- I'm pleased to give you my greetings.
The greetings to the speakers,
father Father Augusto Zampini,
Austen Ivereigh and
Paul Elie good scholars,
great friends,
and to the many participants
in this webinar dedicate
to Pope Francis and the
Reform of the Church.
This is part of a series of
conferences organized jointly
by La Civiltà Cattolica
in Georgetown university,
two very ancient Jesuits institutions.
I would like to briefly introduce
this webinar by offering
a simple and brief framework
for the discussion.
Pope Francis is a Jesuits Pope
and his idea of the reform
of the church corresponds
to that of Ignatius of Loyola,
the founder of the Jesuit.
Ignatius was conceived that
starting from the reform
of one's own life and keeping
one's eyes fixed on the poor
and humiliated Christ.
One could not but necessarily achieve
a structural reform of the church.
The reform is indeed a spiritual process
that also affects by connectuality
the ecclesial structure.
One of the great inspirations
of Monsignor Bergoglio, Pope
Francis is this the Jesuit son,
Peter Fader, who the
scholar, the Jesuits scholar,
Michelle de certo,
simply characterized
as the reformed priest.
for whom the inner experience,
the dogmaticexpression
of faith and the Structural
Reform of the Church
are intimately connected.
Pope Francis is inspired
by this kind of reform.
The spirituality of Ignatius
of Loyola is on historic,
historic spirituality,
connected to the dynamics
of history better yet it
is what drives history
and organizes and gives
shape to an institution.
Bergoglio observes that in
Ignatius's life is found
the internal coherence of this project.
But what is exactly Ignatius project,
it is a about theoretical vision
ready to be applied to reality
to force it in its parameters.
It isn't an obstruction
to be applied to reality.
This project consists in
making explicit and concrete,
what he had experienced
in his inner World.
In light of this,
the question about what
is Pope Francis program,
that's not make sense.
The Pope has not clear, and distinct ideas
to apply to reality,
but he proceeds based on his
spiritual experience and prayer
that he shares in dialogue
in consultation with others.
This procedure is called the discernment.
It is the discernment of
God's will in our daily lives.
Although it is fulfilled with
the heart, the innerself,
it's a raw material is always the echo
that daily reality
reverberates in that intimacy.
Intimacy We've got, it
is an inner attitude
that drives us to be open to dialogue,
to the encounter with others,
to finding God wherever
He wants to be found.
Not only in narrow or well delimitated
and restricted confines.
The task of the reformer
is there for to initiate
or accompany hisStoric processes.
This is one of the fundamental principles
of Bergoglio vision.
Time is greater than space as
he wrote in Evangelii Gaudium
his first Apostolic Exhortation.
To reform means to start off in processes
and do not cut heads or
concrete spaces of power.
Francis is the Pope of
processes of exercises.
The Pope lives are constant
dynamic of discernment,
which opens him to the future.
It opens him also to the future
of the Reform of the Church.
For the Pope the change of structures
will not be as many
actually expect the result
of reviewing an organizational flow chart.
This would lead to an
inert reorganization.
The change must be linked
to the dynamics of a missionary work.
It must be linked to current challenges.
So the Reform of the Church
has to be a radical missionary
transformation of the church.
To conclude it must be
said that for Pope Francis
the Reform of the Church
is experiencing a strong
and fruitful dialectic tension
between spirit and institution.
In his Apostolic Exhortation
Evangelii Gaudium,
he wrote the church has to
accept this unruly freedom
of the Word, which accomplishes
what it wills in ways
that surpass our calculations
and ways of thinking.
There is a dialectical and
intra-ecclesial tension
in Francis remark regarding
spirit and institution.
One never the denies the other,
but the former must animate
the latter in an effective
incisive way to counter
the ecclesial introversion
of Saint John Paul II call it,
which is always a great temptation.
Finally worth nothing
is the fruitful tension
between the church as a pilgrim
people in as institution,
which reflects two of Pope
Francis further definition
of the church and is also
evident in the interview,
he gave to La Civiltà Cattolica in 2015.
The pilgrim people of God, Lumen Gentium
and Holly mother and hierarchical church,
the definition that was created by sending
ashes over his preferred
definition of the church.
So the Reform of the Church
for Francis is basically this,
to ensure that the only mother,
the Iroquois church is always
the pilgrim people of God.
Enjoy our webinar.
Thank you to all of you for
being here with us today.
- Thank you, father Antonio,
for your introduction and
the for making possible
this collaboration between
La Civiltà Cattolica
and the Georgetown university.
With these webinar series
on Christianity Discivilta
So welcome everyone and the good morning,
I am Debora Tonelli Georgetown
representative in Rome.
It's an honor and a
pleasure today to present
and to moderate these
webinars on Pope Francis
and the Reform of the Church.
This is the second the webinar
after the first one in
July on citizenship,
teach and answer hold
on in Italian language,
the purpose of these are
webinars series is to stimulate
reflections more than
provide answer or theory.
Today, we will discuss Pope Francis
and the Reform of the Church.
Father Antonio, already provided
us the Pope's perspective
and approach to the global issues,
spirituality more than strategy.
These are spiritual approach
changes the criteria
and the paradigm of our
understanding of global problems
and our research for solutions.
COVID-19 outbreak stressed
several old problems,
but it is also giving us the opportunity
to reflect on our priorities.
Are they financial, economical, political,
or rather is our priority the human being?
What does the church reform consists of?
Reform is a very provocative word
in the history of the Christianity,
we are the Protestant reform,
but the greeter reform in
the history called the church
to a center that began by Pope Francis
is probably much deeper than
a structural conversion.
In August, Pope Francis
began a series of catechesis
on the COVID-19 pandemic,
focusing his attention on the
dignity of the human being,
putting her act to the center
of a new global narrative,
one without the distinction
for race, religion or nationality.
The global leadership of the
Pope seems to me based on
substitution of a particular
interested economic, political
financial with a singular
interest in human dignity.
Today, three leading speakers,
will discuss the Reform
of the Church in the frame of COVID-19.
Before we start our discussion,
I would the like to remind
that the Q&A bottom in zoom
for questions from the audience
and a please my panelists
to Keep the timetable
in order to make it
possible to open the floor.
At last but not least, my
special thanks to the staff
at the office of the vice
president for Global Engagement,
Yvonne Quick, Simon
Tonge, Emmy Van der glitz
And that my thanks to the
staff at the Berkeley Center
for Religion, Peace and
World Affairs Ruth Gopin
and to the staff at the Initiative
on Catholic Social Thought
and Public Life Anna Misleh.
So my welcome to our speakers,
I will present them briefly.
Father Augusto Zampini
is the Adjunct secretary
of the Dicastery for promoting
integral human development.
Before entering the seminary,
he studied law at Catholic
University of Argentina,
as a priest he served
in different parishes
and institutions in
Argentina and in England.
His area of expertize is
moral theology with a focus
on economics and environmental ethics.
He is an Honorary Fellow
at Durham University,
Roehampton University and
Stellenbosch University
and the lecture at the different
university in Argentina
and the United Kingdom.
In 2016, Cardinal Turkson
invited father Augusto
to be the coordinator
of development and faith
at the Dicastery for promoting
integral human development.
