‘Discern and order’: Cardinal calls for continuation of Pope Francis’ reform path

Vatican City, Sep 2, 2017 / 11:13 am (CNA/EWTN News).- In a meeting with religious leaders from Korea on Saturday, Pope Francis said the world is looking to them for an example of how to work together peacefully in order to combat violence and preserve the dignity and rights of all people.

“We have, therefore, a long journey ahead of us, which must be undertaken together with humility and perseverance, not just by raising our voices but by rolling up our sleeves,” the Pope said Sept. 2.

We must work “to sow the hope of a future in which humanity becomes more human, a future which heeds the cry of so many who reject war and implore greater harmony between individuals and communities, between peoples and states,” he continued.

Francis met with leaders of Korea’s seven major religions, including Archbishop Hyginus Kim Hee-jong of Gwangju, president of the Korean bishops’ conference, Sept. 2. The group’s visit to the Vatican took place as threats of nuclear war with North Korea continue to grow.

“We will him ask to impart his prayers and help the Korean people for the reunification of the Korean peninsula,” Archbishop Kim said ahead of the trip, as reported by the Italian news agency Agensir.

“Pope Francis is well informed and closely follows the situation; the Holy Father deeply hopes in the establishment of peace in the Korean peninsula.”

In the meeting Saturday, Francis said religious leaders are called to “initiate, promote and accompany processes for the welfare and reconciliation of all people.”

He called on them to reject violence, and to speak with words which oppose the current “narrative of fear” and “rhetoric of hatred” in the world. “The world is looking to us,” he urged, “it asks us to work together and with all men and women of good will.”

Archbishop Kim also met with Pope Francis in May, when he came to Rome as a special envoy for Korea’s newly-elected President Moon Jae-in.

According to a newsletter from the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Korea (CBCK), during that visit Archbishop Kim asked Francis to “pray for peace and the reconciliation of the Korean people, expressing gratitude for the Holy Father’s special affection and care for Korea.”

“According to the Archbishop, the Holy Father showed a deep understanding of the situation on the Korean Peninsula, putting emphasis on the importance of dialogue without resort to armed force in dealing with the current difficulties,” the announcement continued.

In August, the CBCK issued an appeal for peace on the Korean peninsula which addressed authorities in North and South Korea, in neighboring countries, Koreans, and Christians around the world.

“Peace on the Korean Peninsula,” it said, “can function as a balance weight for international peace and stability beyond that of the Northeast Asia.”

“The current situation on the Korean Peninsula demands our collective efforts to awaken our conscience and use our intelligence in the spirit of solidarity, compassion, cooperation and respect. We must not overlook this crisis with indifference and silence.”

In his speech, Pope Francis also appealed to a spirit of cooperation, especially between religions. The world, he said, “looks to us for answers and a shared commitment to various issues: the sacred dignity of the human person, the hunger and poverty which still afflict too many peoples, the rejection of violence.”

In particular we must reject that violence which profanes the name of God, as well as the corruption that promotes injustice, moral decline, and a crisis of the family, the economy and of hope,” he said.

The Pope pointed out that when interreligious dialogue is open and respectful this is when it can bear fruit leading to the promotion of peace and the common good.

With mutual respect is also found “the right to life, physical integrity and fundamental freedoms, such as those of conscience, religion, thought and expression” from which the foundations for lasting peace are built, something we are all called to pray and work for, he said.

Pope Francis met with Korean religious leaders induring a visit to the country in August 2014 as well, which he recalled with gratitude to God and the beloved Korean people.

“I constantly pray that God will bestow upon them the gifts of peace and fraternal reconciliation,” he concluded. May our mindfulness of the friendship and the good things we have received from one another grant us the strength to move forward together, with the help of God.”

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Rome Newsroom, May 21, 2020 / 10:45 am (CNA).- After the Vatican stopped livestreaming Pope Francis’ daily Masses this week, Catholics from around the world have urged the pope to resume the broadcast.

