Pope Francis struck by Filipinos’ genuine smiles, joy; reminds focus on poverty
Filipino Catholics begin to gather in Kalaw Avenue in Manila to attend a mass by Pope Francis in Luneta. INQUIRER PHOTO / ALEXIS CORPUZ
MANILA, Philippines – Enthusiasm and sincerity. These are just some of the things that Pope Francis fondly remembers when he looks back at his recent trip to the country.
He himself has proven in the five days he was in the Philippines that not even the rain could dampen the spirits of Catholics hoping to see him and hear his message.
“The gestures moved me,” the Pontiff said during a press conference aboard the papal flight, according to an unofficial transcript released by AmericaMagazine.org.
“[A gesture] that struck me very much is an enthusiasm that is not feigned, a joy, a happiness, a capacity to celebrate,” he said.
He recalled the smiles of the people who attended his masses, even under the pouring rain.
“It wasn’t a painted (false) smile. No, no! It was a smile that just came, and behind that smile there is a normal life, there are pains, problems,” he said.
Recognizing the Filipinos’ resilience amid diversity, he said the people know the true meaning of “resignation.”
He described Filipinos as “A people who knows how to suffer, and is capable of rising up.”
During his trip to the so-called bastion of Catholic faith in Asia, Pope Francis inspired and consoled people, especially the survivors of Supertyphoon Yolanda (international name: Haiyan).
He gave a moving speech in Tacloban, in front of hundreds of thousands of typhoon survivors, amid an approaching storm.
Focus on the poor
Pope Francis also pointed out that the message he wanted to bring to the Philippines was about the poor.
He said people tend to get used to the poor coexisting with the rest of society. In his diocese in Buenos Aires, he said, there are a lot of poor families, as well as luxurious restaurants.
“There is hunger. One next to the other. And we have the tendency to get used to this, no?” he pointed out. “I think the Church must give an example, a much greater example here, refusing every worldliness.”
Pope Francis said it is “really ugly” when a man of the Church is worldly. “This is not the way of Jesus,” he said.
In his first public speech in the Philippines he said it is a moral imperative to ensure social justice and respect for human dignity.
“The great biblical tradition enjoins on all peoples the duty to hear the voice of the poor. It bids us [to] break the bonds of injustice and oppression, which give rise to glaring, and indeed scandalous, social inequalities,” he told an audience of Filipino officials and diplomats. “Reforming the social structures, which perpetuate poverty and the exclusion of the poor first requires a conversion of mind and heart.”
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