by Michael Briody

When I saw Pope Leo appearing at the balcony, I had a reaction which surprised me – I felt that I had not mourned Pope Francis enough yet. It wasn’t that I thought anything had been rushed: 17days had elapsed since the death of Pope Francis on Easter Monday and, this will seem contradictory, I was pleased that the conclave had been short. It gave a good message that the cardinals had been open to the Holy Spirit and had coalesced rapidly around the one whom God had already elected.

It pleased me too that the cardinals had confounded the previous wisdom that they couldn’t elect a citizen of a major world power, and being old-fashioned, I liked the fact that he did wear the red mozzetta.

Finally, I knew he was an Augustinian friar. As seminarians at the Royal Scots College, Valladolid, we strode out every weekday to the local Augustinian seminary to receive philosophy and theology lectures from Augustinian friars. I thought that this pontificate could turn out to be a bit like going back to class, having Saint Augustine quoted at us on a regular basis.

And that’s what happened! Among his opening words at the inauguration Mass were: ‘You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you’. There couldn’t have been any of our lecturers who didn’t quote that at us in Valladolid but, understandably, Pope Leo used it because it is something our restless world needs to hear, as well as our restless Church, and our restless selves.

Unity

I think that a key section in the homily at Pope Leo’s inauguration Mass was about church unity: ‘I would like that our first great desire be for a united Church’.

Unity is already a recognised theme of his. He frequently uses words like ‘family’ and ‘harmony’ not ‘closing ourselves off in small groups’, not dissipating the energy of the Church with petty squabbles. None of this has to do with cutting ourselves off from the wider world but rather that we, the Church, become a ‘sign of unity and communion, which becomes a leaven for a reconciled world’.

He said: ‘for our part, we want to be a small leaven of unity, communion and fraternity within the world. We want to say to the world, with humility and joy: Look to Christ! Come closer to him! Welcome his word that enlightens and consoles! Listen to his offer of love and become his one family: in the one Christ, we are one’.

His episcopal motto ‘In Illo uno unum’, (in the One, we are one) taken from Saint Augustine, emphasises that it is Christ who unites. This holds good not just for the Church, but for the whole of humanity. He will preach Christ to the whole world.

‘Unitas, veritas, caritas’ are three Augustinian watchwords. To proclaim Christ is not easy. In his first Mass as Pope on 9 May, the day after his election, he said:

‘Even today, there are many settings in which the Christian faith is considered absurd, meant for the weak and unintelligent. Settings where other securities are preferred, like technology, money, success, power, or pleasure. These are contexts where it is not easy to preach the Gospel and bear witness to its truth, where believers are mocked, opposed, despised or at best tolerated and pitied. Yet, precisely for this reason, they are the places where our missionary outreach is desperately needed. A lack of faith is often tragically accompanied by the loss of meaning in life, the neglect of mercy, appalling violations of human dignity, the crisis of the family and so many other wounds that afflict our society’.

It is because of ‘caritas’ that we offer Christ Our Lord to the world. ‘It is never a question of capturing others by force, by religious propaganda or by means of power. Instead, it is always and only a question of loving as Jesus did’. The love of Christ urges us on’ (2 Cor 5: 14).

Continuity

Among the bits and pieces coming out from Rome since the cardinals came together for the General Congregations where they discussed the ‘job description’ of the pope to be elected, was a desire to continue Pope Francis’ outreach to the whole world, the doors of the Church were to be open for ‘todos, todos, todos’(everyone). There was also an equal desire that there would be clarity in matters of faith and morals. ‘We will speak the truth in love’ was an expression of Pope Saint John Paul II.

Did you notice that the chasuble worn by Pope Leo was the same worn by Pope John Paul at his inaugural Mass?

Pope Leo proclaimed: ‘Brothers and sisters, this is the hour for love! The heart of the Gospel is the love of God that makes us brothers and sisters. With my predecessor Leo XIII, we can ask ourselves today: If this criterion ‘were to prevail in the world, would not every conflict cease and peace return?’ (Rerum Novarum, 21).

Pope Leo says that communion is built primarily ‘on our knees’, through prayer. There is a feeling that this may be a more reflective, contemplative papacy in the sense that great emphasis will be put on recognising that prayer is the oxygen of the Church. Not only in daily private devotion, but also in public liturgies that are prayerful and unhurried, where people sense that they are devoting a crucially important time to God and each other. This is essential for any pastoral renewal and outreach to the world.

Fr Michael Briody is a priest of Motherwell Diocese.