Holy Year
In the “priestly gaze” can be found the core of the richness of the Magisterium contained in several meditations offered by Pope Francis during the Jubilee of Mercy for Priests (June 1-3). Thus the priestly gaze can and must be considered the heart of the Pope’s teaching. It is a gaze measured on the gaze of God, who stands in observation of all his children, starting with those that have drifted apart, with indissoluble love.
A veritable marathon of priestly spirituality was offered by Pope Francis on the occasion of the Jubilee for Priests (June 1-3). The Pontiff, in the meditations held on June 2 in the basilicas of Rome and contained in the homily of the Mass of June 3 (solemn celebration of the Sacred Heart of Jesus), presented a veritable “summa”, a global vision of the richness of faith and experience, called to guide and express the life of the priest and his pastoral mission, in the light of what can and must be considered the leitmotif of his teaching:
The mercy of God, founding guide of Christian and ecclesial experience.
So rich was the Pope’s teaching that it comes natural to ask ourselves: what is his unifying point of departure? Francis has offered meditations, personal recollections, stories, reference to the life of the Saints, historical suggestions. Where can we find the clues to unravel its threads is the mind and in the heart, to eventually instil them into the concrete life of the presbyters? How can we unify all these indications, creating a synthesis that will stand as a new point of departure to renew the life of the priests, which today is marked by so many difficulties and contradictions?
After having read over and over the texts, with due attention, I seem to have found a point of departure to bring together the richness of the magisterium they contain, in one of the indications of the third meditation – delivered in the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls – where Francis spoke of the
“priestly gaze”,
that is, the “gaze of a father”, the gaze through which the merciful father of the parable (Lk 15,11-32) looked at his son who returned after having sinned, with merciful love.
I believe that precisely this priestly gaze can and must be considered the very core of the Pope’s teaching.
A gaze measured upon the gaze of God, who observes his sons and daughters, starting with those who had drifted apart, with indissoluble love.
It’s the gaze of the celestial Father, that no betrayal, no human malice could ever erase or swerve from. That gaze is the full expression of his mercy, the authentic indication of mercy that must impregnate the entire life of the Christian community: the image that should be impressed in the heart of all priests, that they may learn from the merciful gaze of God, that through their own gaze they may bear witness and proclaim his Word.
The gaze of priests, in communion with the great “Shepherd” of every soul, should be a gaze of mercy. It’s a gazee that never hastens to condemn. Indeed, the priestly gaze, like the gaze of Christ, condemns all evil, never renouncing to love the sinners.
The priest carries in his gaze of love for the faithful – for saints and sinners, for those living in the richness of the sacraments and those who refuse them in a life distant from God – the same gaze of merciful love of the Father.
But the priest can do this inasmuch as he lets himself be seen by the love of God that follows him, indeed that trails him in his peregrinations between love and evil, faithfulness and betrayal, beauty of the ministry and the fatigue of the service.
Only the priest that lets himself be seen in this way by God, discovering himself as a saved sinner, feeling himself as the object of the mercy of God, feeling saved by his mercy, can attain the “ashamed dignity”, which, despite his weaknesses and fragilities, makes of him a witness of God’s “nostalgia” enabling him to became the person who observes his faithful with a gaze of mercy, that is the gaze of God.
Thereby become the one who knows, like God, how to
“instil mercy” into humankind.
And through this gaze of mercy, that is the gaze of God, and of the one who is a man of God, the priest learns to observe the whole world, all of history, every man and every woman.
This is the pastoral way that Francis has indicated to us priests.
With this gaze of mercy, the priest will see his sinful brothers not as “cases” but as people in need of love and forgiveness. This is the cornerstone of every pastoral plan. In fact, it is the pastoral plan indicated by the Pope. And at the same time it’s the true priestly plan of life: to see Christ, and with his gaze, with his heart, see the whole of humanity. The foundation of priestly pastoral care is found in that gaze that shows us how to see God and man, with which spirit, which attitude and which heart.