And then in 2018, Pope Francis
appointed father Augusto
as one of the expert to the scene
of the of the Amazona in 2019.
Our second speaker will be
Paul Elie is a senior fellow
at the the Berkley Center
for Religion, Peace,
and World Affairs and the director
of the American Pilgrimage Project.
He also coordinates
Faith and Culture Series
sponsored by the office of president.
He has a written about Pope
Francis for the New Yorker,
the New York Times and the
Atlantic and the vanity Fair.
Before joining Georgetown
he spent 15 years
as a senior editor with Farrar, Straus
and Giroux in New York.
His works deals primarily
with the ways religious ideas
are given expression in the
literature that arts, music
and culture in the broadest sense,
and at the last but not
least Austen Ivereigh
is a Fellow of Campion Hall,
at the University of Oxford,
a writer journalist and commentator
and co-founder of Catholic voices.
Is the author of the biography
"The Great Reformer: Francis
and the Making of a Radical Pope,"
and the "How to Defend the Faith
without Raising Your Voice."
Both titles have been
translated into many languages,
A former deputy editor of The Tablet
and later Public Affairs Director
for Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor.
He has written widely on
church affairs on the Francis
purpose for the commonwealth,
the New York Times, Crooks,
American Magazine, Thinking
Fate and many others.
So I thank you, all of you
for accepting our invitation
and my welcome.
So we can start now our
first round of questions
and then I'd like to start,
to address my first
question to father Augusto,
welcome father Augusto Zampini
I would the like to
know if in your opinion,
this global emergency can
contribute to the reform
of the church and of the Vatican.
- And yeah, good
afternoon or good morning,
wherever you are, thank you.
Thank you Deborah and thank
you for the invitation.
I think the question is not
difficult to ask in itself
because the COVID-19
emergency is pushing the World
I mean, to a different scenario.
That mean, things will
change unnecessarily
as the book said
So that means that we have to change
either for good or for ill.
So we will emerge differently.
That's for sure.
And because the church is in the word,
we are not foreign to this challenge.
So the church needs to respond
to this emergency and crisis
in a very radical way,
because it's a radical crisis
and it will emerge differently
for good or for ill.
What does it mean?
So how do address it,
so the advantages that we
have is the emergency is now,
but we have to think in the longterm,
we have an advantages.
So we going to put all
our transcendent view
into our response or not.
And if so, are we going,
how are we going to do it and with whom?
Now that these theological reflections,
are we going to include other
churches, other religions
and people of Goodwill in general?
I think the church has been doing that,
but this will accelerate but reform,
but it's part of Pope Francis reform,
the openness and the dialogue
and this culture of a encounter
that father Spadaro was
saying, that's the first thing.
The second I would say is what COVID-19
is also pushing the church
into refining its mission.
So for example, this is something
that we have to respond urgently,
but it requires deep, deep reflection.
And its it's very complex,
but it's require simplicity
at the same time to propose solutions.
And it requires, is a
new problem that requires
new solutions with new
wine, with new skins.
Are we going so all these
things that the church
has always been trying
to respond to reality
through the traditional of the church.
Well, how are we going to do it now,
when a tiny little virus is
exacerbating the viruses.
They enormous viruses
that we have in terms,
ecological crisis, social
crisis, financial crisis,
economy, crisis, lifestyle,
crisis, et cetera.
So it's an opportunity
for the church to bring,
the old wine of the tradition,
but to express this in a new way
and to put it into new skins
and to offer it not to the church,
but to offer to the World in that sense.
I think that necessarily
the COVID-19 will accelerate
some of the resources that, of
the reforms that Francis is,
Pope Francis is proposing,
particularly through discerning
together with others, because
we don't have the solutions,
but contributing very strongly
with our the best of our tradition.
We have a lot of things to
say of what does it mean?
What, does it mean to live
together in a global World?
What does it mean to
think in the long term?
What does it mean to love
our neighbors, our enemies,
or because they are all affected virus,
what does it mean to create a
culture of encounter and base?
And what does it mean to
address the deep crisis
that are underpinning the COVID-19?
There are basically the economic
and the ecological crisis.
And I think that the way
we have to address this
and how to respond,
it is part of the Reform of the Church.
As I agree with what father Spadaro said,
it's not that a book has
a Stalinist planning,
reforming the church.
You is that the church
is part of the World,
the World revolves the church evolve,
Of course, with the same basis
of that were settled by Jesus.
But we cannot be the same
institution in a different World.
We need to be able to say something new
because the word of God is always new.
- So thank you so much to father Augusto.
It's very interesting, and
it's important to highlight
this idea of a process, involvement,
and also tension between the emergence
and at the same time, a deeper
reflection on these problems.
And in some way,
these emergency is pushing the whole World
on different levels.
So, thank you so much,
but in some way we can
claim that Pope Francis
is a revolution, is a reformer
is in some way regarding the,
not only the church as an
institution or the Vatican
as an institution, but
also the people of God.
So, Paul Elie, how are the Pope's actions
and gesture creating a
new religious imaginary.
And then a new understanding
of the role of the church
in the World, which is the
perception of people of God?
- Thank you, Deborah.
And thank you for the question.
I think that Pope Francis.
Has used images very, very effectively
to convey not only a sense of the papacy
and of the church in the midst of reform,
but of Catholic Christianity
at something like its essence
over the past few years.
when he was elected, the image
that got the most attention
initially was his refusal to
live in the Apostolic Palace
and said he would live in the guest house.
This suggested a stripped
down or simplified papacy.
And to a certain extent that's been true,
but that essentially the
negative character of the image
things he would not do quickly yielded
to the positive character
of things that he would do.
And those as I see it,
I've taken the character
of the personalist papacy,
the papacy that's on a human scale.
It's useful in this connection
to see him connection
to his predecessors,
both of whom had considerable
ability to use images
in the mass media,
but they use them in different ways.
John Paul, as I would interpret
it, simplifying a bit,
was a dramatic Pope.
He had a power for the grand gesture
and to speak to a large crowd
to give a sense of the global scale
of the Catholic undertaking.
And to do that over a series of decades,
Benedict was a scholarly Pope.
He took great care to make
sure that the church positions
were expressed precisely in language
and especially around the
time of the millennium,
when there was lots of
unprecedented actions
involving repent and so forth,
the codification of those actions
in words fell to Benedict.
He was still Ratzinger at the time,
but he was a scholarly Pope.
Well, Francis, I would say,
is a personalized Pope,
he has his feet on the ground,
he meets people essentially one-to-one
and he is the Pope who looks
the whole World in the eye.
We see this in some of
the characteristic images
of his pontificate
The embrace of a man with
boils and St. Peter's Square,
a modern day leper.
The Pope were unexpectedly
going to confession
at a penitential service in Rome.
The Pope standing shoulder to
shoulder with other religious
leaders at the 30th
Anniversary of the prayer
for peace in the Saint Francis of Assisi,
not putting the Pope over
against other leaders
or up above them,
but them standing there
as existential equals
in this place made it so powerful
by Saint Francis of Assisi.
And we saw it in the
events of COVID two events,
similar in some ways in
different and others.
