Pope Francis names Archbishop Tomasi delegate to Order of Malta

Vatican City, Jun 29, 2017 / 03:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Thursday, the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, Pope Francis said that we can’t just know about our faith, but we must live our faith, with Jesus as the center of our hearts and lives.

“The question of life demands a response of life. For it counts little to know the articles of faith if we do not confess Jesus as the Lord of our lives,” the Pope said June 29.

“Today he looks straight at us and asks, ‘Who am I for you?’ As if to say: ‘Am I still the Lord of your life, the longing of your heart, the reason for your hope, the source of your unfailing trust?’

Jesus is asking us today the same questions he asked to his disciples: “Who do people say that I am?” and “Who do you say that I am?” Francis continued. In the end, only Peter answers that he is “the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

“Along with Saint Peter, we too renew today our life choice to be Jesus’ disciples and apostles. May we too pass from Jesus’ first question to his second, so as to be ‘his own’ not merely in words, but in our actions and our very lives,” he said.

This is the “crucial question,” he continued, especially for pastors. “It is the decisive question. It does not allow for a non-committal answer, because it brings into play our entire life.”

Pope Francis spoke to pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square for his Mass celebrating the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, patrons of the city of Rome. During the ceremony, he blessed the pallia to be bestowed on the 32 new metropolitan archbishops who were present, all appointed throughout the previous year.

The pallium is a white wool vestment, adorned with six black silk crosses. Dating back to at least the fifth century, the wearing of the pallium by the Pope and metropolitan archbishops symbolizes authority as well as unity with the Holy See.

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.

Traditionally the Pope bestows the stole to the new archbishops June 29 each year. The rite is a sign of communion with the See of Peter. It also serves as a symbol of the metropolitan archbishop’s jurisdiction in his own diocese as well as the other particular dioceses within his ecclesiastical province.

However, as a sign of “synodality” with local Churches, Pope Francis decided in 2015 that new metropolitan archbishops will officially be imposed with the pallium in their home diocese, rather than the Vatican.

So while the new archbishops still journey to Rome to receive the pallium during the liturgy with the Pope, the official imposition ceremony is in their home diocese, allowing more faithful and bishops in dioceses under the archbishop’s jurisdiction to attend the event.

In his homily, Pope Francis reflected on three words from the liturgy that he said are “essential for the life of an apostle: confession, persecution and prayer.”

For confession, the Pope spoke of the confession of faith, which means “to acknowledge in Jesus the long-awaited Messiah, the living God, the Lord of our lives.”

We should ask ourselves, he said, if we are “parlor Christians,” who only love to sit and chat about how things are going in the Church and the world, or “apostles on the go,” people “who confess Jesus with their lives because they hold him in their hearts.”

We can’t be half-hearted, he urged, but must be on fire with love for Christ, not looking for the easy way out, but daily risking ourselves to put out “into the deep.”

“Those who confess their faith in Jesus do as Peter and Paul did: they follow him to the end – not just part of the way, but to the very end.”

But doing so isn’t easy, and that’s when we come to the second word, he explained, because following the way of Christ, also means facing the cross and persecution.

Peter and Paul shed their blood for Christ, as well as the early Christian community as a whole. Even today, he continued, a great number of Christians are persecuted.

The Pope emphasized the words of the Apostle Paul, who said “to live was Christ, Christ crucified, who gave his life for him.”

“Apart from the cross, there is no Christ, but apart from the cross, there can be no Christian either,” Francis stated.

The Christian is called to “tolerate evil,” but tolerating evil doesn’t mean simply having patience and resignation, he explained, it means imitating Christ, accepting the cross with confidence, carrying the burden for Christ’s sake and for the sake of others – all the while knowing that we are not alone.

“Tolerating evil,” he continued, “means overcoming it with Jesus, and in Jesus’ own way, which is not the way of the world.”

This is why St. Paul writes: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” The essence of this “good fight,” the Pope emphasized, was living “for Jesus and for others,” giving your all. There is only one thing that Paul kept in his life, and that is his faith.

“Out of love, he experienced trials, humiliations and suffering, which are never to be sought but always accepted. In the mystery of suffering offered up in love, in this mystery, embodied in our own day by so many of our brothers and sisters who are persecuted, impoverished and infirm, the saving power of Jesus’ cross shines forth.”

Lastly, Pope Francis said that the life of an apostle must be a life of constant prayer.

“Prayer is the water needed to nurture hope and increase fidelity. Prayer makes us feel loved and it enables us to love in turn. It makes us press forward in moments of darkness because it brings God’s light. In the Church, it is prayer that sustains us and helps us to overcome difficulties.”

When St. Peter was in prison, it tell us in the Acts of the Apostles that “earnest prayer for him was made to God by the Church.”

“A Church that prays is watched over and cared for by the Lord. When we pray, we entrust our lives to him and to his loving care,” he said.

Francis concluded by praying that the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, may “obtain for us a heart like theirs.”

Hearts that are wearied because they are constantly asking, knocking, interceding, weighed down by the many needs of people and situations that need to be handed over to God, but also at peace, because the Holy Spirit brings consolation and strength through prayer, he said.

