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Pope Francis the Mystic? Two recent experiences

1. Pope experienced a ‘great light’ before accepting the papacy

By Elise Harris

Vatican City, Oct 1, 2013 / www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-experienced-a-great-light-before-accepting-the-papacy/ [catholicnewsagency.com] (CNA/EWTN News).- In a recent interview, Pope Francis shared a mystical experience he had shortly before accepting the role as Bishop of Rome and also touched on several issues surrounding Church reform.

The Pope recounted his experience during a Sept. 24 interview with Eugenio Scalfari of the Italian newspaper La Repubblica which was published on Oct.1.

When asked if he considered himself a mystic, the Pope replied “What do you think?”

Scalfari replied that no, he did not believe Pope Francis was the type. When he asked the Holy Father if he had ever had a mystical experience, the pontiff replied that he “rarely” has, but that one such experience did take place during the conclave shortly before he accepted his election as Pope.

“Before the acceptance, I asked to be able to retire for some minutes in the room next to that with the balcony on the square. My head was completely empty and a great anxiety invaded me,” he said.

“To make it pass and to relax, I close my eyes and every thought disappeared, also that of refusing to accept the charge, as after all the liturgical procedure consents.”

Pope Francis shared that once he closed his eyes, he did not feel anymore “anxiety or emotion,” but that at “a certain point a great light invaded me, it lasted for a second but it seemed really long.”

“Then the light dissipated and I stood straight up and headed to the room where the cardinals were waiting for me and the table on which rested the act of acceptance. I signed it…and then on the balcony came the ‘Habemus Papam.’”

Also brought up in the interview was the topic of Church leaders, who, according to the Holy Father, “have often been narcissistic.” Although the curia’s main job is to manage “the services that serve the Holy See,” said the Pope, “its has a defect: it is Vatican-centric.”

“This Vatican-centric vision neglects the world that surrounds it. I do not share this vision and I will do everything (I can) to change it,” he said, emphasizing the need for a more communal dynamic in which the leaders of the Church “are at the service of the people of God.”

Referencing St. Francis of Assisi’s vision of the Church, Pope Francis urged that “the ideal of a missionary and poor Church remains more than valid…this is still the Church that Jesus and his disciples preached.”

When pressed by comments stating that a love for power strongly exists in the Vatican, and that the institution predominates the poor, missionary Church he envisions, the Pontiff stated that “Things are in fact like this.”

“On this subject no miracles are made,” he said, recalling how during his life, St. Francis also had to “negotiate at length with the Roman hierarchy” for the recognition of the rules of his order, which he eventually obtained, “but with profound changes and compromises.”

When asked if he would follow the same path as his patron, the Pope said that although he does not have the “strength and holiness” of the saint, he has appointed the council of eight Cardinals to assist him in building a Church that is “not only vertical, but horizontal.”

Although the road will be “long and difficult,” he said, such a Church is possible with “prudence, but firmness and tenacity.”

Being asked about the fact that Christians are a minority in the world, the Successor of Peter stated that “we always have been,” but that he personally thinks that “being a minority is actually a strength.”

Elaborating this point, the Pope explained that “we have to be a yeast of life and love and the yeast is a quantity infinitely less than the mass of fruits.”

He also spoke of the need to return to the Second Vatican Council’s call to open to modern culture through dialogue with non-believers, saying that although little has been done in this direction, “I have the humility and ambition to want to do it.”

In speaking to the Church’s role in politics, Pope Francis said that “the Church won’t occupy herself with politics,” explaining that when he urges Catholics to commit themselves politically, he is referring not just to them, but to “all men of good will.”

“Politics is the first of the civil activities and it has its own field of action that is not that of religion,” he said, emphasizing that political institutions are lay institutions by definition, and that they operate independently.

“I believe that Catholics working in politics have within them the values of religion,” he said, “but a mature conscience and competency to act on them.”

“The Church will never go beyond the task of expressing and spreading her values, at least as long as I’m here.”
_________________________________________________________________________________

2. Pope Francis’ white rose

Bergoglio, who has always considered the flower a “sign” of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux and of her intercession, received one out of the blue, the day after the peace vigil for Syria

Andrea Tornielli
vatican city
9/26/13

vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/en/the-vatican/detail/articolo/28151/

On Sunday 8 September, the day after the long prayer vigil for peace in Syria – when some passages from texts written by Saint Thérèse of Lisieux were read out – Pope Francis received a white rose as a surprise. Francis considers the flower to be a “sign” linked to the devotion of the saint. The Archbishop of Ancona and Osimo, Edoardo Menichelli broke the news, with Francis authorisation.

