Pope Francis attends funeral of Cardinal Sodano

Rome, Italy, Feb 22, 2019 / 05:02 am (CNA).- American women from the Catholic Worker Movement are in Rome this week to pray for the Vatican’s sexual abuse summit in emulation of Dorothy Day’s Roman pilgrimage to fast and pray for peace.

“We’ve all been very deeply grieved by the sex abuse crisis, and the crisis it has created for the entire Church,” Catholic Worker Movement leader Johanna Berrigan told CNA Feb. 21.

“It just dawned on us that this would be an important time to be in Rome, to bear witness to the suffering Church that we care deeply about and … we wanted to address ways for reform,” she said.

Through her involvement in the Catholic Worker Movement, a group dedicated to aiding and advocating for the poor, Berrigan co-founded the Catholic Worker Free Clinic for homeless and uninsured adults in Philadelphia in 1991 and opened another medical clinic in Haiti in 2005.

Berrigan, along with six other women, decided in November that they wanted to be in Rome as the summit was happening to pray and to give a voice to women, mothers, and lay people in the Vatican’s discussion of the issue.

“When we first heard about it, it was strictly bishops that were invited, we have since learned that there has been some lay involvement,” Berrigan explained.

Three of the nine official speakers at the Vatican sex abuse summit Feb. 21 – 24 are women, one of whom is a religious sister from Nigeria, Sister Veronica Openibo.

On the first day of the summit, the women were invited for a surprise visit to the US Embassy to the Holy See, where they met with Ambassador Callista Gingrich to discuss their perspective on the sex abuse crisis.

The seven Catholic Worker Movement women on pilgrimage meet each day to decide which historic churches they should visit to pray for the summit.

“We have an example in Dorothy Day, our foundress, who came to Rome in another significant point in the Church’s history and she and a delegation of women came on pilgrimage to fast and pray for the Church to recognize ‘conscientious objection,’ and really calling for an end to nuclear weapons. So we have that in our history,” Berrigan said.

Dorothy Day, whose cause for canonization has been opened, founded the Catholic Worker Movement with Peter Maurin in 1933, starting soup kitchens, farm communities, and a Catholic newspaper. She dedicated her life to aiding and advocating for the poor and leading a life characterized by voluntary poverty and works of mercy.

During their time in Rome, the Catholic Worker Movement women attended a sex abuse survivors’ vigil sponsored by Ending Clergy Abuse Feb. 21 in solidarity with victims.

At the vigil, the women called for justice for survivors and an end to clericalism, as well as truth, reconciliation and healing for the entire Church.

“We care deeply about this Church, we are very, very grateful that Pope Francis has called this summit. It seems to be a step forward,” Berrigan said.

“The world is watching … people of all faiths are watching to see what the outcome of [this summit] is going to be,” she said.

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Vatican City, Mar 3, 2018 / 03:15 am (CNA/EWTN News).- When pilgrims in the Eternal City hope to get an up-close view of the pope, or even shake his hand, they are usually advised to arrive at the Vatican early, to sit next to the barrier and, most importantly, to find a baby.

Brian and Kelle Smith, whose youngest son Bobby recently made his debut on the Pope’s Instagram account, only needed the first two suggestions. They’d come prepared with the baby.

Like many pilgrims who visit Rome, on Wednesday morning they woke up early, gathered their six children and braved the rain and long security lines before making in into the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall for Pope Francis’ Feb. 28 general audience.

Almost as soon as he entered the hall, Francis saw the family and made a beeline to the kids, giving each of them a blessing and patting Bobby, 2, on the cheeks. The toddler, perched on the barrier, has his eyes fixed on the Pope’s pectoral cross.

Instead of continuing down the line, Francis paused when he saw Bobby pointing to his chest, and stepped closer, allowing the boy to trace his finger along the chain holding his pectoral cross.

<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet” data-lang=”en”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”><a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/PopeFrancis?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#PopeFrancis</a> greets a young child at today’s audience who wants to get a better look at the Cross he wears. <a href=”https://t.co/vXH0u7UHqv”>pic.twitter.com/vXH0u7UHqv</a></p>&mdash; Mary Shovlain (@maryshovlain) <a href=”https://twitter.com/maryshovlain/status/968773182936289280?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>February 28, 2018</a></blockquote>
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Video footage of the encounter shows the Pope flashing a big smile and giving Bobby a final pat on the cheek before moving down the line of pilgrims.

