THE POPE'S SPEECH

PRE- CONCLAVE SPEECH

The archbishop of Havana says that a speech given by Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio (now Pope Francis) during the cardinals' pre-conclave meetings was "masterful" and "clear."

Cardinal Jaime Lucas Ortega y Alamino spoke of Cardinal Bergoglio's speech at a Mass on Saturday in Cuba, having returned home from his trip to Rome to bid farewell to Benedict, participate in the conclave, and welcome Francis.

Cardinal Ortega said that Cardinal Bergoglio gave him the handwritten notes of the speech, and the permission to share the contents.

"Allow me to let you know, almost as an absolute first fruit, the thought of the Holy Father Francis on the mission of the Church," Cardinal Ortega said.

During Saturday's Mass, Havana's archbishop spoke of the address as "masterful, enlightening, calling for a commitment, and true."

Then he read the full text that the future Pope gave him, in which he summarizes in four points the thoughts he wished to share with his brother cardinals and which express his personal vision of the Church in the present time. Here is the text. The headings in caps are mine.

Then-Archbishop of Buenos Aires in  footwashing ceremony

"The Sweet and Comforting Joy of Evangelizing"

Reference was made to evangelization. It is the raison d'etre of the Church -- "the sweet and comforting joy of evangelizing" (Paul VI). It is Jesus Christ himself who impels us from within.

THE CHURCH GOING OUT OF HERSELF

1. - To evangelize implies apostolic zeal. To evangelize implies a desire in the Church to come out of herself. The Church is called to come out of herself and to go to the peripheries not only in the geographic sense but also the existential peripheries: those of the mystery of sin, of pain, of injustice, of ignorance, of doing without religion, of thought and of all misery.

THE SELF-REFERENT CHURCH

Popes should pay their hotel bills!

2. - When the Church does not come out of herself to evangelize, she becomes self-referent and then she gets sick. (cf. The hunchback woman of the Gospel). The evils that over the course of time happen in ecclesial institutions have their root in a self-reference and a sort of theological narcissism. In Revelation, Jesus says that he is at the door and knocks. Evidently the text refers to his knocking from outside in order to enter but I think of the times in which Jesus knocks from within so that we will let him come out. The self-referent Church keeps Jesus Christ within herself and does not let him come out.    

 

TWO IMAGES OF CHURCH

 3. - When the Church is self-referent without realizing it, she believes she has her own light. She ceases to be the mysterium lunae and gives way to that very great evil which is spiritual worldliness (according to De Lubac, it is the worst evil that can come upon the Church). The self-referent Church lives to give glory only to one another. In simple terms, there are two images of the Church: the evangelizing Church that comes out of herself; the Dei Verbum religiose audiens et fidente proclamans, and the worldly Church that lives within herself, of herself, for herself. This must give light to the possible changes and reforms which must be made for the salvation of souls.

THE JOB OF A POPE

Pope on Palm Sunday

4. - Thinking of the next Pope, he must be a man that from the contemplation and adoration of Jesus Christ, helps the Church to come out to the existential peripheries, that helps her to be the fruitful mother who lives from the sweet and comforting joy of evangelizing.   

 

After Francis' election, Cardinal Ortega again asked permission to share the text, and Francis again agreed. Cardinal Ortega reported that he is keeping the original as a special treasure of the Church and a privileged memento of the present Supreme Pontiff of the Church.        

BLOGGER'S NOTE

After reading this pre-conclave speech it's hard to accuse the new pope of "blind-siding" the people who elected him.  The cardinals in the conclave knew who they were electing. Let's pray for Pope Francis and for the Church, that we will all be able to put his Christ-like vision into practice.