The Eucharistic Theology of Pope Francis: Covenant and holiness for service and life

Breaking of the bread. Español: Fracción del p...

As the “new man” on the block I am trying to figure what the new Roman Pontiff’s taught prior to his move to Rome. In 2008, Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio now Pope Francis, was invited to give a teaching on the Holy Eucharist to International Eucharistic Congress, Quebec City, Canada. The title of his talk was “The Eucharist: Gift of God for the Life of the World.”

I would say that his controlling idea is based on the Aparecida document where it is written, “The Eucharist is the vital center of the universe, able to satisfy our hunger for life and happiness. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood in this happy banquet participates in eternal life, and thus our daily existence is transformed into an extension of the Mass.” He then develops the theme of the Eucharist as gift and mission in light of the Church’s enduring self-understanding as covenant. He appeals to tradition, some saints and the Mother of God to demonstrate that evangelization is about Eucharistic Presence, sacrifice, and communion. He argues in the key of communio theology.


Much of what we’ve heard in the last two weeks in his papal addresses and homilies given here.


The text: Bergoglio Eucharist Gift of God for the Life of the World.pdf

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The Pope’s Regina Coeli address: the Easter sacraments Easter are an enormous source of strength for renewal

Pope Francis makes direct connections between what believe and how we live the sacred Liturgy and the sacraments. It is the consistent teaching of Scripture and the Church that the practice of prayer, personal and liturgical (that is, what makes for a vital relationship with God) necessarily spills over to being an alive Catholic. The connection he’s making is consistent with what say in liturgical theology about the “lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi” tradition: the law of prayer (and sacraments) tells us what we believe and how we live.


For the 50 days of Easter when the pope gives a teaching it is called the “Regina Coeli Address” but during the rest of the year it is called “Angelus Address” because during Eastertide we pray the Regina Coeli. The Address:


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Happy Easter to you all! Thank you for coming today, in such large numbers, to share the joy of Easter, the central mystery of our faith. Let us pray that the power of the resurrection of Christ might reach everyone – especially those who suffer – and every place that is in need of trust and hope.

Christ has conquered evil fully and finally, but it is up to us, to people in every age, to embrace this victory in our lives and in the realities of history and society. For this reason it seems important to point out that today we ask God in the liturgy: “O God, who give constant increase to your Church by new offspring, grant that your servants may hold fast in their lives to the Sacrament they have received in faith.” (Collect for Monday in the Octave of Easter).

Indeed, the Baptism that makes us children of God, and the Eucharist that unites us to Christ, must become life. That is to say: they must be reflected in attitudes, behaviors, actions and choices. The grace contained in the Sacraments Easter is an enormous source of strength for renewal in personal and family life, as well as for social relations. Nevertheless, everything passes through the human heart: if I allow myself to be reached by the grace of the risen Christ, if I let that grace change for the better whatever is not good in me, [to change whatever] might do harm to me and to others, then I allow the victory of Christ to affirm itself in in my life, to broaden its beneficial action. This is the power of grace! Without grace we can do nothing – without grace we can do nothing! And with the grace of Baptism and Holy Communion can become an instrument of God’s mercy – that beautiful mercy of God.

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Pope Francis’ prayer intentions for April 2013

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April’s papal prayer intentions has, for the first time the monthly intentions, Pope Francis’ ministry as the focus of our attention. Being in prayerful solidarity with the successor of Saint Peter is a hallmark of communio ecclesiology.


While the Apostleship of Prayer formed the papal intentions prior to the papal resignation and papal election, our prayer continued through the sede vacante because of the Office of the Bishop of Rome never ceases. The needs of the Church remains.

The general intention


That the public, prayerful celebration of faith [the sacred Liturgy] may give life to the faithful.


The mission intention


That mission churches may be signs and instruments of hope and resurrection.

Scripture tells us in 1 Corinthians 11:23-32 that the community of believers are anchored in the Eucharist. As you know, this is the earliest recorded Christian understanding of what the Lord did on the day before He died on the cross.  In fact, Saint Paul’s letter to the Corinthians has the famous line, “Do this in remembrance of me,”  which keeps our attention on what’s essential. Pope Benedict’s good example and teaching tells us that real renewal of our faith rests in our living what the Eucharist means. Consider what the bishops of the Second Vatican Council said about the Eucharist: it is “the memorial of Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross.” Hence, our prayer intention for April not only echoes a key teaching of Scripture but also the magisterium that teaches us that “the liturgy is the summit toward which the activity of the Church is directed.” The Liturgy, most particularly the Eucharist, is the fount of our faith in the Risen Lord, and from which the Church’s pastoral power flows.