He stood in st. Peter's square
at the worst moment of
the pandemic in Italy,
by himself with some of the
ritual character of Catholic
events over the centuries,
but in a way that made us see the Pope
as himself vulnerable
and as exposing his own vulnerability
at a moment when so many
of us felt vulnerable.
And then paired to that was
the image of Francis walking
on the core so in this, same days,
the Pope as a city man who
feels confined by the pandemic
and combined by his role as
Pope and wishes to do nothing
more than to walk down the
corridor and say a prayer
in a local Roman church.
these are images of a personalist Pope
and are images of the human scale.
Now, what does this mean for
the Reform of the Church?
People in Rome were pondering that,
there's a reform of the Curia underway,
and let's assume that such
a foremost takes place
will give us a reformed Curia
on something like a more human scale.
But as far as for the
people of God generally,
what it does is reaffirm for us
something basic to
Christianity there is always
a danger of getting lost
and it's the human scale.
As I see it, that's what the incarnation,
God becoming human perpetually reminds us
of the human scale is the scale.
Individual human lives are sufferings
large and small.
The prospect of death,
the hope of eternal life.
These things rooted in every individual.
We're not abstractions,
we're not members of groups.
Finally, we're not sources
for big data to analyze
and suggest the way we act
based on mass behavior.
We're individual free people responding
to cues in our own lives,
Francis with his affirmation
on the human scale has
served to remind us of that.
And not only to remind us of it,
but to make it attractive and possible.
I think there's a feeling often.
And there was certainly a feeling
from me during the
Pontificate of John Paul,
that Christianity Catholic
style wasn't really possible.
You had to set yourself count
as a one man or one person counterculture
to everything going on around you in order
to be an authentic Christian
and Pope Francis suggested
that to live this way is possible
and I don't want to say simple,
but ordinary or normal and
relatively straightforward.
He extended himself and he's made
so many of us myself for
sure want to do likewise.
- Thank you very much
for your explanation is very interesting
to see the Pope not only as
the presence of a Jesus Christ
and the leader of the
church but a human being,
looking for our relationships
with the people of God
and in this way, involving each one,
in these, wonderful truly relationships
between transcendence and the humanity.
It's incredible, really fascinating,
but also listening you and father Augusto,
I am understanding that maybe
the right word to express
and to explain the reform
of the Pope is not reform,
but maybe compassion.
And then on this point,
I'd like to listen the
point of view of Austen,
what I am asking you is
if the spiritual approach
of the Pope Francis can transform
and the political approach
to the global issue.
It is just a structural form
or a spiritual combustion.
What to do you mean Austen?
- Thanks, Deborah.
Hello, everybody.
Good to be with you.
Yeah, well conversion of
course was the subject
of my new book that came out last year,
which you didn't mention Deborah
and I hope you don't
mind if I just show it
because the subtitle in fact
has the very word struggle there.
And that partly reflects the fact that
I had come to realize since
writing my first book,
the great reformer that
really what Francis
was doing was much more akin
to a process of spiritual accompaniment.
A bit like in a retreat,
a retreat director accompanies
somebody through a process
of conversion and it was
Antonio Spadaro actually
who helped me to do understand that,
that actually the real reform comes about
when we no longer depend on the
things that we think we need
power, wealth, honor and so on,
but rather depend on the Grace of God
that the true change happens.
And that's true personally,
it's true ecclesially, and
it's true in a wider sense.
I pass rather boringly keep coming back
to a great event,
which to me explains so
much of this pontificate.
And that was the meeting of
the Latin American bishops
at Aparecida in Brazil, in May, 2007,
when the entire Latin
American Episcopal gathered
for the first time in 25 years
and carried out what I continued to insist
have not yet been contradicted
is the most far reaching discernment
of the signs of the times that
had been done by any church,
anywhere in the World.
And at the heart of that discernment
was the diagnosis of where the church had,
why the church was failing
to evangelize contemporary
modernity and at heard it
was because of the trauma
in a way, the tribulation
of secularization
and the changes in society,
which had caused the church in many ways
to fall into a state of desolation,
that it was spending more time lamenting
and condemning than discerning and asking,
what is it that the Holy
spirit is asking of us
in order to be able to offer
the gospel at this time?
So the diagnosis of Aparecida
was that the church was in desolation,
the prescription or the answer,
or what they heard the Holy spirit saying
was that this is the time for the church
to really offer the encounter with Christ
as the starting point of conversion
that the church can no longer rely
and this was the key point,
can no longer rely on Catholic structures,
as well as law and culture
to transmit the faith.
Therefore, the church had to do
what the church always did at
the beginning of Christianity,
which was without the
support of Law and culture
and great institutions,
but to offer the
experience of the encounter
with the mercy of Christ
expressed above all in mercy
and radical charity.
And the idea of the
universal dignity of humanity
is all burned there in the concrete acts,
if you like of the church.
So this is the famous Iglesia
in Salida sometimes translated
as the outgoing church or
extrovert church, but really,
it sounds best in Spanish,
the church that goes
out, it's very simple.
Now, how does the, this crisis
in a way underpins all that?
Well, of course we are now living
through one of the great breakdowns,
one of the great trawlers
in Western well global indeed history.
This pandemic followed by what we all know
is going to be and already
is a massive economic crisis.
And that it is precisely in this context
that everything I think
Francis has been saying
since the beginning of his pontificate,
encapsulated above all
in Evangelii Gaudium,
this is the moment that the church
in a way demonstrates
to the World precisely,
what it did at the beginning
of all of the Christian era.
And to the extent that the
church is with is a company
is capable of diagnosing
and bringing hope.
And so on in this context to the extent
of the church is present in
the pain and the suffering,
particularly on the margins,
to the extent that the
church can reconcile
and heal in a context
necessarily of division
therein is the evangelization.
So to the extent that this is the call
on the church at this
time in a very radical,
in a very specific way, I mean,
let me put it more
simply, either the church,
I mean, the Pope has been saying,
we rely that come out
of this better or worse.
A crisis never leaves you the same.
And exactly the same thing is true
of the church of the future.
So much will depend now
on what happens over the next few years.
And to me, that means in a
way embracing the reform.
And I do use the word reform
that Francis has been calling
upon the church these past few years,
which obviously we can
spell out and unpack
and describe in so many ways,
but that I think is the heart of it.
- Thank you very much Austen.
So these are reformer and that
these attempted to evangelize
the World is a big opportunity,
not only within the church,
but for all the World in
order to find a new approach
to solve the global
issues, global problem,
investing on poor people
and the different
countries around the World,
and but to continue our interview,
where I'd like to ask now father Augusto.
which are the new challenges
of all the your dicastery
in managing these COVID Outbreak,
which are the priorities
in order to find a solution
that able to satisfy the whole World.
- Thank you though Debora.
Well, I think the
dicastery know is in charge
of a commission that is called
the Vatican COVID-19 Commission.
and we have to work together
with other Dicasteries
and with the secretary of
state, with local churches
with other institutions from the church
and outside the church.
So it's quite a very big,
I would say global effort,
but we, our aim is not
to find these solutions
because we don't know them in advance,
but it is to help those
who have to take the decisions today,
to take the best decisions they can,
because the decisions
that they make today,
whether they are in government,
whether they are a leader of a church,
whether you are a leader of
a business or labor union,
or a leader of a household,
you have to take decisions now
that will affect your future.