“How urgent it is for the Church to have teachers of prayer, but even more so for us to be men and women of prayer, whose entire life is prayer!”

“The Lord answers our prayers. He is faithful to the love we have professed for him, and he stands beside us at times of trial.”

Just as the Lord accompanied the journey of the Apostles, “he will do the same for you, dear brother Cardinals,” he said.

“He will remain close to you too, dear brother Archbishops who, in receiving the pallium, will be strengthened to spend your lives for the flock, imitating the Good Shepherd who bears you on his shoulders.”

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Pope Francis greeting pilgrims and visitors to the weekly general audience on Aug. 31, 2022 / Daniel Ibáñez / CNA

Rome Newsroom, Aug 31, 2022 / 03:15 am (CNA).
Pope Francis has launched a new catechesis series on spiritual discernment.The pope … […]

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jan 2, 2023 / 06:00 am (CNA).

On Feb. 11, 2013, before a gathering of cardinals who had come to the Vatican expecting to hear the announcement of upcoming canonizations, Pope Benedict XVI dropped a bombshell.

After a few announcements about Church business at the conclusion of the meeting, the pope took out two sheets of paper and read a prepared statement in Latin.

“I have convoked you to this Consistory, not only for the three canonizations, but also to communicate to you a decision of great importance for the life of the Church. After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry,” the then 85-year-old pontiff told the gathering of the Catholic Church’s highest-ranking clergymen.

Because he spoke in Latin, the language used for official Vatican proclamations, reporters present did not at first realize that the pope had just stepped down.

‘Total surprise, total shock’

The assembled cardinals, on the other hand, who knew their Latin, reacted with stunned silence.

American Cardinal James Stafford later told CNA that the pope’s statement was received with “total surprise, total shock.”

“A cardinal who was sitting next to me said, ‘Did he resign?’ I said, ‘Yes, that’s what he did. He resigned.’ And we just all stood at our places.”

Nigeria’s Cardinal Francis Arinze, who was present that morning, said the announcement was a “surprise, like thunder that gives no notice that it’s coming,” reported The Catholic Telegraph.

In renouncing the papacy, Benedict became only the second pope in almost 600 years to voluntarily step down. In 1294, Pietro da Morrone, an elderly hermit, was crowned Pope Celestine V, but finding the demands of the job too much for him, he resigned after only five months.

In 1415, Pope Gregory XII also resigned, but under very different circumstances — he stepped down in order to end a crisis within the Church known as the Great Western Schism.

Title, white clothes, and papal coat of arms

What happened next with Benedict XVI was no less surprising to those who expected him to live as a retired cardinal.

In his last official statement as pope, before a general audience on Feb. 27, 2013, Pope Benedict assured the tens of thousands of people gathered to hear him speak as pope for the last time that even though he was stepping back from official duties, he would remain, in essence, pope.

“The ‘always’ is also a ‘forever’ — there can no longer be a return to the private sphere. My decision to resign the active exercise of the ministry does not revoke this,” Benedict said.

“I do not return to private life, to a life of travel, meetings, receptions, conferences, and so on. I am not abandoning the cross, but remaining in a new way at the side of the crucified Lord,” he told the crowd.

A day earlier, on Feb. 26, 2013, the director of the Vatican Press Office, Father Federico Lombardi, had silenced speculation over what Benedict would be called and what he would wear. He would, Lombardi said, retain the trappings of the papacy — most significantly, his title and dress.

“He will still be called His Holiness Benedict XVI,” Lombardi said. “But he will also be called Pope Emeritus or Roman Pontiff Emeritus.”

Lombardi said Benedict would continue to wear a white cassock but without the mozzetta, the short cape that covers the shoulders. The pope’s fisherman’s ring would be replaced by a ring from his time as cardinal. The red shoes would go as well, Lombardi said, and be replaced by a pair of brown ones.

“The city of León is known for beautiful shoes, and very comfortable shoes. And when the pope was asked what he wanted to wear he said, ‘I want the shoes from León in Mexico,’” Lombardi said at the press conference.

On May 2, the cardinal who designed Benedict’s coat of arms in 2005 told CNA that he had written the pope emeritus suggesting that his coat of arms would need to be redesigned to reflect his new status. Cardinal Andrea Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo proposed making the keys of St. Peter smaller and less prominent.

“That shows that he had a historic possession but not a current jurisdiction,” said the cardinal at the time.

Benedict, however, it seems, politely declined a new coat of arms. La Stampa reported the following year that the Vatican Publishing House’s manual of ecclesiastical heraldry in the Catholic Church contained the following note:

“Expressing deep appreciation and heartfelt gratitude to the author for the interesting study sent to him, [Benedict] made it known that he prefers not to adopt an expressive heraldic emblem of the new situation created with his renouncing of the Petrine Ministry.”

By his decision to continue to dress in white like the pope, retain the title of pope, and keep the coat of arms of his papacy, Benedict revealed that in giving up the “active exercise of the ministry,” he was not forsaking the role of pope altogether.

