Pope Francis
As the winter edition of The Swag goes to Press news of the death of Pope Francis has broken. Pope Francis, born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, became the first non-European pope in centuries, the first Latin American pope, the first Jesuit pope and the first to take the name Francis when he was elected to succeed Pope Benedict XVI in 2013.
Australian Catholic Bishops Conference President, Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB, noted that Pope Francis will be remembered as a man of simplicity, humility and compassion. “The sad news of the death of Pope Francis, while it does not come as a surprise given his age and his declining health in recent years, will be received with great sadness by Catholics, and by people of good will, all over the world,” Archbishop Costelloe said.
“When Cardinal Bergoglio appeared on the balcony overlooking Saint Peter’s Square on 14 March 2013, and was introduced to the world as the newly-elected Pope Francis, his simplicity and humility set the tone for a papacy which would be marked by an emphasis on the mercy and compassion of God, and on the Church’s vocation to be a sign and bearer of that merciful love in an increasingly troubled world. His famous description of the Church as a field hospital where wounds could be healed and hearts could be warmed was a call to a renewal of the Church’s life and mission, grounded in a return to Christ as the source and inspiration of everything the Church sought to do and to be.”
The National Council of Priests deeply honours the memory of Pope Francis, and we pray that he rise in glory. The NCP was born out of the energy of Vatican II, and Pope Francis has sought to continue the drive, the energy and the aggiornamento of that Council in the same spirit as Pope St John XXIII.
Requiescat in pace.