So how do you help the people
who have to take the decision,
is to take good decisions or
the best decisions they can.
And this is one of our challenges
and how to do it in Alliance with science
or in dialogue with science, with agility,
but also with these
creativity and imagination
that faith brings.
Now for example, I mean, we
were talking about churches,
It's not all of this impact that the COVID
has had on the celebration
of the sacraments.
Now, what is the,
what are the parish or the
bishops or the partial preist
going to do or what the parish
community is going to decide?
What does it mean all these new,
I would say understanding
of the virtual contact.
Now you see just virtually,
does this mean this is not real?
What part of reality affects us?
What does, what is the sacrament,
or the grace of God embracing
through this new way
of relating ourselves and things
that ordinary people ask,
questions that ordinary People ask
from can I Confess myself through Zoom
or what happens with a Eucharist
if we cannot gather together
or when we gather together.
So basically how to grade,
we have knowledge at
least in the near future,
we have to promote communion and union,
but in a World that is
asking for social distance,
because social distancing is necessary
to keep people healthy.
So all these are challenges
that we are doing,
but we are doing it in Alliance,
and in permanent dialogue
with local churches
and how are they responding
there with the experts
in different fields
that means with science,
with the entire digastric,
for communication and groups
of communication that can help
us to communicate this,
what we are doing also with governments
and with international institutions.
And we just cover that
nobody has the solution,
but everybody wants the
church to participate.
Everybody believes that
the church has something
to say through our spirituality again,
not that because what Austen
said about Evangelii Gaudium
that is we have to apply it now it's true
because in the Evangelii Gaudium
The Pope said, very clearly,
this is what the land,
this is what I want the church to be
in the next years to come.
And one of the things
he said in Evangelica
we are more many, is that the response
to social problems normally,
what happened to those
responses, people think,
Oh, this is the part the people
who work in Caritas or experts,
or none of the respond to social issues
is submission of the entire church.
Now, of course, on these certain levels
but the entire church,
because as Paul was saying,
this it's a consequence of
the principle of incarnation.
(laughs)
God embracing the whole human nature.
God embrace us on nature.
So we cannot be detached from that.
Our mission as Christians
cannot be detached,
unless the entire church is
not just a group of people.
So what is the level of
participation to my contribution
of this new work that is coming,
that we have to create to
design, to invent a new word,
and how are we going to
contribute as Christians?
So this is the challenge
that we have basically
to coordinate that satellite gastric,
not because we are going to
do it just a clarification,
but we want to join
forces to create synergy
in how to take decisions
that will enable us to be
a more sustainable future.
Our society that creates
the possibility for actual
encounters and implements
the preferential option
for the poor.
Not because they Vulnearable
or those in need,
from the micro to the macro level,
our society that creates the conditions
where we can have a healthy society
and not to leave into a
false dichotomy between,
shall we recover the economy
or shall we allow people
to die or to how this is a false economy,
because what kind of
economy do we want to create
if people are ill?
So, or again, shall we,
shall we go back again
to what we had before?
Well, again, why don't we take this crisis
and opportunity to create
something that we have,
or to do something that we have,
we should have done some decades before.
So, to design a system that
is not that doesn't destroy,
or doesn't an exploit
people just destroy nature
and creates this environment,
this universal solidarity,
where we can have healthy people,
healthy societies and healthy institutions
that enable the health
of people and societies.
So basically this is our
challenge, no pressure,
but we have a lot of people helping us.
A lot of people are not just helping us.
We have a lot of people
who are participating
in this endeavor and I think
it would be a long term.
We hope that COVID won't last that long,
but the society has to change.
If we don't want to have more COVID
if we don't have to address a terrible
or worst crisis that COVID.
So this is the time to
take, to make a change.
And this is what the book has asked us,
please, this is the time
don't wait(indistinct)
There's nothing to lose and
we cannot wait any longer.
- So thank you Augusto.
So in some way, you are claiming that,
it is not to too much important
what the dicastery is doing
but recognizing that,
the Pope's proposal is right,
what I can do to support his proposal.
Maybe this is the true
conversion of the people of God
to be committed in first person
in these journey to save our
World and to make it
a better World.
- But Deborah,
if I may that's a very
short intervention there,
because I forgot to say yes or no,
because I want to clarify also
in relation to what Paul said
about human scale.
And that's a great time there,
its not just about what I can do,
because one of the viruses of
the World is individualism.
We are not, we are not individuals.
We are persons in relations.
So the solution for a new World
can not come from an individual.
Will come from communities
and this is what the church is about.
It's a community of people
are followers of Christ,
not missionary disciples,
talking about a Parasita
So this is very important.
The solution to a global crisis,
won't come from one individual,
all individuals have
something to contribute.
Of course, is it the spiritually,
everything has something to contribute,
but if we don't do it as a community,
there's no way out of our global crisis
of a communitarian crisis.
This is very important.
I'm sorry to say that,
because this is very important.
Particularly in some countries,
in some countries that they seem to,
they don't understand that
individuals are not isolated
cells and that we thrive in community
and we can respond to common
problems in community.
This is including the church,
not including the church.
And that's why I started
to point out about this,
but I really won't be happy
if we think that, yeah,
this is about what I can contribute here.
You can contribute,
but you as part of a community
as a household or something,
or as a church, but isolated
efforts are not enough.
- Now thank you, thank you very much
Augusto for highlighting these
are very important points
because of this change, our point of view,
not only in the individual perspective,
but the communitarian perspective
and human relationships,
this is very, very important.
And thank you, thank you very much.
So I'm going to get Paul,
come back to Paul Elie,
I'd like to know also in
continuity with the words
of a father Augusto.
What is like happening
from you point of view
within the peoples of God?
Which is the perception?
How are the people perceiving
the Pope actions set to reform the church?
- Thank you for the question.
Of course, the people of God are divided.
We can't speak in a single generalization
about what the Catholic people,
even in one country think
or what they're inclined to do,
but some things can be said.
Father Augusto framed the challenge
at the moment, very succinctly.
We were called to a culture of encounter
at a time when the pandemic is asking us
to keep our distance.
This is the challenge of our moment.
And I would say that
when we look at Pope Francis
pontificate up to this point,
we can be grateful that he
laid up a store of images
and examples that would show us
how a culture of encounter is valuable
and how it might be
possible going forward.
So before the pandemic
already Francis was suggesting
in a way that didn't partake
with the culture Wars,
how to offer a counterexample
to dominant ways
of doing things in our society
we have in global society.
This is in many respects
in age of the strong man
of authoritarian would be
authoritarian rulers in Russia,
in Turkey, in Hungary,
in the United States, in Israel.
Against this Francis
suggested that a person
of great power the Pope
could be an anti strong man
could work in ways that
didn't involve authoritarian
gestures decrees the use of power,
to suppress the ideas
of his rivals to banish,
his enemies, but a culture of encounter,
even from a person in a position
of great power and leadership.
Likewise, the images that he
laid up before the pandemic
of encounter during the interview
that father Spadaro did with Pope Francis
shortly after his election,
the image of the field hospital emerged,
and then image has
gotten a lot of attention
because of the COVID epidemic.
