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| Early morning Selfie with the class (feat. Jacob) |
Papa Francesco was born Jorge Mario
Bergoglio on December 17th, 1936, in Buenos Aires, Argentina to a family of Italian
immigrants. He earned a Chemical
technician’s diploma after attending Escuela Técnica Industrial
Hipólito Yrigoyen Secondary School, and he briefly worked as a test chemist in a food laboratory before
being called to become a Jesuit Priest in 1960.
Following the Jesuit mission of education, he taught literature and
psychology at a few different Argentinian high schools while finishing his own
education in theology. He was ordained
as a priest in 1969. From there, he went
on to become Auxiliary Bishop of Argentina in 1992, Archbishop of Buenos Aires
in 1998, Cardinal in 2001, President of the Argentine Episcopal Conference in
2005, and, finally, he was appointed the 266th Pope in 2013. And I got
to see him today!
I saw the Pope this past Sunday from
a distance, but today was a totally different story. Pope Francis passed within about ten feet of where I was standing in
Vatican Square!
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| Pope Francis blessing the crowd as he rode by our position on the square |
I woke up at 5:30 AM this morning,
and made it to the Vatican by 6:45 in order to get through security and secure
a seat as close as possible to the pavilion where the Pope would be speaking
from. My classmates and I were not able
to get front row seats, but we did arrive early enough to get seats along the
edge of the large central aisle, which the Pope would later ride through on the
Pope mobile. Prior to the Pope’s arrival
in the square, bishops started announcing visiting groups to the square. And, to my great surprise, the University of
Arkansas - we - were actually announced! To a crowd of thousands. In Vatican Square!
We cheered and cheered.
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| Another up-close pic of the Pope. On the left side, one of the colorful Swiss Guards is just visible. |
Following the reading, Pope Francis gave a short sermon in Italian from his central location underneath the white Papal pavilion. The topic of the sermon was compassion, and the Pope was joined under the pavilion by a group of African refugees - which I think added a lot of weight to his message.
Summaries of the Italian sermon were given in the eight languages after the Pope was finished. The Pope then blessed the crowd, friends and family of those present, and any religious articles in the square. The entire audience lasted about an hour.
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| View of the Papal pavilion from our aisle seats |
I don’t think I’ve ever been in a situation in my entire life where English is not the first or the second most popularly spoken language in any given crowd. Italian and Spanish were probably number one and number two today, and yet they didn’t dominate by any means. Hearing each group cheer when they were greeted in their own language was a beautiful thing.
Diversity is the name of the game today. Everyone is connected through the internet and social media, and Pope Francis is well aware of it. I’d like to end this post with a series of two quotes from Pope Francis’s twitter account – which he posted yesterday. In the spirit of working together in this world, Pope Francis tweeted out:
“People are the primary artisans of their own development,
the first in charge!"
"We are all on a
journey to the common house of heaven, where we will be able to admire
with joyful wonder the mystery of the universe.”
Grazie,
Brock
--
Read more from Brock at http://brockdemarkrome.blogspot.com/
For more information on the U of A Renaissance in Rome program at http://studyabroad.uark.edu/renrome