An expanded Petrine ministry 

In his 2013 announcement, Benedict clearly expressed his intention to step aside, even determining the date and time of his official departure. Nonetheless, his decision to keep the title of pope and maintain the ceremonial protocol that goes along with the papacy led some to speculate whether there were not actually “two popes.”

Benedict’s personal secretary and closest confidante, Archbishop Georg Gänswein, sought to clear up any confusion in 2016.

In a speech at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome on May 20, 2016, Gänswein said that Pope Francis and Benedict are not two popes “in competition” with one another but represent one “expanded” Petrine office with “an active member” and a “contemplative.”

Parsing Benedict’s speech, Gänswein explained that in stepping down, Benedict was not giving up his ministry.

“The key word in that statement is ‘munus petrinum,’ translated — as happens most of the time — with ‘Petrine ministry.’ And yet, ‘munus,’ in Latin, has a multiplicity of meanings: It can mean service, duty, guide, or gift, even prodigy. Before and after his resignation, Benedict understood and understands his task as participation in such a ‘Petrine ministry [munus],’” Gänswein said.

“He left the papal throne and yet, with the step he took on Feb. 11, 2013, he has not abandoned this ministry,” Gänswein explained, saying the latter scenario was something “quite impossible after his irrevocable acceptance of the office in April 2005.”

Benedict himself later made clear in an interview with his biographer Peter Seewald that he saw himself as continuing in his ministry. He said that a pope who steps down is like a father whose role changes, but always remains a father.

“Of course a father does not stop being father, but he is relieved of concrete responsibility. He remains a father in a deep, inward sense, in a particular relationship which has responsibility, but not with day-to-day tasks as such. It was also this way for bishops,” Benedict said.

“I think it is also clear that the pope is no superman and his mere existence is not sufficient to conduct his role, rather he likewise exercises a function. 

“If he steps down, he remains in an inner sense within the responsibility he took on, but not in the function. In this respect one comes to understand that the office of the pope has lost none of its greatness, even if the humanity of the office is perhaps becoming more clearly evident,” Benedict said.

Benedict’s decision “not to abandon his ministry” inspired a cottage industry of conspiracy theories, with some questioning whether the pope emeritus truly stepped down because of his age and frailty.

George Weigel, author of the definitive biography of St. John Paul II, “Witness to Hope,” dismissed such speculation in an interview with CNA.

“I have no reason to think that there was anything more to Pope Benedict’s resignation than what he said was its cause: his conviction that he no longer had the strength, physical and intellectual, to give the Church what it needed from a pope,” he said. 

“Everything else written about this is sheer speculation. Let’s take Benedict at his word,” Weigel said.

A life of prayer

In retiring to live in the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican Gardens, Benedict did not completely withdraw from the world. He attended public events in his new capacity as pope emeritus, received visitors, and pursued a life of fruitful study, writing, and prayer. 

Matthew Bunson, Catholic historian, author, and executive editor of EWTN News, told CNA that Benedict was determined not to exercise authority in his new role.

“He really embraced what it means to be pope emeritus, and refrained from making public comments, to instead live a life of prayer and reflection,” Bunson said.

“Benedict really was on retreat, and in prayer,” he said, “and that means we have his prayer for us as a Church.”

While becoming increasingly frail, Benedict continued to celebrate Mass daily with the other residents of the monastery and was known to enjoy spending time in the Vatican Gardens praying his daily rosary. 

In the fall of 2021, more than eight years after Benedict stepped down, his private secretary, Gänswein, told Domradio in Cologne, Germany, that Benedict was “stable in his frailty.” 

He described the pope emeritus as very weak physically but still clear in mind. Gänswein said he had not lost his “typical Bavarian humor.”

The meaning of Benedict’s renunciation for future popes

In 2013, after Benedict announced that he would step down as pope, Father Gianfranco Ghirlanda, a Jesuit theologian and canonist chosen by Pope Francis to be a cardinal, wrote an essay on what should happen when a pope steps down.

In the article, published in Civiltà Cattolica, Ghirlanda suggested the retiring Benedict take the title bishop emeritus of Rome. 

“It is evident that the pope who has resigned is no longer pope; therefore he no longer has any power in the Church and cannot interfere in any government affair. One may wonder what title Benedict XVI will retain. We think that he should be given the title of bishop emeritus of Rome, like any other diocesan bishop who ceases,” he said.

In December 2021, at a congress on papal resignations, Ghirlanda took up the theme again.

“Having two people with the title of ‘pope,’ even if one added ’emeritus,’ it cannot be said that this might not generate confusion in public opinion,” he said. 

To make clear that the pope who resigns is no longer pope, he said, he should perhaps be called “former Roman pontiff” or “former supreme pontiff.” 

Pope Francis in July 2022 told reporters that if he were to retire from the papacy he would do things differently from his predecessor. 

“The first experience went very well,” Pope Francis said, because Benedict XVI “is a holy and discreet man.”

In the future, however, “it would be better to define things or explain them better,” the pontiff added.

“I am the bishop of Rome. In that case I would be the bishop emeritus of Rome,” he said, and then suggested he would live in St. John Lateran Palace rather than at the Vatican.

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