Right after that Pope Francis said
what's needed is nearness, proximity
and the seven years of his
pontificate prior to the pandemic
gave us images that
showed us what nearness
and proximity might mean.
When John Paul traveling around the World
to a certain extent,
dramatize the global nature
of the church and who
centers Rome for him.
But Francis and his travels
suggested something rather different
that he would come to
meet us where we live.
We would meet us where we are
that the Pope drawing near
is analogous for a God
who wishes to draw near to each of us,
who makes it possible for us in response
to draw near to God.
Now we're in a situation where
so many of the things that
enabled us to draw near
to one another physical contact, meals,
crowds at sporting events
and plays and concerts,
and the like are very difficult.
Let's hope that if we
emerge from the pandemic,
when we do with a heightened
sense of nearness and proximity
is very close to what makes us human.
And we can do probably
because Pope Francis
and his pontificate has
affirmed that again and again,
already through his words
and through the images
that he's conveyed to
the World of himself,
reaching out, drawing near.
- Thank you so much, Paul.
And the, okay people is
divided but in some way
Pope Francis became Pope for
the election of Cardinals,.
So the Cardinals selected the Pope Francis
is a very particular figure matter.
In some way, ease the
sign the other our time.
Do you agree?
- Sorry, is this directed
to me or to Paul?
- Paul?
- I thought you were
posing the question to us,
can you post it once more?
- And sorry sorry.
Now, I was asking you if that in some way,
Pope Francis, was elected by Cardinals?
So even the people is divide.
There is a some resistance to his reformer
and to his style.
Do you think that is the man
the right man of our time
for the church or?(chuckles)
- Myself, I most certainly do.
I think the resignation of Pope Benedict
and the possibility for Francis to emerge
as the first Jesuit Pope,
essentially as Bergoglio
as a Pope who's time
and action as Pope is so consistent
with so much of what he did beforehand.
And with a really astonishing,
he's thrusting into public
life on the grand scale.
And yet does not himself
seem to be elevated
to have lost this quality of
having his feet on the ground.
Is he the Pope for this moment?
I thought so since 2013
and I think so even more today.
let me just address
something that circled around
and father Augusto's remarks
though and then on the chat
and suggesting that Pope
Francis is a personalist Pope
and that he looks each of us in the eye,
that's not to suggest
individualism at all.
And I know that,
especially because I speak
from the United States a
country where individualism
Run Amok is probably what's led us
to the particular grave situation
we're in with the pandemic.
Pope Francis as a member
of the Society of Jesus
as a member of our church in Argentina,
as a member of the South
American bishops conference,
as a Cardinal in all these ways,
he's affirmed membership communities
and his images of encounter
of nearness have served
to remind us of how
interconnected we all are
and if we didn't realize it beforehand,
we sure ought to realize it now
because the pandemic has
made clear that biologically
we're connected and our
response to the pandemic
lays bare just how much
we depend on one another.
- Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Thank you very much Paul.
So Austen I have...
- Deborah you've gone quiet.
You've muted yourself I think that's it.
- Sorry, I have the last
question for you Austen,
do you think of that
this spiritual approach
of our Pope is contributing
to his global political leadership?
Which your perspective?
- Yeah, I mean, as you'd
expect me to say, I'd say yes,
unquestionably, I mean, his role
is one of the spiritual authority
and that's important to understand
that it's a different kind of authority
from the kind of authority
that say a politician
who is elected on a
mandate would exercise.
And some of the frustration with Francis,
I think comes from an
incorrect hermeneutics
as the theologians would say,
and in other words, we look
at him with a particular lens.
In reality, even though
of course he makes law
and he is the Supreme
authority in the church.
And ultimately his authority
is the authority of Jesus.
It's the authority to persuade,
to offer people a horizon,
to build bridges that allow
them to open themselves
to the Holy spirit, to grace.
In other words, to set
in motion processes,
which if you like allow God in
and change people's horizons,
and that's fundamentally
the task of the Pope.
Now, of course, there are
a lot of structural issues
in the church and I know
some of the questions already
are asking about that and by the way,
I can talk for a long time
about the structural reforms
that have happened over
the last seven years,
which I think actually have
been far more substantial
than most people think.
But I would always come back to this,
which is that ultimately
what Francis is trying to do
in Rome is to change a culture, a mindset,
he's taking a bureaucracy or organization,
which in many ways was built
to defend itself from the World
and trying to put it at
the service of the World
and he uses this great distinction
between a being a mediator
and an intermediary.
A mediator is somebody who
facilitates an encounter
in this case, of course,
between God and humanity.
And intermediary is somebody
who interposes themselves
in a way to profit at the
expense of both parts, middleman,
we sometimes say in English.
Now, I think what he's been
seeking to combat in Rome
and in the wider church
has been what I might call,
a middleman or intermediary
culture, hence his war
and we have to call it
a war on clericalism,
which he sees as
absolutely the worst thing
that can happen to the church,
because it's what happened
of course, to Israel.
When you have elite groups
who try to arrogate to themselves.
If you like the power of religion,
rather than placing it at
the service of the people.
So I think, we can talk
about the structural forms,
but I think at the heart
of what he's been seeking
to do has been a
transformation of culture.
And he's been doing it in,
I think, a very consistent,
a very, a very radical
wherever I determined way,
but it's not all about as
Antonio i think was saying right
at the beginning,
it's not all about cutting off heads.
It's not about sacking people.
He allows people to retire
and then appointments,
new people underneath.
I mean, his approach
is much more longterm.
It's about sowing seeds that probably
other Pope's will, will harvest.
It's a very, very longterm process.
If you simply change the structures
without changing the
culture, you achieve nothing.
If you change people
without changing culture,
again, you just support.
So it's all about a gradual,
a much more organized process,
but here's what I really
want to say in answer
to your question, Deborah, and
this is picking up a lot on,
what's been said already
by Augusto, especially,
but also Paul, about the
culture of encounter,
which is that, setting
in motion processes,
which allow people to come together
and work together in many ways
is Bergoglio's great specialty.
He did his doctoral thesis
on the whole question
of how we can travel
together in disagreement,
allowing the tensions between us
not to turn into contradictions,
but rather to help to,
if you like bring the Holy spirit in.
And I think he's a bit of a genius at this
and of course, what he sought
to do in a room is introduce
through mechanisms of synodality,
processes which actually allow this.
So if you wanna know,
where's the real action
in this pontificate,
it's been in the synods and by the way,
also the place of course
where the greatest opposition
to this pontificate has
also been felt, Why?
Because the synods, the
heart of the synodal process
is discernment, it's about
allowing the Holy spirit
to guide the church.
It's about bringing people together
who have very different views,
asking them to express
themselves clearly and boldly,
and then listen to each
other very carefully,
and then to detect the
motions of the spirit,
which allow everybody to look in a,
if you like in a third place,
which is beyond those
contradictions or differences.
Now, this he's doing for
the sake of the church,
but I think above all,
he's doing it for the sake of a humanity,
which is increasingly
polarized and divided.
So here's the thing.
