Pope Francis landed early this Sunday in Corsica, and his first message was on secularism, a particularly sensitive issue for French society. Furthermore, during the flight of less than an hour between Rome and Ajaccio, he was moved when they handed him a wooden statue of an angeldamaged due to DANA in Valencia.
Francisco, who took off from Fiumicino at around 8 in the morning, was impressed by the state of the statue of the angel in the parish of Picanya, one of the most affected in the diocese. It was sent to you by Spanish journalist Eva Fernández, correspondent for COPE radio. “It is a sign of the prayer, suffering and work of our people that, walking together, we are going to be pilgrims of hope in this dramatic situation,” recited the letter that accompanied the gift.
The pontiff landed shortly before 9 in the morning at the Napoleon Bonaparte airport in Ajaccio (France) and immediately moved to a congress center on the seashore to close a meeting on ‘Popular religiosity in the Mediterranean’. «Popular piety allows placing faith in the public sphere without creating social tensions. In public acts related to our faith, we see an important principle of freedom and equality. On the street, everyone is on equal footing: those who are very religious, those who are not, and the curious,” introduced the Bishop of Ajaccio, Navarrese Cardinal Francisco Javier Bustillo.
The Pope has gone one step further and has defended that if faith is authentic it must nourish “constructive citizenship.” «Faith is not a private fact May it be consummated in the sanctuary of conscience. If it aims to be fully faithful to itself, it implies a commitment to human growth, social progress and the care of creation, as a sign of charity.” This explains why the brotherhoods and public pilgrimages have given rise to »innumerable works of solidarity and institutions such as hospitals, schools, care centers in which believers have committed themselves to the benefit of those in need and have contributed to the growth of the common good«.
«In this common ground of doing good, believers can find themselves on a shared path with civil and political institutions, to work together in favor of all people, starting with the most disadvantaged. Hence arises the need to develop a concept of secularism that is not static and rigid, but evolutionary and dynamic, capable of adapting to diverse or unexpected situations, and of promoting constant collaboration between civil and ecclesiastical authorities for the good of the entire society. collectivity, each remaining within the limits of their own powers and space.
Citing Benedict XVI, he has claimed “a healthy secularism” that “frees religion from the weight of politics and enriches politics with the contributions of religion, maintaining the necessary distance, clear distinction and indispensable collaboration between the two.” “This way, energies and synergies can be made more use of, without prejudices and principled opposition, in an open, frank and fruitful dialogue,” he added.
On the other hand, Francisco has requested Do not contrast “Christian culture and secular culture”but rather to confirm “the reciprocal openness between these two horizons.” On the one hand, “believers always open themselves with greater serenity to the possibility of living their own faith without imposing it, like leaven in the middle of the world and the environments in which they live” and on the other, “non-believers or those who have distanced themselves from religious practice, they are not alien to the search for truth, justice and solidarity; and they carry in their hearts a great thirst, a question of meaning that leads them to question the mystery of life and search for fundamental values for the common good.
Under the December sun of this beautiful Mediterranean island, the Pope moved enthusiastically through the alleys of Ajaccio, stopping the popemobile every few meters to greet and bless dozens of children who greeted him from the edge of the sidewalk. The Pontiff got out of the car to greet Marie-Jean, a 108-year-old woman who claimed to be “the oldest” in the city.
This morning he visited the Ajaccio cathedral, and this afternoon he plans to celebrate a mass mass and meet for thirty minutes at the airport with the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron. You will land back in Rome around seven in the afternoon.
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