I vividly remember sitting in this chair last year
on March 13, and seeing the new pope step out on the balcony over Saint Peter’s
Square. He was different from the
beginning, graciously but firmly refusing the big chair and the red shoes…
referring to himself as the Bishop of Rome.
Since then he’s done many things no pope in living
memory has done, all of them directed to the people.
I attribute some of his behavior and choices to his
formation and identity as a Jesuit. When
a man goes through the “spiritual boot camp” of a Jesuit novitiate and
tertianship, he experiences his own faults in a way that keeps him humble and
keeps him in relation with others… a community man, as they say in the
Vincentians. That’s why he doesn’t live in the Vatican apartments, but lives in
simple quarters in the priests’ residence down the path… and he celebrates the
Eucharist every morning, not alone, but with others present.
Not only that, he is the first pope who was ordained
after Vatican II. He imbibed those documents about the inner nature of the
Church right from the beginning of his ministry.
Do I sound happy about him? I am.
talking with reporters on the plane...
in retreat, right in the midst of all the other guys...
last Holy Thursday, washing the feet of the young prisoners in Rome.
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