A CHRISTMAS REFLECTION ON POPE FRANCIS’ ENCYCLICAL, FRATELLI TUTTI

 

     Why bother trying to make sense of a pronouncement from the ‘Vicar of Christ’ when the Church has been shown to be corrupt from the beginning? Tom Doyle points out the corruption of the church in his review of Dylan Elliot’s new book on the pedophile scandal.[i] Still I would contend that it is worthwhile to attempt to understand the point of view of Pope Francis, a world religious leader.  It is obvious that neither Francis nor his followers see the hypocrisy of advocating a change of political structures when the Church ignores the pedophile issue, the catalyst being its own clerical system.  However, the serious life and death situation we are experiencing worldwide demands we look at every point of view without trivializing any opinion, except the trivial.

          Pope Francis uses the parable of the ‘Good Samaritan’ as the keystone of his encyclical, Fratelli Tutti. Dr. Amy–Jill Levine offers some hints for understanding a story teller’s point of view in her book, Short Stories by Jesus.[ii] She asks, “What is Jesus saying in the parable of the Good Samaritan?” (Luke 10, 25-37)  Dr. Levine contends that the purpose of a parable in the first century was to make the listeners uncomfortable.  Many commentaries and homilies are standard and listeners yawn and forget the story until next time.  It is conventional for Christian homilists to comment that Priests and Levites are insensitive to the beaten man on the road because of their Jewish beliefs.  Is Luke trying to say that the message of the Christian Jews is better?  Luke, writing forty or more years after Jesus’ death, was in a contentious situation with the Pharisees after the destruction of the Jewish Temple by the Romans in C.E.70.  Were the Christian Jews to take a leadership role?

          Samaritans were of Jewish heritage and revered the Torah.  Basic to the Torah is the Jewish commandment, “Love God and your neighbor.”  If the source of the story is Jesus and not Luke, then what does the parable mean?  In Jesus’ time the Samaritans were despised by Judean Jews – they were people of another country.  The lawyer in the story asks:  what does love of neighbor mean, who is my neighbor?  The Samaritan tells us by his action; he followed the law of the Torah as advocated by Jesus.  Jesus is telling a story that illustrates what both Judaism and Christianity believe, a cause for both Jesus’ listeners and contemporary believers to be uncomfortable.

          Pope Francis refers to the Good Samaritan in chapter two of  Fratelli Tutti. Francis goes beyond brotherly love. He expands the meaning of charity to charitable political love.  In chapter five Frances writes, “This political charity is born of social awareness that transcends every individualistic mindset.”

          Philia is brotherly love and charity is agape in Greek.  Agape is selfless love, a term used long before Christianity.  Agape is a human trait we strive to achieve, but international political agape?  That’s an ancient consideration and demand for action, like the Samaritan, to a contemporary world under siege.  Is agape the answer?  It’s been suggested before with limited success.

          Marguerite Porete, a Beguine and a mystic who wrote in French, identified the human quality of agape as divine love and stated in her book, The Mirror of Simple Souls[iii], “Such love is a sure guide and more secure than rational morality.”  Marguerite Porete was burned at the stake for heresy in Paris in 1310; William of Paris, O.P., the chief inquisitor, called her pseudo-mulier, a fake woman.  At that time Clement V reigned from Avignon as Pope.

Francis’ solution seems impossible, but it is Christmas time.  Matthew says it was the birth of Emmanuel, God with us.  Can we see the victims of pedophilia, pedophiles, Presidents and Popes in the image of Christ - the Messiah?  For now, perhaps this is the answer.

 

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[i] Elliot, Dylan, The Corrupter of Boys, University of Pennsylvania Press.       

[ii] Levine, Amy-Jill, Short Stories by Jesus, Harper One, New York, 1989.

[iii] Porete, Marguerite, The Mirror of Simple Souls, Paulist Press, New York, 1993.