Pascha III

The Third Sunday of Easter

Acts 2:14:22-33; Psalm 16; I Peter 1:17-21; Luke 24:13-35

Jesus quietly catches up with some disciples who are having a lively debate as they walk home. Caught off guard by the unexpected stranger, Jesus poses an open ended question, “What are you talking about?” Jesus listens to them express their discouragement, their sadness, and hopes. He then challenges them by speaking truth, “How foolish you are, how slow of heart”. This becomes an occasion to teach and draw them into relationship with him. The scene ends with an invitation to Jesus for dinner.

Walk with people. Be yourself. Ask questions. Listen closely in-between what is spoken. Gently challenge. Speak the truth of what we believe. Be comfortable with silence. Share meals with people. It is what Pope Francis calls, “the art of accompaniment”. It is a very different and much more nuanced way of being Church for others.

In HULU’s new film, “The Pope: Answers”, Francis offers us a masterclass in accompaniment through engagement, openness and vulnerability across ages, genders and beliefs that we can all learn from. In the film,Francis sits with 10 Spanish-speaking people between the ages of 20 and 25 from various countries. Among those who sit down to the conversation with the pope are an atheist, a pro-choice and a pro-life Catholic, an evangelical Christian, a survivor of sexual abuse, a Muslim man, and a non-binary person. The conversation touches on everything from sex, the dating app Tinder and money to pornography, teenage pregnancy, forced and economic migration, abortion, sexual abuse and the faith and faithlessness of young people. As an aside, note that all the topics are moral and relational issues.

The pope takes his time to hear the context and the lived experience in which the questions of each person are wrapped. He never rushes to correct anyone. 

The 82-minute film is not simply an opportunity for the young people to unburden their concerns and emotions on the pope, it is also a time for the pope to exercise his role as a pastor ministering, responding, and even gently challenging his conversation partners.

The film concludes with Francis saying to each person, “Thank you. Each one of you has been brave enough to tell the truth. I liked that because each one of you has said it with your own personality, and from your own lives and conflicts—because we all have conflicts… traumas… flaws.”

“We all have conflicts… traumas… flaws.”

During World Youth Day 2013, Pope Francis issued a challenge to the church: “[W]e need a church capable of walking at people’s side, of doing more than simply listening to them; a church that accompanies them on their journey”. Francis envisions “a church that realizes that the reasons why people leave also contain reasons why they can eventually return.

There is good reason that Francis has offered us the medical metaphors of the church as a “field hospital” and the Eucharist as “a powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak – we all have conflicts… traumas… flaws.”

Can you envision yourself walking and listening to the experience of a poor, black, woman who has had an abortion, almost any 20 or 30-something, a woman who truly feels called to Holy Orders, the victim of sexual abuse, a person who has assisted in a suicide, a gay person, or someone addicted to pornography?

How comfortable would we be in listening to experiences of contemporary dating and ‘hooking up’ by people, of a migrant from Central America, a mass shooter, a pregnant teen with little education or future?

Francis writes, “the Church will have to initiate everyone into this “art of accompaniment” which teaches us to remove our sandals before the sacred ground of the other. _{[Evangelii Gaudium, 169]}

“Jesus drew near and walked with two disciples…” We need to learn to do likewise.