Bergoglio told him about the rose a day before the prelate was due to present a book in Pedaso, in the Italian region of Marche. The prelate recounted the story during the presentation. The book presented was an essay by theologian and writer Gianni Gennari entitled “Teresa di Lisieux. Il fascino della santità. I segreti di una dottrina ritrovata” (“Thérèse of Lisieux. The fascination of sainthood. Secrets of a rediscovered doctrine”) and published by Lindau. This was the book Francis took with him when he flew to Brazil last July.

“The Pope told me he received the freshly-picked white rose out of the blue from a gardener as he was taking a stroll in the Vatican Gardens on Sunday 8 September,” Mgr. Menichelli said. “The Pope sees this flower as a “sign”, a “message” from Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, whom he had turned to in a moment of worry the day before.” The Archbishop passed on the Pope’s greetings to those attending the book presentation, adding that he had been authorised to tell them about the rose. The Pope did not say anything about the white rose having any connection to the peace vigil for Syria the previous evening. But it is not hard to imagine that one of the Pope’s worries at the time was the international situation, the massacres in Syria and the West’s proposed intervention in the Middle Eastern country.

What significance does the white rose have for the Pope? Bergoglio mentions it in “El Jesuita” (“The Jesuit”), a book interview written by Sergio Rubin and Francesca Ambrogetti when he was still a cardinal. In a description the two journalists give of Bergoglio’s library in Buenos Aires, they write: “We pause before a vase full of white roses standing on a shelf in the library. In front of it is a photograph of Saint Thérèse. “Whenever I have a problem,” Bergoglio explained to the journalists, “I ask the saint not to solve it, but to take it into her hands and to help me accept it and I almost always receive a white rose as a sign.” Pope Francis’ devotion for the Carmelite mystic who died at the young age of 24 in 1897, was canonized by Pius XI and proclaimed a Doctor of the Church by John Paul II in 1997, is common knowledge. Francis himself told journalists about it on the flight back from Rio de Janeiro after World Youth Day. When she was still alive, Thérèse had promised that when she died she would shower “rose petals” down from the sky, a sign of her intercession. “A soul inflamed with love can not remain inactive … If only you knew what I plan to do when I’m in heaven … I will spend my heaven by doing good on earth.” So during the peace vigil held in St. Peter’s Square on 7 September, the mysteries of the rosary were recited along with passages from the Gospel and verses from a piece of poetry written by the saint.

The rose devotion and message did not begin with Bergoglio. On 3 December 1925 Fr. Putigan, a Jesuit, began a novena to ask for something very important. He also asked for a sign, to know whether his prayers had been heard. He asked for a rose to be sent to him. He didn’t speak to anyone about the novena or about the unusual request he made to the saint. Then, in the third day of the novena he received the rose he had asked for and his prayer was therefore answered. He then started another novena and on the fourth day of this prayer, a nurse/nun brought him a white rose and said to him: “Saint Thérèse sends you this rose.” So the Jesuit decided to spread the word about this “miraculous” novena which he named after the roses, making it famous worldwide.

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Tomassus,

There are those here who consider Pope Francis not a mystic, but a mistake! smile

Viva il Papa!

Alex

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I really miss Pope Benedict XVI The Great!

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I miss Pope Benedict, too, and he is/was truly the Great. The more I read of his books, the more I am awed by his holy intellect.

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I also miss Pope Benedict. He spoke with such clarity.

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I have often wished that Pope Benedict XVI had been elected 10 years earlier. Let's face it, the last ten years of JPII were a study in inaction, as everyone waited for him to leave this earth. His health was terrible, and I think his real accomplishments were in his earlier years.

Can you imagine the good Benedict could have accomplished if he had been younger and been in office longer?

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I like Francis; he's about applying, not just knowing. For, knowing isn't enough, one must apply. Willing isn't enough, one must do... (Goethe)

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Goethe is dead, you know. wink Those who don't "know" before they "do," often have a gift for taking small problems and making them into gigantic problems.

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I also like Francis, but he appears to be a man who likes doing things without thinking first. Nevertheless, I am sure that he is a nice guy.

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don't confuse Francis's energies w/ his actual essence, which we don't know... Yes, we clearly see what he does, but we can't be vetting against what he may, or may not be thinking.

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I like Pope Francis. I see him as compassionate which we need more of in our world.
Theology is extremely important, but I like what my wife has quoted many times. She may have picked it up somewhere but it says:
"People don't care how much you know -- until they know how much you care".
I think Pope Francis will win many to the faith.

David


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