I mean, you guys in America at the moment
are going through an election,
you're coming up to an
election and revealing as ever,
ever deeper tribal
divisions, a polarization,
which is deeply affecting
the church as well,
which is inducing eight paralysis,
the solutions which face the World
and the church can never be solved
when the body itself
is completely divided.
If this is not dealt with
then in a way we all fail.
And so I think what Francis is doing,
often in a very gentle way
is offering mechanisms,
modules for how we can live
together in disagreement,
but actually turn those disagreements
into something fruitful that
allows us to work together.
And this is really the
whole point about the body
and the people of God.
God comes into the incarnation,
is God entering human
history to form a people,
to create a body,
which isn't a matter of
eradicating differences,
but allowing them to work
together against a shared horizon.
And that's what opens
up a new future of hope.
- So thank you very much Austen.
But my impression in hearing you
is that this approach to this agreement
It would be fruitful
even out of the church,
not only within the Catholic church.
So my impression in listening
to you and the Augusto
and Paul Elie is that in some way,
this Pope is like a
model for problem solving
and for creating a new
kind of a global World.
- It's about creating
a new kind of politics,
which is much more about the
engagement of ordinary people
from their institution
at the base of society.
It's about allowing the
energy and the creativity
of what he would call
the popular movements
or the people's movements
to actually become,
to bring about change in others
is not just about the state.
It's not just about the next great leader
who we think will solve everything.
Yeah, it's about
restoring the pre-liberal,
if you like idea of politics
as the cultivation of virtue
and the engagement of
people in the common good,
different kinds of politics and then,
Augusto is very good on this,
a different kind of economy,
where the goal is not simply
the growth in GDP,
which we know excludes half
of the World's population
from the benefits of
the goods of the World,
but also damages the environment.
Can we have an economy with
different kinds of goals,
which are human goals?
How do we flourish better?
How do we make sure the poor have enough
without damaging the planet,?
which involves changes to how we all live,
but who has the courage
to offer those kinds of
models of conversion,
if not Francis the church at this time,
because frankly, nobody else is doing it.
- Yeah, Thank you so much Austen.
Now, we at the time to open the floor
because we have a really several questions
from our audience, of course,
it will be impossible
to answer to everyone,
but thank you very much everyone,
to attend these webinar and
thank you for your questions.
So I can choose some questions,
okay, one question that
probably for Austen
from Mark Kirken, doesn't
the reform of the Church
ever to come from the people
of God that are rising up,
rather from the topic hierarchy down,
Francis can inspire us as a people,
but we are able to take the course
much like black lives matter, Austen.
- Yeah, well, I'm not sure
that the changes will come
through an uprising of the people.
I'm not sure uprising is necessarily
the word we're looking for,
but certainly the participation
and engagement of the people of God,
which is also what synods are about.
I mean, it's easy to say,
well, synods just involve bishops
'cause they're the only ones who vote,
but actually synods involve
a very long process prior
to the actual similar opening
of consultation of the people of God.
We had that with the synods on the family
and indeed young people
and Amazonia last year,
I mean a two year process of consultation
of dialogue and stuff.
So there are lots of ways in
which the people of God engage,
need to engage in this process.
But synodality as Francis has himself said
needs to permeate the whole church
is not just about those
meetings with them.
Our diocese, our parishes,
our bishops conferences need
to become much more synodal
and much more about people
being able to participate
and contribute to a discernment.
But we're not talking here about democracy
because the synodal process,
ultimately the bishops have
that authority to discern it.
But as Francis says and I figured
out what this is in Latin,
but it's something like,
a teaching church must
be a listening church.
You know, we kept the church
will not be effective in
teaching unless it first listens
and so that's what the
Senate is also about.
- Yeah and there may be
this is a way to overcome
clericalism, this new approach,
a church listening then you can go.
- Well I absolutely, I mean,
clericalism by the way is
not just the vice of clerics.
Laypeople can be clerical as well.
Clericalism is an aristocratic mentality,
It's whoever puts themselves
above the people of God
sees themselves as separate from it.
And I'm afraid there are no
shortage of elitist laypeople.
We have them on the left and
on the right in the church,
you spend all that time,
judging and writing long blog
post announcing everything.
So we all need to overcome this.
So we have to start to believe
as Ignatius puts into the
spiritual exercises here,
we have to believe in the
church as our own mother,
we have to care about her suffer with,
in order to really participate.
- Well, thank you Austen.
Now we have another question
from Jack and Bailey
to Paul Elie for Paul Elie
and given the general
ignorance of Catholics
about the basics of their faith,
such as the principle of
Catholic social justice
could technologies such as Zoom,
that are now Mainstream become
plot for re-Evangelizing
the fateful on the large scale.
This is very interesting
because, okay, so Paul.
- Well, so first of all, the
question is thinks hasn't given
the general ignorance of Catholics.
I'm not sure I would go along
with that given altogether,
there's always somebody
in the church saying
that somebody else is ignorant.
People of simple faith
have maintained the church for centuries.
So that's not a
constructive way of opening
as far as I'm concerned to take as a given
the ignorance of others.
That's certainly not the way Pope Francis
has approached things.
So setting that aside, of course,
we can use new media to help communicate,
we're doing it now.
We have in father Spadaro,
someone who's thought about,
the social networking of the
internet on a theological level
and the way it dissenters
hierarchical structures
in ways that could be really fruitful
for the church and fruitful
for drawing near that we're trying to do
in context of what I said earlier
about the central thrust
of Francis pontificate.
Will we do it?
I hope so.
I guess I think the going back
to one of my earlier points
that the challenge for the
next generation of people
who would evangelize has to
do more with communicating
the beauty and the order
of living as a Christian,
faith that will then seek understanding.
I don't think the problem is lots and lots
of Catholics who are ignorant.
I think it's fewer and fewer people
who really want to be Catholic.
And I would think that Pope
Francis with his use of images,
his suggestion, that complicated
as Christianity, it is,
it can be essentially
simple about drawing near
to person on the margins.
That's a better place to start than
with Zoom Catechism or
something like that.
- Wow, thank you so much Paul.
we have another question
for father Augusto Zampini.
Will the spiritual conversion
promoted by Pope Francis
lead to specific institutional
changes in the church,
including the religions of
traditional theological Dogma?
This is very interesting because sometimes
so the public debate is
talk about some geological,
some changing in the doctrines and saw on,
and may be this question,
give you Augusto the opportunity
to solve these these situation, please.
- Well I'm, (clears throat)I am not sure
because the Dogma are what we believe that
it's no discovery of the truth
that is expressed in the gospel.
And we have discovered afterwards so,
that's very difficult to change,
but there are lots of things
that we teach you the church
and not necessarily Dogmas and
then we have dogmatized them.
And that could be the case, but certainly,
certainly there are two
things about that question
that I would like to just stress.
One is, that it was very well supported.
The change that we need
in the World to address
the mega economic ecological
crisis that we have,
which is also political,
is also health crisis.
But the changes that we need
to make in the way we live,
the way we produce,consume ways
that we design politics is so, so deep
or so, so wide, so, so, so big.
There's no way that it
can be done through our,
It can come only from what
we think from our brain.
It needs to come from here
from the guts, from the spirit,
not just because they are the deep roots,
but also because that,
when the spiritual force
is the driver for change.
That's the only way of
sustaining it in time.