Clips of the interaction immediately went up on Twitter, and later that day a close-up of the Bobby touching Francis’ cross went up on the Pope’s Instagram account, Franciscus.

In a March 2 interview with CNA, Brian Smith, the boy’s father, said it was a special moment for the family, “and Pope Francis was great, he was engaging with [Bobby].”

Smith said his son had been waving at the Pope as he walked in, “and he’s got the curly blonde hair, so I guess he caught Pope Francis’ eye.”

Francis, he said, “was very warm, and he spent a lot of time with the kids, really engaging with my youngest son.”

Though the interaction only lasted about 20 seconds, Smith was moved by the amount of time Pope Francis spent with them. “He’s the Pope, he’s the leader of our Church, of a billion Catholics, and he came and spent that amount of time with us when thousands of people were there to see him.”

During the brief encounter both the Pope and Bobby were talking with each other, Francis spoke in Italian and Bobby in baby-babble. However, with the noise and the excitement of the moment, Smith said he couldn’t make out what either was trying to say.

“It all seemed to happen so fast,” he said, noting that Francis “came and touched all six of the kids’ heads and gave them all a blessing, which was great.”

The family left Rome Thursday night and returned to Germany, where Smith is stationed with the U.S. military. They didn’t know about the Pope’s Instagram post until the next day, when a friend sent them a link to the post on Facebook.

“It was a pretty neat photo, the photographer did a great job capturing it,” he said. “It was pretty meaningful.”

<blockquote class=”instagram-media” data-instgrm-captioned data-instgrm-permalink=”https://www.instagram.com/p/Bfvu1NMDWx-/” data-instgrm-version=”8″ style=” background:#FFF; border:0; border-radius:3px; box-shadow:0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width:658px; padding:0; width:99.375%; width:-webkit-calc(100% – 2px); width:calc(100% – 2px);”><div style=”padding:8px;”> <div style=” background:#F8F8F8; line-height:0; margin-top:40px; padding:50.0% 0; text-align:center; width:100%;”> <div style=” background:url(data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAACwAAAAsCAMAAAApWqozAAAABGdBTUEAALGPC/xhBQAAAAFzUkdCAK7OHOkAAAAMUExURczMzPf399fX1+bm5mzY9AMAAADiSURBVDjLvZXbEsMgCES5/P8/t9FuRVCRmU73JWlzosgSIIZURCjo/ad+EQJJB4Hv8BFt+IDpQoCx1wjOSBFhh2XssxEIYn3ulI/6MNReE07UIWJEv8UEOWDS88LY97kqyTliJKKtuYBbruAyVh5wOHiXmpi5we58Ek028czwyuQdLKPG1Bkb4NnM+VeAnfHqn1k4+GPT6uGQcvu2h2OVuIf/gWUFyy8OWEpdyZSa3aVCqpVoVvzZZ2VTnn2wU8qzVjDDetO90GSy9mVLqtgYSy231MxrY6I2gGqjrTY0L8fxCxfCBbhWrsYYAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC); display:block; height:44px; margin:0 auto -44px; position:relative; top:-22px; width:44px;”></div></div> <p style=” margin:8px 0 0 0; padding:0 4px;”> <a href=”https://www.instagram.com/p/Bfvu1NMDWx-/” style=” color:#000; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px; text-decoration:none; word-wrap:break-word;” target=”_blank”>#GeneralAudience</a></p> <p style=” color:#c9c8cd; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; line-height:17px; margin-bottom:0; margin-top:8px; overflow:hidden; padding:8px 0 7px; text-align:center; text-overflow:ellipsis; white-space:nowrap;”>A post shared by <a href=”https://www.instagram.com/franciscus/” style=” color:#c9c8cd; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px;” target=”_blank”> Pope Francis</a> (@franciscus) on <time style=” font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; line-height:17px;” datetime=”2018-02-28T15:42:59+00:00″>Feb 28, 2018 at 7:42am PST</time></p></div></blockquote> <script async defer src=”//www.instagram.com/embed.js”></script>

After living in Germany for two years, the family is set to return to the United States in six months, and had wanted to visit Rome one last time before going back.

