Pope Francis is a Pope who has made many ‘firsts’. The first Jesuit to become a Pope, the first successor of Peter to choose the name Francis, the first Pope to make the widest possible consultation for the synod of bishops through a questionnaire that everyone was free to answer and, on September 24, he became the first Pope to address a joint session of the US Congress.
The latter event took place five years, almost to the date, since Pope Benedict XVI addressed members of the both Houses of Parliament in Westminster Hall, London, on September 17, 2010.
These two events are a clear sign of the respect that liberal democracies have for the leader of the Catholic Church, and that the message of the Church merits to be listened to. They are further proof that the Church is not the Church of the sacristy; nor is its message relevant only to the naïve and the credulous.
Once again, as the Scripture says, God “has exalted the humble and meek”. Francis spoke not only as a Pope but also as a son of the Americas, and started by praising the US as “the land of the free and the home of the brave”. But having said that, Pope Francis took the US Congress to task.
In a wide-ranging speech, the Pope touched on several hot issues, ranging from migration to the death penalty. About the former, he emphasised to Congress that the golden rule requires the US to respond with as generous heart to neighbours migrating from the south. He also referred to abortion and euthanasia, saying this same rule reminds us of “our responsibility to protect and defend human life at every stage of its development”.
Pope Francis stressed the need to care for creation, migrants and the family. When he expressed concern that American family life is threatened by forces “from within and from without” he drew a sustained applause. He did not shy away from referring on the arms industry, in which the US can claim primacy. When he called for an end the arms trade, which he suggested makes profit “drenched in blood”, the response was more subdued.
If politics must truly be at the service of the human person, it follows that it cannot be slave to the economy and finance- Pope Francis
Another point stressed by the Pope dealt with the importance of dialogue to resolve international disputes. The silent reference to Cuba and Iran was too obvious to be missed.
Francis was aware that this this was a unique opportunity to use his physical presence to address some of the most burning issues that are of fundamental importance to humanity and to exert his moral influence on the most powerful and richest nation in the world. And he rose to the occasion in an impeccable manner.
Very often power breeds arrogance. The antidote is humility and meekness. This was the medicine Pope Francis offered the US Congress. He spoke in a humble and fraternal way to the most powerful lawmakers of the world – almost a third of whom are Catholic – on the need to be on their guard against “fundamentalism, whether religious or of any other kind”.
He also draw the attention of Congress to avoid “reductionism which sees only good and evil… the righteous and the sinners”, which often divides humanity into two opposing camps.
He did not neglect to refer to the basic requirement for good politics: “If politics must truly be at the service of the human person, it follows that it cannot be slave to the economy and finance”.
The Pope’s address to the US Congress is an address to all parliaments in the world. Let is hope our politicians give it its due importance whatever creed they hold, and even if they hold none.
And the media – considered all over the world the fourth pillar of the State – should not neglect its important duty. As Malcolm X said: “They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that’s power. Because they control the minds of the masses.”
joe.inguanez@gmail.com
Fr Joe Inguanez, a sociologist, is executive director of Discern.