The pope’s Mass livestream ended May 18, the day dioceses throughout Italy were able to resume public Masses. But many Catholics in other countries remain without access to the Mass. 

This is the case for the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary in Nairobi, Kenya, where a lockdown has been extended until June 6 closing all places of public worship.

Sister Mary Anne Williamson wrote a letter on behalf of her religious community, asking if the Pope Francis’ live Mass broadcast could be reinstated. She told CNA that the sisters were “dismayed” when they learned that the broadcast of the pope’s Mass would be discontinued.

“When our churches closed about eight weeks ago, we began to have a Liturgy of the Word in our chapel. But then we heard that our sisters in our general house in Rome, also locked down, were celebrating with the Mass of the Holy Father from their house. We found EWTN on our TV channel server Zuku and began to join at 8 a.m. Nairobi time,” she said.

The sisters gathered together to watch the pope’s Mass after morning prayer in their chapel. Williamson said the missionary sisters found it meaningful to pray in this way in union with the pope and Christians throughout the world.

“We really appreciated the Holy Father’s homily and the translations done by Sister Bernadette,” she said. “We also appreciated the moments of Eucharistic adoration at the end of the morning Mass at Santa Marta.”

“We know that the Mass of Pope Francis was appreciated by others and probably many around the world. We will continue to hope that Vatican Media will be able to broadcast again.”

While some countries in Europe are easing their lockdowns, Catholics in India, Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, England, Switzerland, and other countries remain without access to public Mass. In Ireland, churches are not expected to reopen until July. 

Pope Francis first began streaming his morning Mass from the chapel of Casa Santa Marta, his Vatican City residence, on March 9, the day after dioceses across Italy suspended public Masses following a government ordinance. The Vatican spokesman said the livestream was being offered to “to allow those who wish to follow the celebrations in union of prayer with the Bishop of Rome.”

At the beginning of Mass each day, the pope offered a different prayer intention, often related to the suffering inflicted by the coronavirus pandemic.

Announcing the end of the pope’s Mass livestreams, the Vatican spokesman said: “The Pope wishes that the People of God could thus return to communal familiarity with the Lord in the sacraments, participating in the Sunday liturgy and resuming, also in churches, the daily visitation of the Lord and his Word.”

An ACI Prensa article reporting on the conclusion of the daily Mass broadcast from the Vatican received more than 1,900 comments on social media, with people expressing gratitude for the livestream and asking why it was being canceled when dioceses in parts of Latin America are still under lockdown. 

“Thank you very much, Holy Father, but I hope you consider it for the countries of Mexico and America that we remain quarantined and it is very valuable to vibrate with your presence and guidance. May the Lord bless you and be with you always,” Carmen Vazquez wrote in Spanish.

From Costa Rica, Sandra Fernandez Es wrote: “It is a great loss, how sad. I had already become used to watching it in the very early morning, and it was very good for me.”

“I came to think I was the only one who would miss Mass with the Pope. In Puerto Rico, we are still quarantined,” said Iris Lugo.

Mary Grenada wrote from Argentina: “Too bad!!! It was very important for us every day to have mass at home. I hope they send our request to continue to the Pope. Thank you!!! From Argentina.”

Catherine Addington wrote on Twitter on May 19 : “I miss the @Pontifex daily Mass livestream.”

I miss the @Pontifex daily Mass livestream ?

— Catherine Addington (@caddington11) May 19, 2020

Vatican News reported May 20 that thousands of people in China had watched a translated livestream of the pope’s Mass via WeChat and that the news that the live broadcast would be ending was “greeted with some suffering and also with some tears.”

Vatican News said that it had received messages from thousands of people expressing appreciation for the pope’s Mass livestream during the pandemic.

Sister Mary Anne told CNA that she believes that even in places where churches are reopened, like Italy, the homebound and other Catholics would likely appreciate the opportunity to view the pope’s Masses and hear his homilies.

She said that during quarantine the sisters in Kenya had been teaching students using Zoom, but internet and electricity cuts to some students’ homes made it challenging. 

