At Pope Francis' funeral on Saturday, in front of many world leaders, Italian Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re made a plea for care for migrants, an end to wars and action on global climate change – key policy issues for Francis.
Cardinal Battista echoed one of the Pope's harshest remarks about US President Donald Trump, who was in the crowd, calling for “building bridges, not walls.”
For a decade, Trump and the Pope have traded criticism, largely over the Pope's calls for compassion for migrants, a group Trump has repeatedly tried to deport.
Cardinal Battista's sermon, heard by millions around the world, contained a powerful political message for national leaders and a powerful domestic appeal to Catholic cardinals around the world.
For the roughly 135 Catholic cardinals who are set to meet soon in a secret conclave to choose the next pope, it also offered a possible starting point for discussions.
On a spiritual level, the 91-year-old prelate expressed a simple idea: there is no turning back.
Pope Francis, the first Latin American pontiff to attract worldwide attention during his 12-year pontificate, was “attentive to the signs of the times and to what the Holy Spirit was awakening in the Church.”
“Pope Francis, with his human warmth and deep sensitivity to contemporary challenges, sincerely shared the concerns, suffering and hopes of our time,” Cardinal Battista noted.
The cardinal said he touched people's hearts “in a direct and immediate way.”
Francis, pope since 2013, died on Monday at the age of 88.
His funeral on Saturday, also attended by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and about 50 other world leaders, was a carefully orchestrated affair with Latin chants, strictly ordered seating and the use of ancient Catholic rituals.
Cardinal Battista cited criticism Pope Francis leveled at Trump in 2016, when he first ran for president, saying Trump was “not a Christian” because of his views on immigration.
“A man who thinks only of building walls, wherever they may be, and not of building bridges, is not a Christian,” Francis said at the time. “That is not in the Gospel.”
Trump then responded: “It is shameful for a religious leader to question a person's faith.”
Just recently, the Pope called Trump's moves to crack down on immigration during his second term a “disgrace.”
Cardinal Battista also referred to an important document written by Pope Francis in 2015 on climate change, which was intended to influence discussions at the 2016 Paris climate conference, as well as the Pope's visits to the Mediterranean islands of Lampedusa and Lesbos, where he met with migrants in detention camps.
There is currently no clear favourite to succeed Francis, but the history of sermons at papal funerals has influenced conclaves.
Sourse: breakingnews.ie