The mission intention speaks to the virtue of hope. It is the Christian hope in our eternal destiny. Again, appealing to the teaching of Saint Paul’s letter,  2 Corinthians 5:16-20, pinpoints what we believe about faith in Christ: we live with a new humanity, that is, we have a new creation. The Year of Faith proclamation says, “Through faith, we can recognize the face of the risen Lord in those who ask for our love.”

Easter: Jesus no longer belongs to the past, but lives in the present, is projected towards the future

The Transfiguration Lodovico Carracci 1594

Easter is yet again unfolded anew in our lives right now! Here is Pope Francis homily for the great and holy Vigil of Easter at the Vatican Basilica, 2013. The resurrection of Jesus from the dead as He said is a terrifying event in any person’s life. As His Holiness said in his homily, “Newness often makes us fearful, including the newness which God brings us, the newness which God asks of us.” This newness, this new humanity given to us by the resurrected Lord, is a beautiful reminder that all is redeemed by the One who created us and Loves us now.


The key to the Christian journey, to the building of the Kingdom, to the witnessing to your hope is the openness to have the liturgical anamnesis, the awareness of grace being operative, of God’s activity in life, my life, right now; the phrase Francis uses frequently is, “you won’t be disappointed,” the same one John Paul and Benedict used before him so many times.


The question is, can we be open enough to accept the surprises, are you willing not to be disappointed when confronted by a life of grace that contradicts an existence full of nihilism, skepticism, and boredom?


There are several wonderful points the Pope made, not least is this one that reminds me of Father Giussani:


They are asked to remember their encounter with Jesus, to remember his words, his actions, his life; and it is precisely this loving remembrance of their experience with the Master that enables the women to master their fear and to bring the message of the Resurrection to the Apostles and all the others (cf. Lk 24:9). To remember what God has done and continues to do for me, for us, to remember the road we have travelled; this is what opens our hearts to hope for the future. May we learn to remember everything that God has done in our lives. 


Why do you seek the living among the dead? He isn’t here — He is risen!


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The homily:


In the Gospel of this radiant night of the Easter Vigil, we first meet the women who go the tomb of Jesus with spices to anoint his body (cf. Lk 24:1-3). They go to perform an act of compassion, a traditional act of affection and love for a dear departed person, just as we would. They had followed Jesus, they had listened to his words, they had felt understood by him in their dignity and they had accompanied him to the very end, to Calvary and to the moment when he was taken down from the cross. We can imagine their feelings as they make their way to the tomb: a certain sadness, sorrow that Jesus had left them, he had died, his life had come to an end. Life would now go on as before. Yet the women continued to feel love, the love for Jesus which now led them to his tomb. But at this point, something completely new and unexpected happens, something which upsets their hearts and their plans, something which will upset their whole life: they see the stone removed from before the tomb, they draw near and they do not find the Lord’s body. It is an event which leaves them perplexed, hesitant, full of questions: “What happened?”, “What is the meaning of all this?” (cf. Lk 24:4). Doesn’t the same thing also happen to us when something completely new occurs in our everyday life? We stop short, we don’t understand, we don’t know what to do. Newness often makes us fearful, including the newness which God brings us, the newness which God asks of us. We are like the Apostles in the Gospel: often we would prefer to hold on to our own security, to stand in front of a tomb, to think about someone who has died, someone who ultimately lives on only as a memory, like the great historical figures from the past. We are afraid of God’s surprises; we are afraid of God’s surprises! He always surprises us!

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Francis’ homily for Holy Thursday 2013

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Lent ends and the sacred Triduum begins with the Mass of Our Lord’s Supper, with the rite of Washing of Feet (known also as the Mandatum). In Rome, the Pope offered Mass at the Casal del Marmo, an inner city detention center. In the chapel dedicated to the title of “Father of Mercies,” were 40 young detainees gathered around him for Mass, 12 youth, Catholics and non-Christians, 2 of whom were young women and 2 Muslims, had their feet washed by the Pontiff. Concelebrating the Mass were Cardinal Agostino Vallini (the Pope’s Vicar for the Diocese of Rome), Archbishop Giovanni Angelo Becciu (‘Substitute for General Affairs of the Secretary of State), Monsignor Alfred Xuereb, (Chaplain to the Casal del Marmo, and papal secretary), 2 deacons, one deacon from the Seminario San Carlo (the Seminary of the Fraternity of St Charles Borromeo) and another, Brother Roi Jenkins Albuen, a Capuchin of the “Addolorata” with Father Gaetano Greco.  Also there were two young seminarians from the Roman Seminary with the assistant chaplain, Colombian Father Pedro Acosta.

Pay attention to what the Pope says!!!!   Also, some photos.


