Pope tells new Cardinals never to stray from the path of Jesus

By Linda Bordoni

Pope Francis on Saturday encouraged the group of twenty-one new cardinals from across the globe to “walk in the way of Jesus: together, with humility, wonder and joy.”

Presiding at Holy Mass for the Ordinary Public Consistory for the Creation of New Cardinals in St. Peter’s Basilica, the Pope reminded the prelates receiving the red hat, that just as Jesus’ ascent to Jerusalem was not an ascent to worldly glory but to the glory of God, they too must put the Lord at the centre and be builders of communion and unity.

Pope Francis announced the Consistory at the beginning of October pointing to the fact that the origins of the cardinal-elects “express the universality of the Church, which continues to proclaim God’s merciful love to all people on earth.”

Stand before God in humility

Recalling the Gospel of Mark, the Pope said that in Jerusalem, Jesus would die on the cross to restore us to life. He took a “difficult uphill path that would lead him to Calvary,” he explained, while the disciples were thinking of a “smooth downhill path for the triumphant Messiah.”

The Pope noted that the same thing can happen to us: “Our hearts can go astray, allowing us to be dazzled by the allure of prestige, the seduction of power, by an overly human zeal for the Lord.”

“That is why,” he continued, “we need to look within, to stand before God in humility (…) and ask: Where is my heart going?  Where is it directed?  Have I perhaps taken the wrong road?”

Consistory for the creation of new Cardinals

Return to the heart

The Holy Father focused the rest of his homily on how the new Cardinals are called to make every effort to walk in the path of Jesus.

“To walk in the path of Jesus means above all to return to him and to put him back at the centre of everything,” he said, warning them to look out for secondary things and external appearances that can overshadow what truly counts.

The very word “Cardinal”, he explained, refers to a hinge inserted into a door to secure, support and reinforce it. 

[ Dear brothers: Jesus is our true support, the “centre of gravity” of our service, the “cardinal point” which gives direction to our entire life. ]

A passion for encounter

“To walk in the path of Jesus also means to cultivate a passion for encounter,” Pope Francis continued, noting that “Jesus never walked alone.”

Jesus came, he added, “to heal our wounded humanity, to lighten the burdens of our hearts, to cleanse the stain of sin and to shatter the bonds of enslavement.”

On his path, the Pope said, he “encountered the faces of those who were suffering and those who had lost hope”. He raised the fallen and healed the sick and the brokenhearted.

Consistory for the creation of new Cardinals

Builders of communion and unity

“To walk in the path of Jesus means, in the end, to be builders of communion and unity,” the Pope said, warning against “the worm of competition” and “the dividing wall of hostility” that prevents us from seeing ourselves as children of the same Father.

He urged the new cardinals – whom he noted come from different backgrounds and cultures, and represent the catholicity of the Church – to be “witnesses of fraternity, artisans of communion and builders of unity.”

Quoting St Pope Paul VI’s address during a consistory, Pope Francis said: “It is our desire that everyone feel at home in the ecclesial family, that there will be no exclusion or isolation, which proves so harmful to our unity in charity, or efforts to make some prevail to the detriment of others.”

Concluding, he told the 21 new cardinals to “Love one another with fraternal love and be servants to one another, servants of the Gospel.”

Consistory for the creation of new Cardinals