“We know we are among the fortunate ones with a chapel, internet access, food and shelter. Our life of prayer and work can continue, although in new ways,” she said. “Our days, especially our Eucharistic adoration in turns, are offered for our suffering world and the end of this pandemic.”

As public Masses resume in some parts of the world, parishes will also be deciding whether to continue the Mass livestreams that they offered during the pandemic. 

Fr. Gregory Apparcel, rector of St. Patrick’s Church, Rome’s English-speaking parish, told CNA that the parish livestream had gained a much wider audience than he had expected.

“We also have many, many people participating in these Masses from the U.S. and other countries where public Masses are not yet available. And, also from many people who are homebound for many other reasons,” he said.

The priest said he had received requests to continue the Masses despite the lockdown’s end.

“They hope that we will continue to do this, which we will try to do throughout the summer, and beyond if necessary,” he said.

“It has opened up a new ministry that we never thought we needed to do.”

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Vatican City, May 9, 2018 / 02:46 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis said Wednesday that nothing can take away a person’s baptism or the salvation and identity they gain as a child of God, which is why the Church only allows for the sacrament to be administered once.

“Baptism is not repeated because it imprints an indelible spiritual sign: This sign is never erased by any sin, though sin prevents baptism from bringing the fruit of salvation,” the pope said during his May 9 general audience.

Just as parents give their children earthly life, the Church gives spiritual life through baptism, making each person a son of God through Jesus Christ, he said, explaining that at the moment of baptism, God tells each person that “you are my beloved child.”

“This paternal voice, imperceptible to the ear but well audible to the heart of those who believe, accompanies us for our entire lives, without abandoning us,” he said, adding that this is why the Church believes in only one baptism for salvation.

The belonging a person obtains from baptism “is something you never lose,” Francis said, even if a person sins with something as serious as murder, their belonging to God and his Church never goes away, “he continues to be a son.”

Even though everyone is a sinner and there is a great need for conversion in life of each person, “God never rejects his children,” he said, and asked the crowd to repeat the phrase with him out loud.

Speaking to pilgrims who braved a rainy forecast to join him for the audience in St. Peter’s Square, the pope continued his catechesis on baptism, focusing this week on the moment a person is actually baptized when the priest invokes the Trinity, saying “I baptize you in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”

He then pointed to the biblical passage in St. Paul’s letter to the Romans in which the apostle asked: “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.”

The baptismal font is the place where one actually rises with Christ, he said, adding that in baptism, “the old man is buried, with his deceptive passions, so that he is reborn as a new creature.”

“At the same time you die and are born, and the same salutary wave becomes for you tomb and mother,” the pope said, quoting St. Cyril of Jerusalem.

Man’s rebirth as a new creation, then, naturally “demands that the man corrupted by sin is reduced to dust,” he said, adding that the images of the tomb and of the maternal womb referred to by St. Cyril are “incisive” phrases which express the reality of what happens during baptism.

To be incorporated in the body of Christ through baptism means one must also conform to him, Francis said, adding that the action of the Holy Spirit during the sacrament purifies, sanctifies and justifies the person in order to bring them into one body united to Christ.

This dynamic is expressed when the priest anoints the baptized person with oil after reciting the phrase: “God himself consecrates you with the chrism of salvation so that inserted into Christ, priest, king, and prophet, you will always be members of his body for eternal life.”

Pope Francis closed his address saying the entire vocation of a Catholic can be summed up as the necessity to live united to Jesus Christ and his Church “in order to carry out the same mission in this world, bringing fruits which last forever.”

“Animated by the only Spirit, the entire People of God participate in the functions of Jesus Christ, priest, prophet and king, and carry the responsibility of the mission and service that derive from them,” he said.

To participate in the kingly and prophetic priesthood of Christ, he said, means above all “to make oneself a free offering to God, giving testimony through a life of faith and charity, putting them at the service of others in the example of the Lord Jesus.”

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