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Great example of the humility of Pope Francis, and amazingly, it is being recognized by the media. Would that all who are supposed to serve us, like our politicians, would see their role as the Pope sees his.
Can you imagine Barack Obama breaking away from his golf game with Tiger Woods to do something like this?
Over the past two weeks, with one act of humility after another, Pope Francis has proven he’s willing to break with tradition.
Just after being named the new pontiff, he asked the faithful to pray for him, rather than the other way around. He’s refused to stand on the customary platform above other archbishops and dressed himself in simpler vestments than his predecessors. He’s made a practice of shunning the rich trappings of the position, from paying his own hotel bill to opting out of the palatial apartment popes have lived in for a century in favor of simpler digs.
Many of these acts send a signal about who Jorge Mario Bergoglio is and what reforms he thinks the Catholic Church’s leadership needs to make. He’s making a point of continuing the humble lifestyle he lived in Argentina (where he was known to take the subway and fly coach) and showing how the Church’s bureaucracy has become too wrapped in clerical privilege.
But an act of Pope Francis’s on Thursday perhaps says the most about his humility. Taking part in a tradition of Christianity’s holy week that reenacts the humble gesture Jesus made toward his 12 disciples before the Last Supper, Francis washed the feet of 12 people. What was unusual, however, was that he did not wash the feet of priests or even lay men, as have his predecessors, and he did not do it within the hallowed walls of a Roman basilica. Rather, he washed the feet of 12 juvenile prisoners at the Casal del Marmo Penitentiary Institute for Minors. Two of the young people were women and one was a Muslim, marking the first time a pope had included either group in the ceremony.
Of course, the media always has to find the controversy and so seems to be making something of the fact that the Pope washed the feet of women as a grand “break with tradition”, asking “is this a signal of his likelihood to further break with tradition”.
This reveals a lack of understanding of the practice of foot washing and the point of the Pope’s action. It is about humility and service to all-the poor, men, women, prisoner or free, even Muslim or Christian. The media discussion fails to recognize, for example, that foot washing has involved women in the US for years, that there has never been a prohibition about it not involving women.