Installation Mass of Pope Francis: Scenes from the jailbreak

[Valin]

Hot Air:

Ed Morrissey

3/19/13

 

(VATICAN CITY) It’s 2013, and it’s 6:15 in the morning in Rome, but the scene puts me right back to the 2011 beatification of John Paul II. Transportation services stop well short of their destinations, unable to compete with the foot traffic streaming toward St. Peter’s Square. The sun — absent the last few days in wind, chill, and rain — glints down the slightly damp basalt-cobblestone streets, and it’s more cool than chilly. Cafes and trattorie that would never open this early now rush to put out their billboards, advertising take-away breakfasts. I’m starving, but I don’t dare stop; I may not make it through the crowds that have already assembled, even with my press pass.

 

For me, at least, that’s the one big difference between the 2011 beatification and now. I couldn’t get within a quarter-mile of St. Peter’s Square in 2011, but now the press pass gets me through five or six security barriers set up around the piazza. Tens of thousands — probably more than 100,000 – have already turned out three hours before the Inauguration Mass of the Petrine Ministry of the Bishop of Rome that will officially install Jorge Mario Bergoglio as Pope Francis, a ceremony that has drawn 132 national delegations at last count and representatives from most Christian ecclesial communities and other major religions.

 

The security barriers are holding when I take this picture of the crowd waiting at this end of Via Conciliazione, but that doesn’t last long:

 

 

No sooner do I put my camera back in the bag than the cordon ruptures, and a small group of pilgrims run for the Carlo Magno colonnade that emerges from the left side of the basilica........(Snip)

 

 

 

[saveliberty]

I watched on EWTN. It was early morning, I had one cup of coffee and they reported 1 million, or at least that is what I thought. I pinged to the Anchoress and she said it was probably true.

[Valin]

I watched on EWTN. It was early morning, I had one cup of coffee and they reported 1 million, or at least that is what I thought. I pinged to the Anchoress and she said it was probably true.

 

"How many divisions does the pope have?"

Uncle Joe.

 

[Valin]

Transcript: HOMILY OF POPE FRANCIS

INAUGURATION OF THE PETRINE MINISTRY

ST PETER'S SQUARE

19 MARCH 2013

 

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

 

I thank the Lord that I can celebrate this Holy Mass for the inauguration of my Petrine ministry on the solemnity of Saint Joseph, the spouse of the Virgin Mary and the patron of the universal Church. It is a significant coincidence, and it is also the name-day of my venerable predecessor: we are close to him with our prayers, full of affection and gratitude.

 

(Snip)

 

How does Joseph exercise his role as protector? Discreetly, humbly and silently, but with an unfailing presence and utter fidelity, even when he finds it hard to understand. From the time of his betrothal to Mary until the finding of the twelve-year-old Jesus in the Temple of Jerusalem, he is there at every moment with loving care. As the spouse of Mary, he is at her side in good times and bad, on the journey to Bethlehem for the census and in the anxious and joyful hours when she gave birth; amid the drama of the flight into Egypt and during the frantic search for their child in the Temple; and later in the day-to-day life of the home of Nazareth, in the workshop where he taught his trade to Jesus.

 

(Snip)

 

Today, together with the feast of Saint Joseph, we are celebrating the beginning of the ministry of the new Bishop of Rome, the Successor of Peter, which also involves a certain power. Certainly, Jesus Christ conferred power upon Peter, but what sort of power was it? Jesus’ three questions to Peter about love are followed by three commands: feed my lambs, feed my sheep. Let us never forget that authentic power is service, and that the Pope too, when exercising power, must enter ever more fully into that service which has its radiant culmination on the Cross. He must be inspired by the lowly, concrete and faithful service which marked Saint Joseph and, like him, he must open his arms to protect all of God’s people and embrace with tender affection the whole of humanity, especially the poorest, the weakest, the least important, those whom Matthew lists in the final judgment on love: the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick and those in prison (cf. Mt 25:31-46). Only those who serve with love are able to protect!

 

(Snip)