“We basically just went to Rome to see the Pope,” Smith said, explaining that they had initially planned to attend the general audience in January while visiting a friend in Italy, but had to cancel the Rome portion of the trip because the Pope was in South America.

However, it wasn’t their first time meeting the Vicar of Christ. Though it was their first interaction with Pope Francis, Brian, Kelle and their three oldest children met Benedict XVI during his Mass for Pentecost in 2010.

“One thing about both of them is that popes love babies,” he said, recalling that as soon as Benedict entered St. Peter’s Basilica “he saw the children and he just ignored everybody else and came for the kids and blessed them.”

“So my older three kids don’t have an excuse,” he joked, “because they’ve been blessed by two popes.”

Smith said that while he is excited to return to his home in Texas for a few years, he has enjoyed living in Europe, where, despite a general decline in the practice of the Christian faith, “there’s still so many great sites…Pretty much all of modern Europe is based on 1,000 years of the Church being here. So it’s great.”

Highlights of their time in Europe have included visits to Fatima, Orvieto and Lourdes, where Smith participated in the annual military pilgrimage to the shrine, as well as many other places where saints are buried.

However, Smith said perhaps the biggest highlight was having his son Bobby – who is named after Jesuit St. Robert Bellarmine – baptized by a Jesuit priest he knows during Mass celebrated at the saint’s tomb in Rome.

“This has been a great posting for us,” he said, “because you hear about things but America is not really a Catholic country, so it’s great to be able to see all of these pilgrimage places, it’s a great blessing.”

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Vatican City, Sep 30, 2017 / 09:14 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Saturday the Vatican announced Pope Francis’ appointment of Cardinal Raymond Burke as a member of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura – the Holy See’s highest court – which he previously headed for six years.

Burke, 69, is currently patron of the Order of the Knights of Malta, which he was appointed to in 2014 by Pope Francis. An expert in canon law, he served as prefect of the Apostolic Signatura from 2008 to 2014.

Other members added to the tribunal were Cardinal Agostino Vallini, 77, and Cardinal Edoardo Menichelli, also 77. Vallini was prefect of the Apostolic Signatura before Burke, from 2004 to 2008. He then served as Vicar General of Rome until his retirement in May of this year.

It is Menichelli’s first appointment to the Roman Curia. He retired as archbishop of Ancona-Osimo, Italy in July. Other new members to the court include Msgr. Frans Daneels and Msgr. Johannes Willibrordus Maria Hendriks.

Saturday Pope Francis also named Fr. Denis Baudot, a priest of the Archdiocese of Lyon and currently an official of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, judicial vicar of the Ecclesiastical Tribunal of Vatican City.

The Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura is one of three courts within the Holy See. The others are the Apostolic Penitentiary and the Tribunal of the Roman Rota.

The Signatura, as it’s called, functions sort of like a Supreme Court and the Apostolic Penitentiary is the court in charge of cases involving excommunication and serious sins, including those whose absolution is reserved to the Holy See.

The Rota is akin to a court of appeals or court of “last instance,” and is also where marriage annulment cases are judged.

Burke was born on June 30, 1948 in Richland Center, Wisconsin. He was ordained a priest in 1975, serving the Diocese of La Crosse until his appointment as bishop of La Crosse in 1994.

Before becoming prefect of the Apostolic Signatura in 2008, the American cardinal had served as archbishop of St. Louis, Missouri since 2003.
    
As the chaplain of the Knights of Malta, Burke has clashed with the Holy See over the removal of the Grand Chancellor of the Knights. He is also one of four cardinals who signed the controversial dubia, a letter asking Pope Francis to clarify parts of his apostolic exhortation “Amoris Laetitia.”

In an interview Sept. 24 Burke said that he’s been wrongly depicted as the “enemy” of Pope Francis.

Even though he believes that the current division in the Church demands an answer to requests for clarity, he noted that as faithful Catholics, those who have expressed doubt or concern over the confusion surrounding “Amoris Laetitia” love the Pope “with complete obedience to the office of Peter.”

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