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Here’s Vatican Radio transcript and translation of the Holy Father’s unscripted homily:

“This is moving, Jesus washes the feet of his disciples. Peter understands nothing. He refuses but Jesus explains to him. Jesus, God did this, and He Himself explains it to the disciples.. ‘Do you realize what I have done for you? You call me ‘teacher’ and ‘master,’ and rightly so, for indeed I am. If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another’s feet. I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do’.

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Pope Francis to priests: “we need constantly to stir up God’s grace”

Bishops around the world celebrate a Mass at which he blesses new oils used in the diocese for baptisms, pre-baptisms, Anointing of the Sick, ordinations, and other consecrations. Priests who attend renew their priestly commitment to be the Shepherds the Lord has called them to be. The laity present asked by the bishop to pray and fraternally support their priests in their holy mission. As bishop of Rome, Pope Francis does what other bishops have done. 


His homily today Pope Francis has a clear exhortation to all: living one’s vocation is not business as usual, that you are made for another, that Christ has you to do His work. Mediocre priests and bishops are plentiful and the Pope wants to change this attitude. Thanks be to God. One gets the sense that deacons, priests and bishops who act like church bureaucrats (bishop’s secretaries, curial officials, the pastor-king types, etc.) are not living their God-given vocation with consistency and love. Questions that arrive from pondering the homily: What type of priest does God give to us? What type of priest does the Church expect for the People of God? What type of priest do the People want/need? Can we continue to excuse priests who seem to be negligent of their own need for conversion and the People’s? Wearing the sacred robes of the priest have a particular meaning for the pastoral care of souls. The ordained ministry impacts the priest’s own conversion as well as the people who stand in front of  the priest.

Dear Brothers and Sisters, This morning I have the joy of celebrating my first Chrism Mass as the Bishop of Rome. I greet all of you with affection, especially you, dear priests, who, like myself, today recall the day of your ordination.

Anointing of Jesus/ From Augustine's "La ...

“Anointing of Jesus,” St Augustine’s “The City of God,” book I-X.

The readings of our Mass speak of God’s “anointed ones”: the suffering Servant of Isaiah, King David and Jesus our Lord. All three have this in common: the anointing that they receive is meant in turn to anoint God’s faithful people, whose servants they are; they are anointed for the poor, for prisoners, for the oppressed… A fine image of this “being for” others can be found in the Psalm: “It is like the precious oil upon the head, running down upon the beard, on the beard of Aaron, running down upon the collar of his robe” (Ps 133:2). The image of spreading oil, flowing down from the beard of Aaron upon the collar of his sacred robe, is an image of the priestly anointing which, through Christ, the Anointed One, reaches the ends of the earth, represented by the robe.

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Francis: Election of a Pope from the Ends of the Earth

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The Vatican Information Service reported today that a documentary will be published on the new pontificate. The documentary is titled, “Francesco – Elezione di un Papa che viene dalla fine del mondo” (Francis: Election of a Pope from the Ends of the Earth) … made in collaboration with the Officina della Comunicazione (OC) and the Italian newspaper, Il Corriere della Sera.


The DVD will be distributed as a supplement to the Friday, 2 April edition of the newspaper.” On its own the Italian version will cost 10.90 euro; English, Spanish and French editions are planned.


“The documentary registers the events following Pope Benedict XVI’s renunciation of the papacy, the days of the Sede Vacante, and the conclave that brought the election of Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio as the new Pope. Through images and previously unpublished interviews with four cardinals–Cardinal Angelo Comastri, archpriest of the Basilica of St. Peter; Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga, archbishop of Tegucigalpa, Honduras; Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture; and Cardinal Angelo Sodano, dean of the College of Cardinals–it reconstructs the most important stages of this period, culminating in the meeting of the two pontiffs this past Saturday, 23 March, in Castel Gandolfo.”

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Following Jesus means stepping outside ourselves, Pope tells us today

The first Wednesday General Audience of Pope Francis was delivered today. Indeed, Pope Francis is moving us away from the narcissism in which we find ourselves, either personally, or as a Church. The Pope’s text follows, and Vatican Radio’s carrying of the English portion of the address.


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I am pleased to welcome you to my first general audience. With deep gratitude and veneration I am taking up the “witness” from the hands of my beloved predecessor, Benedict XVI. After Easter we will resume the catechesis on the Year of Faith. Today I would like to focus a little on Holy Week. With Palm Sunday we began this week – the center of the whole liturgical year – in which we accompany Jesus in His Passion, Death and Resurrection.