Otherwise, as soon as
you have difficulties,
you will drop it as the
parabola of the seeds.
No well, as soon as the sun
comes, it's too difficult.
But when it's really,
really deep down below here,
that's nothing that will stop us.
And also when its a community
that spirituality's shared in a community,
That's nothing that will stop us.
And that is something that, for example,
we will address next year
for in backing the cup 26,
with different religions,
we are going to arrive there
and to say to the nations,
listen, I know that you
are the one to implement
the sustainable development goals,
and you're not really struggling,
but you know what?
We will just people we have already,
we are already, we have already started
and we are not going to stop
whether you agree or not,
we are going to change anyway.
So, we are going to support you
if you continue to change
in other ways, be careful.
So this, the spiritual training is very,
very important because
it provides the driver
and that's the sustainability for change
because it's an ongoing change,
remember that we don't
convert in an overnight,
it's a process of conversion at first
that I was saying at the beginning.
So this is the first thing
that I would like to say
about that question.
And thank you so much for writing it.
The second thing it's more
related to, of course, what this,
where the spirit blows as in the Surmont,
as Austen was saying,
then we discover new things
about what Christ wants to tell us.
But related to the question
that was posed to Paul,
there's a famous book.
I mean, it's an old book
actually from the '80s
that is called the title of the book
is Catholic social teaching
Our best kept secrets.
(laughing)
And for those who are
not that intellectual,
I will give you a very short story.
So last year somebody asked a priest.
I won't say who.
To go and give a talk Spain.
And I would love that to
see that it's cyclical
for the Pope and the care for our country.
Oh, but are you going to do like a Augusto
because I heard Augusto, Father Augusto
speaking about this in different audiences
in canyon and in Sierra Leone
and the Priest said, "I'm not sure
I'm going to talk about Jesus."
Like he wasn't playing like, what if,
because I speak about
Catholic social teaching,
I'm not speaking it about
the church and the faith.
Has nothing to do.
I'm going to speaking about Jesus.
Ask if Jesus, if you analyze the gospel,
he speaks 80% of his pages of Parables
sometimes are related.
I relating the kingdom of
God with social issues.
So I think one, so the good question,
the good opportunity that this
question provides is to say,
listen, the Pope, what
is the Pope doing now?
Now right now is doing
a seniors' of catechesis
about the response of
the church of the COVID
based on Catholic social
principles and theological virtues.
And this is a catechesis.
So of course he's not going to sort out
and to create new thinking,
but he's providing an
example of what are look,
what are small churches
and local tradition do
to use the best of our tradition,
including the social
principles of the church,
taking the gospel and the
tradition and theological virtues,
but to say, what has got to
say now to the people who are,
who has lost their jobs,
but the people who are sick,
who are the people who have
relatives who have died
and they cannot assist the funerals,
who those who are one of
those, that company who,
those who, who are completely anxious,
because they don't know
what's going to happen in the future,
who those who are locked
down in a horrible household.
And they kind of escape
who those who are giving up their life
and not, they're not recognized.
I mean, has he's got not,
has got nothing to do or has
got nothing to say about that.
I'm sure, of course he has.
And of course the church
in the name of God
has something to say.
So this is what then new catechizes
is among dynamic catechizes
where the social principles of the church
and not just for experts
and explaining boring
things about the history.
It's about the right
now, the spirit of God.
I mean, really, really among us now
and helping us to respond
to provide new solutions
because this is the thing.
This is the keys to provide responses,
a process of responses, to provide fruits,
with our love and our hope,
now with our faith to the World,
to offer these processes to the World,
not being a church that is self centered,
which just to sum up,
this is part of the reform
according to my opinion.
the church cannot be
self-centered the churches
at the service of the kingdom of God
at the service of of the World and this
is what every single crisis is
although is terrible provides
an opportunity to rejuvenate things
to regenerate our service
to the Kingdom God
to the World which includes
of course the preference
to those who are suffering.
I mean, I'd love to be part of that church
I'm already enthused but
even by the by explaining it
you see a church that is has
the strength to help somebody
especially the poor in
the name of our faith
in a sustainable way.
But i'm already excited you see
this is i think is the new
Discernment Dynamic Conversion process
that has been accelerated i
would say by the pontificate
of Pope Francis hasn't started with him
but he's made a big push.
- Thank you so much Augusto,
for your explanation.
I have the last question
for everyone of you
and i'd like to know your
opinion, your idea about
the difference between
criticism and the resistance
because each Pope was a criticized
and everyone is criticized every day,
okay we can do something and
someone else of course claim
that we can do better
and to test, to prove
that we can do better
and so on but in the case
of the reform of the church
engaged by Pope Francis it seems to me
that we find a sort of resistance
so let me know please maybe
beginning with you Augusto
or Augusto or Paul and after Austen,
there's a difference between
resistance and criticism
against the Pope.
- Which one of us would
you like to speak first?
- Yes thank you
- Let me begin at the end i
think there's active resistance
to Pope Francis taking
place in the United States.
In part that's a way to
speak to the question
that father Augusto took up.
Basically, we don't have a situation
in which the catholic people are ignorant
and short Catholic social teaching
is a well-kept secret
We have a situation in which not a small
number of american bishops have sidled
up to a president and a party.
who are fragrantly in violation
of Catholic Social Teaching.
We have the same bishops and many others
who've basically resisted reform
on priestly sexual
abuse for three decades.
These are people with
long habits of resistance
that is for them
co-extensive with the work
of the church is resisting.
liberalizing trends in the
culture and anti-authoritarian
structures and activities.
So the fact that Pope Francis is now
undertaking such activities.
This isn't reform that
we're seeing in the pushback
from the american Bishops
it's active resistance
- Thank you.
- Thanks i would just use the terms
that Pope Francis himself
uses which is to say
that when there is that there's nothing
wrong with criticism.
Criticism is perfectly normal and ordinary
and everybody should
feel free to criticize.
Resistance is, there is
a bad spirit behind it
in the sense that you are
what you're doing is denying
in effect Francis's authority,
his spiritual authority,
you're denying that he's
guided by the Holy Spirit
you're denying that he
was elected by a process
which is open to the Holy Spirit.
And so those people who talk about Francis
as a Heretic or a Modernist
or they just claim
that he's trying to change the
fundamentals of the church.
I mean, all that is an
example of resistance
because these are people
who are infact denying
his authority and at the origin
of that is a schismatic
mentality whether it leads
or not to schism is to be seen.
Every Papacy has had
very strong resistance,
whether it's from the extreme left
or the extreme right or
sometimes from particular
groups with particular vested interests,
what's very interesting
about this pontificate
is that the heart of the
resistance is as i think
i said earlier to discernment.
Whenever Francis is discerning
that's when you find the
greatest resistance which is
why the synods have elicited
real resistance real what might
call bad spirit resistance.
- Thank you Austen,
- Thank you
- Augusto tell me.
- Yeah, I'm following up
with what Austen said,
that the dialogue is part
of the culture of encounter
that Pope Francis is trying to promote.
So those who are able to dialogue
the problem is ideology behind that
and the confusion between our religion
and our ideology yeah
and the same happened
to i mean analogically
speaking as an analogy
with differences no but the same happened
to Jesus when he was talking
about the Kingdom of God
and people were saying
no that's not well yeah
i mean well why not show me how.
