“The Second Vatican Council is a milestone in the
history of the Catholic Church. Roncalli was a leader who was guided by
the Holy Spirit.” Pope John’s prophetic intuition to “convene the Council” and the fact he gave his life to ensuring its outcome was successful,” “his love for the Church’s tradition and his awareness of the crucial need to constantly update it,” remain a “beacon of light” for the Church.
Francis honoured the memory of John XXIII last Monday, saying “he was a man of government, a leader, who was guided by the Holy Spirit.”
The whole world had recognized in Pope John a pastor and a father: a shepherd because [he was] father. What made him such? How could he reach the hearts of so many different people, even many non-Christians?”
Pope Francis asked himself in his address to a group of pilgrims from the Italian diocese of Bergamo who were in Rome to commemorate the 50th anniversary of John XXIII’s death.
The Pope gave his address at around about the same time the Good Pope breathed his last breath 50 years ago.
Francis tried to answer this question by returning to the concept of peace.
Francis joined the pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square, where he knelt down in prayer before the urn with the beatified Pope’s remains.
Bergoglio (who was greeted by rounds of applause and a sea of waving handkerchiefs) addressed those present and after the mass celebrated by the Bishop of Bergamo, Francesco Beschi, he entered the Basilica with the Vatican Secretary of State, Tarcisio Bertone and the Archpriest of St. Peter’s, Angelo Comastri.
“Everything is as was announced to the Diocese of Bergamo,” the Holy See’s spokesman, Fr. Federico Lombardi told Vatican Insider. He added that the rumours which circulated in the afternoon concerning Tarcisio Bertone’s alleged resignation are untrue.
“Angelo Roncalli was a man who was able to communicate peace; a natural, serene, friendly, peace; a peace that, with his election to the Pontificate, was manifested to all the world and [came to be called his] ‘goodness’,” Francis remarked.
Francis described John XXIII as “an effective weaver of relationships and a good promoter of unity, inside and outside the Church community, open to dialogue with Christians of other Churches, with members of the Jewish and Muslim [traditions] and with many other men of good will.”
“Pope John conveyed peace because he had a mind deeply at peace, the fruit of a long and challenging work on himself, an effort that has left abundant traces in [his autobiography], Journal of a Soul.”
John XXIII passed on this Journal to his predecessor, to keep. “Exactly fifty years ago, just at this moment, Blessed John XXIII left this world,” Francis recalled. “Those who, like me, [are of] a certain age, retain a vivid memory of the commotion that spread everywhere in those days: St. Peter’s Square had become a sanctuary in the open, day and night welcoming the faithful of all ages and social conditions, in trepidation and prayer for the Pope's health,” Francis said.
“It’s so nice to find a good priest and this makes me think of St. Ignatius and I’m not trying to get publicity,” the Pope joked, alluding to the fact that St. Ignatius of Loyola is the founder of the Society of Jesus, the religious order to which Francis belongs. Saint Ignatius once spoke about the qualities a religious superior must have: “Make a long list and if he doesn’t have any of these virtues, he should at least be good, a father, a priest with goodness,” the Pope said.
Earlier today Francis called Roncalli “a model of holiness.” This afternoon, French Curia member and former Vatican culture “minister”, Cardinal Paul Poupard, spoke to Vatican Insider about the gathering of pilgrims from Bergamo.
“I told faithful about the moment John XXIII changed the course of history by announcing the Second Vatican Council,” the cardinal said. “I was working in the French section of the Vatican Secretariat of State at the time and papal secretary Loris Capovilla would come to me every day for information concerning the French Church. Roncalli had served as an Apostolic Nuncio to France.”
The cardinal, who was preparing to return to France for a round of conferences on Vatican II, made a revealing joke: “A month ago, I was in John XXIII’s hometown of Sotto il Monte, for a conference on Vatican II which was organised by the Pope Paul VI Institute I am a member of,” Cardinal Poupard said. “Mgr. Capovilla had just received a telephone call for Francis and he said to me: “It’s Pope John back from the dead.”
Fifty years ago Rome kept on saying: “There’ll never be another good and holy Pope like Roncalli.” And yet not we have one.”
In the afternoon, the group of pilgrims from Bergamo went to the Vatican for the anniversary of the Good Pope’s death, where they met Francis. John XXIII was chosen as a transitional pope. “And what a transition it was,” Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano wrote. This was in great part due to the surprising and crucial intuition John XXIII had of holding a Council, just weeks after he was elected Pope.
From a faith perspective, this was an act of divine providence and the news was explosive when it was announced on 25 January 1959.” The newspaper’s editor-in-chief, Maria Vian quoted the Gospel of John which describes Jesus’ first witness as a lamp that burns and shines brightly. This image, Vian said, perfectly sums up Roncalli’s human and Christian parable.
He added that John XXIII’s public death “was a complete first in the history of the Church because of the universal impact it had.”
The Pope’s message in St. Peter’s Square continued: “Fifty years after his death, the wise and fatherly guidance of Pope John, his love for the Church’s tradition and awareness of the constant need of renovation, the prophetic intuition of the convocation of the II Vatican Council and the offering of his life for its success, remain as milestones in the history of the Church of the twentieth century and as a beacon of light for the journey that lies ahead.”
In his introduction to the meeting with Francis, the Bishop of Bergamo said: “Allow me to confide to you that many of us see similarities between you and John XXIII in terms of gestures, language, attitude, evangelical passion and openness.”