It
must be very difficult to be Pope today. He is up there alongside the Queen of
England, and the President of the United States, in terms of world fame. I
would argue that this was probably always the case but it has to be more
intense in today’s world since the advent of social media. The American President
tweets daily to his almost 60 million followers and in most cases, it provokes
wide spread reaction. The Pope also tweets in different languages, although not
personally, to around 47 million. When you take in the ‘likes’ and ‘shares’ the
U.S. President (on his personal Twitter account mostly) has more interaction. The
world watches famous people very closely and all they need to do is make a
mistake and smart phones have the ability to share the unflattering picture or
video. At the same time, Twitter for example, has afforded many famous names to
set the record straight when a tabloid breaks a story the celebrity feels is
untrue.
Pope
Francis speaks and the world hears what he says. He is often misunderstood and while
the sound-bite can make the headlines, the entire piece can get short-circuited.
It was no different for Benedict XVI and
indeed John Paul II. Certainly, the internet grew up during the pontificate of
John Paul II. His homilies, speeches, and addresses, as well as his papal documents
are readily available for download on the Holy See’s website. Thanks to the
web, we have access to thousands of photos of popes with the faithful from all
over the world. Today, it is popular for people who want to get the elusive ‘selfie’
with Pope Francis if they manage to get close to him. He himself would prefer no
selfies if he had his way I imagine.
Recently, footage appeared that was shared on social media of
Pope Francis receiving people who wanted to kiss the papal ring. It quickly
made the mainstream media and news media. Some channels showed edited parts of the
footage and not the whole piece. In it we see the Pope taking his right hand
away from people as they lean down to kiss the papal ring. A far cry from the
days when people would approach the papal throne and drop to the ground and his
kiss the pope’s foot. Francis himself is far more eager to lean to kiss the feet of the
sinner, and people who are broken of all faiths and none. This isn’t something
he does for the cameras either. He has done this in the past in his time as
Archbishop of Buenos Aires.
Since Pope John XXIII, we have seen more user-friendly papacies
in terms of how human and approachable the Pope is. Pope John would chat to the
gardeners and the workers in the Vatican. On the day he was elected Pope in
1958 (for which he wrote an entry in his diary) when he was dressing in the
papal white, he removed his Cardinal’s scarlet skull-cap and placed it on a
Monsignor (thus making him a Cardinal!) When
John died in 1962, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini, Archbishop of Milan
became Pope and took the name Paul VI and he began to dismantle the trappings of
the papacy. He wore a more simple, modern ‘triple tiara’ at his inauguration
and eventually preferred not to be carried around aloft in the Sedia Gestatoria.
In August 1978 when Paul VI died, Cardinal Albino Luciani, Archbishop of Venice,
was elected Pope and took the name John Paul. Although he was only Pope for thirty-three
days, he refused to wear any triple tiara crown. Cardinal Karol Wojtyla was
elected Pope on October 16th 1978 and took the name John Paul II and
he was driven around in the now famous Pope Mobile. He wasn’t interested in people
kneeling to kiss the papal ring and neither was Benedict XVI in his time (2005 –
2013)
Going back to the papal ring, when Pope St. Pius X (1835 –
1914) was ordained Bishop of Mantua in 1884, he went to see his mother,
Margarita, at the family home in Riese where he grew up. As the neighbours
called in to the little house to see the new bishop, they knelt to kiss the episcopal
ring. His mother is said to have remarked as she showed the wedding ring on her
left hand that he wouldn’t be wearing any bishop’s ring had she not first had her
wedding ring.
I seem to recall hearing about the ceremony for the Episcopal
Ordination in 2015 of Angelo De Donatis as Auxiliary Bishop of the diocese of
Rome in the Lateral Basilica. Before the Pope put the ring on the finger of the
new bishop and said the prayer, Francis quietly said to him; ‘Don’t forget the wedding
rings of your parents and defend the family.’ Pope Francis has got the right
idea in that he sees himself in a ministry of service and leads by example time
and again. Any trappings of ministry must remind us, especially as we draw
closer to Easter, that Jesus Christ came not to be served, but to serve, and to
give his life as a ransom for many. (Matt 20:28)
The wedding rings of our parents, the symbols of commitment
mean that from day one, they were our first teachers and that they taught us by
example. Any one of rank, Pope, Cardinal, King, Queen, President, Prime
Minister, etc., had a mother and a father or was brought up by a parent
or guardian or a family who came from a family themselves.
Finally, returning to Margarita Sanson, the mother of Pope
St. Pius X, and how she reminded her son ‘Bepi’ of her role in his vocation by
showing him her wedding ring. Happy Mother’s Day to all mothers and grandmothers
and remembering all mothers in heaven.