So the resistance comes from from deep
from misunderstood i mean i'm going to say
because i agree with
Paul to certain extent
it's not a misunderstanding
it's a confusion i mean between your faith
and an ideology and it's a fear
i mean fear is never a good driver.
So this is going to destroy the term,
what i mean the church it's
not going to be destroyed,
the bases of the church
are there to change
but so but discernment's,
that the church is alive
it's a lively community
led by the Holy Spirit
with a certain structure.
So what is interesting is
that many of the groups
who are quite belligerent and resistant
were those who beforehand they were saying
they were accusing
everybody of being heretic
'cause they were just giving an opinion
that maybe that's not exactly right
and now that they're saying
that the pope is heretic.
I mean, so in there's a
famous book in Spanish book
like it's like a kind of Shakespeare's,
but for Spanish they say,
"Don Quixote by Miguel
de Cervantes Saavedra"
Don Quixote is with on
his way with Sancho panza
which is his mate and on
his horse and then he saw
that the the the dogs are barking
and Don Quixote said to this to his mates
and San Jose said in Spanish he said,
(speaks foreign language)
So Austen can you can
help me to translate that.
(laughs)
How would you say it?
- The dogs are barking Sancho
which is a sign we're moving ahead.
- Exactly that's a
perfect synthesis you see,
we are moving ahead these
churches were ahead based
on the grounds of our faith
on what on the Kingdom of God
and well and there will
always be Tourists at bark
and that's a good sign.
- Thank you, thank you very much
and maybe we have a little time
for a very last last question for you all.
About more responsibility for laypeople.
How do you see people being enabled
and they're given the authority to do this
and so the issue, the question
is about the responsibility for Laypeople.
So Paul Elie, do you like to be to start?
(laughs)
- so one of the things that Pope Francis
has done is to drawnear to people
from different walks of life.
he's drawn near to gays and lesbians
he's drawn near to transgender people,
he drew near to the Atheist Scalfari
with some long interviews.
I would say that the best way for him
to move things forward is to draw near
to Laypeople by giving
them positions of authority
greater than they've
occupied to this point.
It's partly structural
and whatever reform of the
Roman Curia is taking place,
let's hope that there are more
roles for Laypeople in it.
But he can use the
symbolic power of saying,
i draw near to this person
as as a true catholic
as serious as any cardinal or bishop
this person who is a woman
or a layman or a young person
and let's hope that he keeps doing that.
- Thank you Paul, Austen please.
- Yeah sure, i mean i
just think that Francis
is quite sensitive to clericalism even
in the way that Laypeople think
and a lot of the discussion
around this turns about on power
and and ultimately power of
course is is clericalism isn't?
I mean in other words all
leadership roles in the church
are about service whether
they're ordained or non-ordained.
One of the interesting things
that's happened in the last
year was the Amazonia synod,
the one of the very striking
things about that synod
was how in this vast area.
where there are very very few priests
and the church has very
little infrastructure
it is Laypeople
and mostly women who run
the church communities
in the amazon and there was a
lot of discussion in the synod
about ordaining married
men and about women
accessing the Diaconate
and Francis says you know
felt that that's not where the
spirit was where the spirit was was about
affirming raising up recognizing
the authority that is already exercised
the leadership that's already
exercised by Laypeople
and especially women in the church.
in other words the spirit
has already as it were poured
forth the gifts that the
church needs for its mission.
And i think where where Francis is looking
there again in quite a gentle way
it's only one part of the World
but read but particularly
that last section
and you cannot but think well actually
this is what we should be doing
you know the whole church
really needs to be recognizing
in a very new way the the
gifts that are being pulled out
on everybody you know
laypeople as well as religious
men as well as women.
There have been a lot of
questions i've noticed
specifically on women and i'm sorry we
didn't get around to it
but i just say very briefly
that one of the things Francis
has been doing in the
Vatican has been integrating
the voice of women by yes appointing
them leaders of the Casters
giving them senior roles
in the Castries but perhaps
more important appointing
them consulters, just a
couple of weeks ago he renamed
the council for the economy,
which is an incredibly authoritative body
and six out of seven of the
laypeople are all womem.
But they're not working in
the Vatican for the Vatican
they come from outside
to give their advice
and their council and i think here you see
there's a lot of what he's
been doing with women,
he's been trying to say we
need to into the great women
and the voice of women but be careful
that we don't clericalize
them or allow certain kinds
of women to support
particular power structures
which we need to move on from.
- Well thank you Austen, Augusto please,
last word about this topic laypeople
- Well i think
I will give you some again,
I will tell you some my experience,
so it's not just what i think,
so saying i arrived to the
Vatican three years ago
and so one of my first
tasks was to be advisor
to the synod for the youth
and we have a prisoner for the youth
and i think we were only two,
three, four, five priests
among three hundred and
fifty lay young people
and more than one at sixty percent,
sixty-five percent were women,
and so that was my first experience
and somebody told me
well but hold on a minute
this is new and this is new,
because i don't think that this is normal.
So but that was three years ago
then we had the synodal for the use
and they were and for the first time
a lot of the for the scene of the family
was not here but there were some laypeople
participating but then
for the scene of the youth
they were we have the
pre-saint out of the youth
but then there were young people
participating in the scene
that was created just for bishops
and then in Canada Masonia there were,
I cannot say the number but there were,
a lot of number of laypeople
there including indigenous
people in the synod hall alongside bishops
and again the more you
link faith with reality
the more obvious the role of laypeople is
and the more we need them
and but i don't think i would
be a bit cautious inside
these Laypeople or clerics
or because we need noise like symposia
we need all the charisma
and the church that's again,
i will finish my last word will be
again the sense of community.
In a community it's like a
body we need every single
charisma we cannot be one or the other
i think this is also
another full psychotomy
within the church.
Now i mentioned a full psychotomy
in the World of Health and economy
but i think clerics or laypeople
well, we need to work together
i mean this is not one or either
i mean we all have something to contribute
and so long as it is for the service
as Austen was saying
and this is what i mean Evangelii Gaudium
is very clear the Pope said,
"Here this is the church i want."
And some of us are trying to work on that,
with all our imperfections of course
and mistakes but this is
what we're trying to do to,
to generate a community of people
lay clerics women, men young old.
But a community followers of Christ
and i think this is the way forward
and to be honest i don't think
that's the throwback in this
in this part of the reform
i think we will continue
to work here for years to come.
- Thank you very much,
thank you all of you.
We began our webinar
with the idea to speak
about the Pope Francis and
the Reform of the Church
and after we discuss is a spirituality
and the role of his spirituality
in the Reform of the Church
and the in the reform of global politics
but also in the reform
of the people of God.
of course the questions and the issues
are too much but it's a pleasure
for me to to thank all of you.
Our speakers Augusto Zampini, Paul Elie
Austen Ivereigh and the old staff
of the Berkeley center
initiative for a Social Catholic
and the global engagement.
So thank you so much,
we will have a clear the
webinar in Italian language
on power on the 17th of September
and I wish you a wonderful day.
Thank you everyone.
- Thank you Deborah.
