Pope’s personal secretary will return to Vatican Congregation for Bishops

Pope Francis waves to the crowds at the general audience in St. Peter’s Square on Sept 2, 2015. / Daniel Ibanez/CNA.

Vatican City, Jul 17, 2021 / 05:00 am (CNA).

Pope Francis urged members of the Order of Friars Minor on Saturday to seek renewal as they face “the challenges of declining numbers and aging.”

In a message to participants of the order’s general chapter in Rome on July 17, the pope encouraged the Franciscan Friars, known by the initials O.F.M., not to be paralyzed by worry.

“As much of the order faces the challenges of declining numbers and aging, do not let anxiety and fear prevent you from opening your hearts and minds to the renewal and revitalization that the Spirit of God is stirring in you and among you,” he said.

“You have a spiritual heritage of inestimable richness, rooted in the Gospel life and characterized by prayer, fraternity, poverty, minority, and itinerancy.”

“Do not forget that we receive from our closeness to the poor, the victims of modern slavery, the refugees, and the excluded of this world, a renewed gaze, capable of opening us to God’s future. They are your teachers. Embrace them as St. Francis did!”

The general chapter is taking place on July 3-18 on the theme of “Renewing Our Vision, Embracing Our Future.”

The order announced on July 13 that it had elected a new leader, Fr. Massimo Fusarelli, who will serve a six-year term as minister general. He succeeds Fr. Michael Perry, a native of Indianapolis, who led the order since 2013.

In his message, the pope said: “I greet with affection all of you who are participating in the general chapter of the Order of Friars Minor. A grateful thought goes out to Fr. Michael A. Perry, who has concluded his service as minister general, and I offer my best wishes to Fr. Massimo Giovanni Fusarelli, who has been called to succeed him.”

The pope recalled that St. Francis of Assisi wrote in his Testament that he used to be nauseated by the sight of lepers, but that after he met them, he felt transformed.

“At the roots of your spirituality is this encounter with the least and the suffering, in the sign of ‘doing mercy,’” he said. “God touched Francis’ heart through the mercy offered to his brother, and he continues to touch our hearts through his encounter with others, especially those most in need.”

“The renewal of your vision can only start from this new look with which to contemplate the poor and marginalized brother, a sign, almost a sacrament, of God’s presence.”

He continued: “From this renewed gaze, from this concrete experience of encounter with our neighbor and his wounds, can come a renewed energy to look to the future as brothers and as minors, as you are, according to the beautiful name of ‘Friars Minor’ that St. Francis chose for himself and for you.”

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This year Pope Francis did not walk in the Eucharistic procession, but joined at the end for adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and to offer the Eucharistic blessing. / Credit: Elizabeth Alva/EWTN News

Rome, Italy, Jun 2, 2024 / 16:44 pm (CNA).

Pope Francis gave a solemn blessing with the Blessed Sacrament from the steps of the Basilica of Saint Mary Major on Sunday in the culmination of a Eucharistic procession through the streets of Rome.

Holding the monstrance in his hands, the pope offered the blessing on the Solemnity of Corpus Christi on June 2 following prayers of adoration in front of the Blessed Sacrament. 

Crowds lined the streets as the Eucharist was carried under a canopy from the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran to the Basilica of St. Mary Major along the Via Merulana, following the historic route Pope Gregory XIII created for religious processions between the two basilicas during the Jubilee of 1575.

Cardinals, bishops, priests, religious sisters, and families walked together in the one-hour procession singing hymns and reciting prayers. Curious tourists stopped to ask what was happening and onlookers leaned out their windows to watch as the real presence of Christ passed by.

“Beginning from the altar, we will carry the Consecrated Host among the homes of our city,” Pope Francis told the congregation in his homily for the Corpus Christi Mass before the procession. 

“We are not doing this to show off, or to flaunt our faith but to invite everyone to participate, in the Bread of the Eucharist, in the new life that Jesus has given us,” he said. 

It was the first time that Pope Francis participated in Corpus Christi celebrations in Rome in years. 

Health issues prevented the pope from participating in a public Corpus Christi Mass in Rome in 2023 and 2022 and COVID-19 restrictions limited his celebration to Vatican City in 2021 and 2020.

This year Pope Francis did not walk in the Eucharistic procession, but joined at the end for adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and to offer the Eucharistic blessing to the crowd.

Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, the prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of Faith, served as the primary celebrant at the altar for the Mass at the Lateran basilica. Bishop Baldassare Reina, the vicegerent of the diocese of Rome, carried the Eucharist in the procession. 

The last time that the pope led the Corpus Christi procession along the traditional Roman route from the Lateran basilica to St. Mary Major was seven years ago in 2017. 

“The Eucharistic bread is the real presence,” Pope Francis said in his homily. “This speaks to us of a God who is not distant and jealous, but close and in solidarity with humanity; a God who does not abandon us but always seeks, waits for, and accompanies us, even to the point of placing himself, helpless, into our hands, subjecting himself to our acceptance or rejection.”

“Dear brothers and sisters, how much need there is in our world for this bread,” Francis said. 

“It is urgent to bring back to the world the good and fresh aroma of the bread of love, to continue to hope and rebuild without ever growing weary of what hatred destroys.”

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Pope Francis at the general audience in St. Peter’s Square on June 28, 2023. / Daniel Ibanez/CNA

Vatican City, Jun 28, 2023 / 05:03 am (CNA).

At his first general audience in three weeks, Pope Francis praised the evangelization efforts of St. Mary MacKillop, a religious sister who devoted her life to providing Catholic education to the poor in rural Australia.

“Mary MacKillop was convinced that the purpose of education is the integral development of the person both as an individual and as a member of the community; and that this requires wisdom, patience and charity on the part of every teacher,” the pope said in a hot St. Peter’s Square on June 28.

Commenting on the late June weather, Francis asked pilgrims at the start of the event “to be a little patient today in this heat.”

“Thank you for coming in this heat, with this sunshine, thank you so much for your visit,” he added.

Pope Francis held his usual weekly audience for the first time since June 7, the morning of the day he underwent a three-hour abdominal surgery under anesthesia to correct an incisional hernia.

Last week’s public audience was canceled to allow the pope more time to recover from surgery. In July the weekly audience is canceled for a summer break. It will resume on Aug. 9, after Pope Francis returns from a visit to Portugal for World Youth Day 2023 in Lisbon.

Continuing a series of lessons on apostolic zeal, Pope Francis on Wednesday highlighted Australia’s first and only Catholic saint: Mary MacKillop.

MacKillop was the first of eight children born to Scottish immigrants in 1842, in what is now known as Melbourne. At the time, the European settlement in Australia had been established for a little over 50 years.

MacKillop, whose family had its own economic problems, dreamed of offering free education to Australia’s Catholic rural poor.

With the help of her spiritual director and mentor, she developed a plan for a congregation of sisters to aid those in need in Australia’s vast countryside. She took the religious name St. Mary of the Cross, and founded what would go on to be the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Sacred Heart.

MacKillop’s sisters established many schools and orphanages across Australia, including in the “bush.”

Pope Francis said MacKillop believed Catholic education was also “a great form of evangelization.”

“Indeed, education does not consist of filling the head with ideas, just this no,” he said. “In what does education consist? In accompanying and encouraging students on the path of human and spiritual growth, showing them how friendship with the Risen Jesus expands the heart and makes life more human.”

“To educate is to help to think well; to feel well — the language of the heart; and to do well — the language of the hands,” Francis continued. “This vision is fully relevant today…”

The pope noted that MacKillop did not, however, have an easy path to fulfilling her mission of sharing the Good News with those in need.

“You see: all the saints have found opposition, even within the Church,” he explained.

MacKillop “had to pay bills, negotiate with local bishops and priests, manage the schools and look after the professional and spiritual formation of her sisters; and, later, she suffered health problems. Yet, through it all, she remained calm, patiently carrying the cross that is an integral part of the mission,” he said.

“Mary,” Pope Francis emphasized, “had great faith in God’s Providence: she was always confident that in any situation God provides.”

The pope also underlined the saint’s great care for the poor and marginalized, which pushed her “to go where others would not or could not go.”

“This is very important,” he said. “On the road to holiness, which is the Christian road, the poor and the marginalized are protagonists, and a person cannot move forward in holiness unless he also devotes himself to them in one way or another. They, who need the Lord’s help, carry the presence of the Lord.”

Francis recalled being struck once by a line he read that said: “the protagonist of the story is the beggar: beggars are those who draw attention to injustice, which is the great poverty in the world.”

He also lamented that money is spent on making weapons instead of on producing food.

“Don’t forget: there is no holiness if, in one way or another, there is no care for the poor, for the needy, for those who are somewhat on the margins of society,” he said.

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