Pope Francis, in his homily at today’s Ordinary Public Consistory in St Peter’s Basilica creating 17 new cardinals,
said that “The virus of polarization and animosity permeates our way of
thinking, feeling and acting,” and this is “contrary to the richness
and universality of the Church, which is tangibly evident in the College
of Cardinals.”
What should concern is the fact that “so many of our
brothers and sisters are living without the strength, light and
consolation born of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of
faith to support them, without meaning and a goal in life.”
Reflecting a practice initiated by John Paul II, the cardinals are
increasingly non-European, including some from small Churches that had
not cardinal in the past. Three of the new cardinals are in fact from or
based in Asia: Mario Zenari, apostolic nuncio to Syria; Patrick D'Rozario, Archbishop of Dhaka (Bangladesh); and Anthony Soter Fernandez,
Archbishop Emeritus of Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia). One of the new
cardinals, Mgr Sebastian Koto Khoarai, bishop emeritus of Mohale's Hoek
(Lesotho), was not present.
Card Zenari, invited to present the initial greeting and expression
of gratitude to the pontiff, said: "We are called by the ancient
Churches of the East, by young Churches and the Churches of the New
World" and "we are invited by her to be in a Church outward bound, in
the most diverse existential peripheries."
After reading a passage of the Gospel (Lk 6, 27-36), called
the ‘Sermon on the Plain’, Francis compared Jesus’ call to his disciples
to his to the new cardinals. “The call of the Apostles is linked to
this ‘setting out’, descending to the plain to encounter the multitudes
who, as the Gospel says, were ‘troubled’ (cf. v. 18). Instead of
keeping the Apostles at the top of the mountain, their being chosen
leads them to the heart of the crowd; it sets them in the midst of those
who are troubled, on the ‘plain’ of their daily lives.
“My dear brothers, newly created Cardinals, the journey towards
heaven begins in the plains, in a daily life broken and shared, spent
and given. In the quiet, daily gift of all that we are.”
The pontiff stressed the "four commands" Jesus gives: "Love, do good,
bless and pray. [. . .] They are four things we can easily do for our
friends and for those more or less close to us, people we like, people
whose tastes and habits are similar to our own. The problem comes when
Jesus tells us for whom we have do these things. Here he is very
clear. He minces no words; he uses no euphemisms. He tells us: ‘love
your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you;
pray for those who mistreat you’ (cf. vv. 27-28).
“These,” he added, “are not things we spontaneously do in dealing
with people we consider our opponents or enemies. Our first instinctive
reaction in such cases is to dismiss, discredit or curse them. Often
we try to ‘demonize’ them, so as to have a “sacred” justification for
dismissing them.
“Here we find ourselves confronted with one of the very hallmarks of
Jesus’ message, where its power and secret are concealed. Here too is
the source of our joy, the power of our mission and our preaching of the
Good News. My enemy is someone I must love. In God’s heart there are
no enemies. God only has sons and daughters. We are the ones who raise
walls, build barriers and label people. God has sons and daughters,
precisely so that no one will be turned away. God’s love has the
flavour of fidelity towards everyone, for it is a visceral love, a
parental love that never abandons us, even when we go astray. Our
Father does not wait for us to be good before he loves the world, he
does not wait for us to be a little bit better or more perfect before he
loves us; he loves us because he chose to love us, he loves us because
he has made us his sons and daughters. He loved us even when we were
enemies (cf. Rom 5:10).
The Father’s unconditional love for
all people was, and is, the true prerequisite for the conversion of our
pitiful hearts that tend to judge, divide, oppose and condemn. To know
that God continues to love even those who reject him is a boundless
source of confidence and an impetus for our mission. No matter how
sullied our hands may be, God cannot be stopped from placing in those
hands the Life he wishes to bestow on us.
“Ours is an age of grave global problems and issues. We live at a
time in which polarization and exclusion are burgeoning and considered
the only way to resolve conflicts. We see, for example, how quickly
those among us with the status of a stranger, an immigrant, or a
refugee, become a threat, take on the status of an enemy. An enemy
because they come from a distant country or have different customs. An
enemy because of the colour of their skin, their language or their
social class. An enemy because they think differently or even have a
different faith. An enemy because… And, without our realizing it, this
way of thinking becomes part of the way we live and act. Everything
and everyone then begins to savour of animosity. Little by little, our
differences turn into symptoms of hostility, threats and violence. How
many wounds grow deeper due to this epidemic of animosity and violence,
which leaves its mark on the flesh of many of the defenceless, because
their voice is weak and silenced by this pathology of indifference!
“How many situations of uncertainty and suffering are sown by this
growing animosity between peoples, between us! Yes, between us, within
our communities, our priests, our meetings. The virus of polarization
and animosity permeates our way of thinking, feeling and acting. We are
not immune from this and we need to take care lest such attitudes find a
place in our hearts, because this would be contrary to the richness and
universality of the Church, which is tangibly evident in the College of
Cardinals. We come from distant lands; we have different traditions,
skin colour, languages and social backgrounds; we think differently and
we celebrate our faith in a variety of rites. None of this makes us
enemies; instead, it is one of our greatest riches.”
The pope ended with a few recommendations. “Jesus never stops “coming
down from the mountain”. He constantly desires to enter the crossroads
of our history to proclaim the Gospel of Mercy. Jesus continues to
call us and to send us to the “plain” where our people dwell. He
continues to invite us to spend our lives sustaining our people in hope,
so that they can be signs of reconciliation. As the Church, we are
constantly being asked to open our eyes to see the wounds of so many of
our brothers and sisters deprived of their dignity, deprived in their
dignity.
“My dear brothers, newly created Cardinals, the journey towards
heaven begins in the plains, in a daily life broken and shared, spent
and given. In the quiet, daily gift of all that we are. Our
mountaintop is this quality of love; our goal and aspiration is to
strive, on life’s plain, together with the People of God, to become
persons capable of forgiveness and reconciliation.
“Today each of you, dear brothers, is asked to cherish in your own
heart, and in the heart of the Church, this summons to be merciful like
the Father. And to realize that “if something should rightly disturb us
and trouble our consciences, it is the fact that so many of our
brothers and sisters are living without the strength, light and
consolation born of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of
faith to support them, without meaning and a goal in life” (Evangelii Gaudium, 49).”
At the end of the Consistory, the pope and the new cardinals went to
Mater Ecclesiae Monastery to meet with Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI.