to have communicated to Cruz, Collins, and Donilon that he delivered the letter. To Cruz and Collins, he also seems to have confirmed conveying their concerns to Pope Francis. It is unlikely that the letter went undelivered.

What is not clear is how O’Malley delivered the letter: whether he handed it directly to Pope Francis, and summarized the contents, or whether he delivered it to an aide.

If O’Malley delivered the letter to an aide, or if Francis passed it on to an aide, it is possible that it never made its way back to the pope. In that case, serious questions would need to be answered about whether someone on the pope’s personal staff was protecting Barros, or shielding Francis from bad news. Such things would not be unprecedented; but in a matter as serious as this, they demand accountability.

It is also possible, and perhaps most probable, that although Francis says he was misinformed, he did read the 2015 letter from Cruz. It seems likely that, after reading it, Francis would have consulted with Errazuriz, his close adviser and a Chilean. Given that Errazuriz is already alleged to have discounted allegations involving Barros, he might have discredited Cruz’ account.

Francis had previously blamed criticism of Barros on Chile’s “leftists.” It is possible that Errazuriz, Scalpo, or others convinced the pope that Cruz’ allegations were rooted in a political attack on the Church, or on Barros. Throughout his pontificate, Francis has shown little patience for Latin American “leftists.” If that scenario is the case, the mistake was accepting the narrative discrediting Cruz, instead of investigating the matter.

Francis has made mistakes before regarding sexual abuse, most notably in the case of Fr. Mauro Inzoli, an Italian removed from ministry by Benedict XVI, restored to ministry by Francis in 2014, and then dismissed from the clerical state by Francis in 2017, after he was sentenced in 2016 by a civil court to a prison term for eight counts of sexually abusing children. Francis blamed his initial reversal on being new to his office, and not understanding the case fully. Some clerics close to the pope say that Francis was persuaded to restore Inzoli to ministry after pontifical advisers made a personal plea to the pope. It is possible that, in matters of sexual abuse, Francis trusts advisers without sufficiently investigating circumstances himself.

Nevertheless, Francis has long advocated a position of “zero tolerance” for clerics who commit abuse, and taken a hard line on bishops who fail to take abuse allegations seriously. In 2015, he accepted the resignation of Bishop Robert Finn, then Bishop of Kansas City-Saint Joseph, who was convicted of a misdemeanor after failing to report allegations that a priest was in possession of child pornography. Ironically, some of Finn’s decisions in that affair were attributed to trust placed in advisers who turned out to be wrong.

After meeting with the Pope, Karadima’s victims told reporters that they are “waiting for actions.” They’re not the only ones; how Francis acts now will likely be considered a barometer of how seriously he is willing to act on sexual abuse issues.

The pope is likely to accept the resignation of Bishop Juan Barros in the weeks to come. He will also have to decide who was responsible for misinforming him, and what the consequences will be. And he will have to consider carefully when to trust advisers, and when he is obliged to take matters into his own hands.

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