Pope Francis undertakes intense 1-day apostolic visit
to Genoa
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis made an intense, 1-day visit to
Genoa on Saturday. With a departure at 7AM, the schedule of the visit to the
northern Italian port city on the Ligurian coast included six major appointments:
• A meeting with the “world of labour”;
• Another with the Bishops, priests,
seminarians, and religious of Liguria, along with lay curial collaborators and
representatives of other religious confessions at the Cathedral of San Lorenzo;
• An encounter with young people attached
to the Diocesan Mission at the Marian Sanctuary of the Madonna della
Guardia;
• Lunch at the sanctuary with a number of poor and homeless persons, refugees, and prisoners;
• Lunch at the sanctuary with a number of poor and homeless persons, refugees, and prisoners;
• A moment with children from the various
departments of the Giannina Gaslini Pediatric Hospital;
• Solemn Mass at the Piazzale Kennedy
named for the first Catholic President of the United States.
The Holy Father’s meetings with the various groups followed
a Q&A format.
Pope Francis’ meeting with the world of labour included
four questions regarding the issues ranging from the challenges of ossified and
unresponsive bureaucracy to the dehumanizing effects of technology and large
forces on the workplace and the labour market: one each from a worker, an
entrepreneur, a business-owner, and a union representative.
In each of his responses Pope Francis focused on the primacy
of the human person over the reality and rights of labour and capital,
insisting that only a correct vision of human nature can inform and direct our
efforts to build a just and harmonious society.
The Pope also insisted forcefully on work as something given
to man in the order of creation, and essential to genuine human flourishing.
“It is necessary, therefore, to look fearlessly and a sense
of responsibility on the technological transformations of the economy and of
life, he said, “without resigning ourselves to the ideology that seems to be
gaining a foothold wherever one looks, which envisions a world in which only a
half or maybe two-thirds of employable people actually work, and the others maintained
with a welfare cheque.”
“It must be clear,” Pope Francis continued, “that the true
objective to reach is not ‘income for all’ but ‘work for all’.”
The questions from clergy and religious came from two
secular priests, Don Andrea Carcasole and Don Pasquale Revello: the President
of the Italian Union of Women Religious Superiors for the Liguria Region; and Fr.
Andrea Caruso, O.F.M. Cap.
Their queries focused on the search for ways to maintain
hope and nourish the interior life of faith in today’s frenetic world – and the
Holy Father’s responses centered on the imitation of Christ, the fostering of a
sense of fraternity among the clergy and of genuine diocesan ecclesial unity,
and the cultivation of a rich, mission-focused interior life of prayer.
“What we want,” said Pope Francis, “is pastoral conversion, missionary conversion.”
“What we want,” said Pope Francis, “is pastoral conversion, missionary conversion.”
The Pope also condemned the practice – diffuse in Latin
America and at one time not too long ago present also in Italy and other
places, of encouraging poor young women to join a religious congregation as
novices – often in order to shore up diminishing numbers – and then to abandon
the girls and young women for whom religious life is not their calling.
“It is a scandal,” said Pope Francis.
“It is a scandal,” said Pope Francis.
“Work [to foster vocations – (It. lavoro vocazionale)] is
difficult, but we must do it,” he said. “It is a challenge,” Pope Francis
continued. “We need to be creative.”
During that encounter the Pope also prayed for the Coptic
Christians killed on Friday in Egypt by Islamic extremists, saying
that there are more Christian martyrs today than in ancient times: “Let's not
forget, he said, that today there are more Christian martyrs than in ancient
times, than in the early day times of the Church.”
Young People
Pope Francis’ meeting with young people took place in the
sanctuary complex of Our Lady of the Watch – the centuries-old Marian shrine
atop Mount Figogna overlooking the Ligurian Sea, from which sentries kept watch
for hundreds of years for approaching ships and armies on the move in the Valpolcevera.
Four young people of Liguria – two young men and two young
women – asked questions regarding discernment, keeping and growing the faith in
themselves and sharing it with their fellows, meeting the challenges of
building a just and merciful society in the face of a constant barrage of bad
news and overwhelming personal brokenness often found right next door or in
their own homes, and meeting the “right” person with whom to settle down and
start a family.
“Loving means having the capacity to take a ‘dirty’ hand in
your own and look those who are in a situation of degradation in the eye and
saying: ‘For me, you are Jesus’” the Pope said.
And responding to an observation about how it is accepted as
‘normal’ that the Mediterranean Sea has become a cemetery, The Pope said Italy
is generous but if it seems ‘normal’ for so many countries to close their doors
to people who are fleeing hunger, war, exploitation, then it is necessary for
us all to bring about a change of mentality.
Lunch with the Poor, Homeless, Refugees, and Prisoners
Pope Francis took lunch with the poor and homeless of Genoa,
as well as members of the refugee community – some 135 people, all gathered in
one of the sanctuary complex’s great-rooms.
Detainees serving penal sentences in the region’s
Pontedecimo and Marassi prisons were also connected via closed-circuit
television.
The Holy Father had special words of encouragement for the
prisoners, 11 of whom were personally present for the meal.
During the afternoon Pope Francis spent time with young
patients of the “Giannina Gaslini” children’s hospital and with their
families.
Upon his arrival at the hospital the Pope visited the
intensive care units before meeting personally with some 300 little patients,
their families and the hospital staff: “The suffering of children is the
hardest to accept” the Pope said, and the lack of an answer as to ‘why do
children suffer?’ can find alleviation only in the message of the Cross.
Pope Francis thanked the hospital staff for the love and
dedication they show towards their little patients and said that faith operates
through charity, and that without charity there is no faith. He encouraged them
to continue to put their delicate service into practice thinking often of the
‘Good Samaritan’ and always being attentive to the needs of the patients.
The highlight of the day was the celebration of Mass during
which Pope Francis said “Christian prayer is not a way of being a little bit at
peace with oneself or finding some interior harmony; we pray in order to bring
all to God, to entrust the world to Him.”
He said the Gospel calls us to “go out into the world with
Jesus ‘message” because God’s love is dynamic and wants to reach others.
“A Christian is always on the move with the Lord towards
other. He is a pilgrim, a missionary, a hopeful marathon man, gentle but
intent on walking”, the Pope said. The Lord – he explained - desires that the
proclamation goes ahead with his strength, not with that of the world, with the
limpid and meek strength of joyful witnessing. This, the Pope said, is
urgent.
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