Pope Francis and Henri de Lubac, SJ | Carl E. Olson | CWR blog
Sandro Magister reports:
It is a widespread opinion, confirmed by numerous testimonies, that the
intention of electing pope Jorge Mario Bergoglio grew substantially
among the cardinals on the morning of Saturday, March 9, when the
then-archbishop of Buenos Aires spoke at the second to last of the
congregations - covered by secrecy - that preceded the conclave.
His
words made an impression on many. Bergoglio spoke off the cuff. But we
now have the account of those words of his, written by the hand of the
author himself.
Bergoglio's remarks in the preconclave were made
public by the cardinal of Havana, Jaime Lucas Ortega y Alamino, in the
homily of the chrism Mass that he celebrated on Saturday, March 23 in
the cathedral of the capital of Cuba, in the presence of the apostolic
nuncio, Archbishop Bruno Musarò, of the auxiliary bishops Alfredo Petit
and Juan de Dios Hernandez, and of the clergy of the diocese.
Cardinal
Ortega recounted that after the remarks of Bergoglio in the
preconclave, he had approached him to ask if he had a written text that
he could keep.
Bergoglio responded that at the moment he did not
have one. But the following day - Ortega recounted - "with extreme
delicacy” he gave him “the remarks written in his own hand as he
recalled them."
Ortega asked him if he could release the text, and Bergoglio said yes.
Here is that text of Cardinal Bergoglio's notes:
Reference has been made to evangelization. This is the Church's reason
for being. “The sweet and comforting joy of evangelizing” (Paul VI). It
is Jesus Christ himself who, from within, impels us.
1)
Evangelizing implies apostolic zeal. Evangelizing presupposes in the
Church the “parresia" of coming out from itself. The Church is called to
come out from itself and to go to the peripheries, not only
geographical, but also existential: those of the mystery of sin, of
suffering, of injustice, those of ignorance and of the absence of faith,
those of thought, those of every form of misery.
2) When the
Church does not come out from itself to evangelize it becomes
self-referential and gets sick (one thinks of the woman hunched over
upon herself in the Gospel). The evils that, in the passing of time,
afflict the ecclesiastical institutions have a root in
self-referentiality, in a sort of theological narcissism. In Revelation,
Jesus says that he is standing at the threshold and calling. Evidently
the text refers to the fact that he stands outside the door and knocks
to enter. . . But at times I think that Jesus may be knocking from the
inside, that we may let him out. The self-referential Church presumes to
keep Jesus Christ within itself and not let him out.
3) The
Church, when it is self-referential, without realizing it thinks that it
has its own light; it stops being the “mysterium lunae" and gives rise
to that evil which is so grave, that of spiritual worldliness (according
to De Lubac, the worst evil into which the Church can fall): that of
living to give glory to one another. To simplify, there are two images
of the Church: the evangelizing Church that goes out from itself; that
of the “Dei Verbum religiose audiens et fidenter proclamans" [the Church
that devoutly listens to and faithfully proclaims the Word of God -
editor's note], or the worldly Church that lives in itself, of itself,
for itself. This should illuminate the possible changes and reforms to
be realized for the salvation of souls.
4) Thinking of the next
Pope: a man who, through the contemplation of Jesus Christ and the
adoration of Jesus Christ, may help the Church to go out from itself
toward the existential peripheries, that may help it to be the fecund
mother who lives “by the sweet and comforting joy of evangelizing.”
Rome, March 9, 2013
The influence of de Lubac, one of the finest Jesuit theologians of the past century, on Bergoglio is also obvious in this 2007 interview, which ends with this remark:
Nice! I was wondering if anyone caught that de Lubac reference. Good man! :-)
Posted by: Justin N. | Friday, March 29, 2013 at 08:41 AM