But what does it mean for us to live Holy Week? What does it means to follow Jesus on His way to the Cross on Calvary and the Resurrection? In His earthly mission, Jesus walked the streets of the Holy Land; He called twelve simple people to remain with Him, to share His journey and continue His mission; He chose them among the people full of faith in the promises of God. He spoke to everyone, without distinction, to the great and the lowly; to the rich young man and the poor widow, the powerful and the weak; He brought the mercy and forgiveness of God to all; He healed, comforted, understood, gave hope, He led all to the presence of God, who is interested in every man and woman, like a good father and a good mother is interested in each child. God did not wait for us to go to Him, but He moved towards us, without calculation, without measures. This is how God is: He is always the first, He moves towards us. Jesus lived the daily realities of most ordinary people: He was moved by the crowd that seemed like a flock without a shepherd, and He cried in front of the suffering of Martha and Mary on the death of their brother Lazarus; He called a tax collector to be His disciple and also suffered the betrayal of a friend. In Christ, God has given us the assurance that He is with us, in our midst. “Foxes”, Jesus said, “have dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest His head” (Mt 8:20). Jesus did not have a home because His house is the people — that is, us; His mission is to open all God’s doors, to be the loving presence of God.

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Private notes of Jorge Bergoglio from pre-conclave meetings published

Reading the notes from the pre-conclave meetings of the cardinals meeting in the General Congregation is not usual reading material for most people. One has to admit that it is interesting to know what the cardinals think and what they verbalize with regard to the life of the Church and the proposal for future ministry. Zenit.org published today the notes of Jorge Cardinal Bergoglio (now Pope Francis). Nothing really new except that now we know with better certainty the perspective of the made elected the Supreme Pontiff. The notes follow:


The archbishop of Havana says that a speech given by Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio (now Pope Francis) during the cardinals’ pre-conclave meetings was “masterful” and “clear.”


Cardinal Jaime Lucas Ortega y Alamino spoke of Cardinal Bergoglio’s speech at a Mass on Saturday in Cuba, having returned home from his trip to Rome to bid farewell to Benedict, participate in the conclave, and welcome Francis.

Cardinal Ortega said that Cardinal Bergoglio gave him the handwritten notes of the speech, and the permission to share the contents.


“Allow me to let you know, almost as an absolute first fruit, the thought of the Holy Father Francis on the mission of the Church,” Cardinal Ortega said.

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Pope Francis’ books draw on Ignatian spirituality

Have you been wondering what the Pope has published? Well, look no further. L’Osservatore Romano is publishing an article in tomorrow’s edition on Francis’ books. With Pope Francis leading the Church I think there will be a resurgence of Ignatian spirituality –as distinct from “Jesuit spirituality”, inhabiting our Christian lives. I am sure these books will be published in various languages before long.

The first two books in Italian by Jorge Mario Bergoglio were presented on Tuesday, 26 March in the offices of Civiltà Cattolica. They are published by Editrice Missionaria Italiana (Emi): Umiltà, la strada verso Dio (Bologna, 2013,  64 pages, € 6.90, with an afterword by Enzo Bianchi) and Guarire dalla corruzione (Bologna 2013, 64 pages, € 6.90, with an afterword by Pietro Grasso) and are collections of  addresses that the Cardinal Archbishop of  Buenos Aires gave in 2005 to the faithful of the archdiocese.

Both books draw on the spirituality of St Ignatius of Loyola to describe  its deep inner workings and offer solutions to extremely pertinent phenomena such as corruption in both society and the Church, as well as the urgent need for an ecclesial life distinguished by brotherly holiness.

Speakers at the meeting chaired by Fr Antonio Spadaro, editor-in-chief  of the Jesuit journal, were Lucetta Scaraffia, an Italian historian, Fr Luigi Ciotti and Lorenzo FazzinI, director of Editrice Missionaria Italiana.

Bergoglio stated:

“Factions fighting to impose the hegemony of their own viewpoint and preferences are  fairly common in religious communities, both local and provincial. This occurs when charitable openness to neighbour is replaced by each individual’s own ideas. It is no longer the religious  family as a whole which the religious defends, but only the part of it that concerns him. People no longer adhere to the unity that contributes to configuring the Body of Christ, but rather to the divisive, distorting, and debilitating conflict. For formation teachers and superiors it is not always easy to inculcate a sense of belonging to the family spirit, especially when it is necessary to shape inner attitudes, even small ones, but which have repercussions at this level of the institutional body. One of the effective attitudes that must acquire substance in the hearts of young religious is that of ‘self-accusation’, for it is in the absence of this practice that the spirit of  separation and division is rooted. It is therefore essential first of all to ban every  reference, even an unconscious one, and every kind of pharisaic attitude that presents self-accusation as something puerile or characteristic of the cowardly. Self-accusation, rather, presupposes a rare courage in order to open the door to unknown realities and let others see beyond my appearance. It means removing all our make-up so that the truth may shine through.

The accusation of ourselves (which is only a means) is the basis in which the fundamental option puts down roots: for anti-individualism and for a family and Church spirit which brings us to relate as good children and good siblings, so as to succeed later in being good parents. Accusing ourselves implies a fundamentally communitarian attitude.”