Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Like so many Catholics, the last part of this week has been filled with the excitement about the election of the new pope. Habemus papam! I was at work, in a meeting when a colleague knocked on the door and said, "White smoke!" And we all went trotting out to watch Vatican TV on someone's computer. When the name and the man were finally announced, there was a kind of jubilant wonder.
Then when I read today's scriptures, I couldn't help but reflect on how much Pope Francis exhibits the characteristics in today's first reading (Wisdom 2:1a, 12-22). It says, "Because his life is not like that of others, and different are his ways" - and how different is the life and witness of this cardinal from the Global South? This man who lived in a small apartment, who cooked his own meals, who worked directly among the poor - how amazing! I'm so captivated by him precisely because he practices what he preaches. I wouldn't blame him at all for living as a cardinal, with the chauffeur and the cook and so on. But he doesn't, and that is part of what makes him so compelling to me as a person. In these initial days as pope, he has continued a path of doing things his own way, with humility (including going to the convent where he and the other cardinals had stayed, to pick up his own luggage and pay his own bill). The simplicity and humility, the desire to follow Jesus and not to let that way be deterred by illusions of power or money and so on - that's compelling.
Of course, today's first reading is not about the pope - it is a prophetic statement about Jesus and it is preparing us to walk the rest of the way through Lent to the cross and the resurrection. "Let us test him" say the wicked ones in this passage. They hope they can prove that Jesus is false - that at the slightest hint of death or torture or other horrible thing he will stop being so "goody two shoes" and will instead reveal himself as the false prophet he is.
That does not happen, though in the gospel we wonder at first. (John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30). Jesus goes in secret, hides, and makes us wonder: is he for real? Or is he just being dishonest about who he is. But then we find out that this is not the case, as we continue reading the passage. For when people start asking questions and raising the alarm, he throws off the secrecy, stands up in the temple, and very publicly proclaims who he is and why he has come.
Jesus throws off power, throws off money, throws off all kinds of worldly things, all kinds of selfish inclinations, in favor of being God for us. He is so in love with us that he takes that love to his death, rather than turn his love into something false through selfish motivations. Pope Francis offers us a witness to Jesus in his own actions. We say Habemus Papam! But we mean, always and forever, "Habemus Christum" - we have a Christ! Someone who has loved us completely!"
May we, today, be likewise witnesses in favor of loving others, and against our own desires to be famous or powerful.
- Jana M. Bennett