On Sunday 27 April, Bishop David Oakley celebrated Mass at Northampton Cathedral on the second day of Novemdiales, the nine days of mourning following the death of Pope Francis.
The Mass was offered for the repose of the soul of the Holy Father, whose funeral had taken place the previous day, Saturday 26 April, at St Peter’s Basilica in Rome. The Cathedral was filled with faithful from across the Diocese, gathered in prayerful remembrance.
In his homily, Bishop David reflected on the central theme of Pope Francis’ life and ministry: mercy.
“Everything he wrote and taught us, his pastoral ministry and the decisions he made may be summed up in one word: mercy,” Bishop David said.
He spoke movingly of how Pope Francis constantly invited the Church and the world to encounter the mercy of God, and how his witness challenged all to show that same mercy to others, especially the poor, the marginalised, and the suffering.
Bishop David encouraged the faithful to honour Pope Francis’ memory by living lives rooted in mercy, and by continuing to pray for the Church during this time of mourning and transition.
The Diocese of Northampton remains united with the Universal Church during the Novemdiales, giving thanks for the life, witness, and enduring message of Pope Francis.
Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May he rest in peace.
Listen to the full homily here:
Read the full homily here:
We will all have our own story of where we were and what we were doing last Monday morning when we heard the news. For my part, I was in my little hermitage over in Herefordshire with the phone very firmly turned off until about 10:30 or so when I decided I’d better turn it on again and saw the news. And of course, much has been said and written about Pope Francis during this past week. Many commentators have talked about what he has said and done during the 12 years he was Bishop of Rome and Supreme Pontiff. For my part, everything he wrote and taught us, his pastoral ministry and the decisions he made may be summed up in one word.
And it is a word which lies at the heart of our liturgical celebration this morning. And that word is mercy. Today we celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday during a jubilee year. And you may remember the extraordinary jubilee year in 2016, which Pope Francis decided to call and dedicate to mercy. To my mind, this was a defining moment in Pope Francis ministry. Quoting the angelic doctor, as he is known, St. Thomas Aquinas, the Holy Father reminded us of something really quite important. Almighty God most shows his power, his omnipotence, when he demonstrates his mercy.
I think we constantly need to remind ourselves of that truth. And there were many at the time who felt unsettled by this teaching. They wondered out loud, where is the sense of divine justice in all this? It’s a good question, and let me try to answer it by saying this. If we look around our world today, we may wonder if anything has changed over the past week. Probably not. The wars seem to continue, don’t they? But if our church and our world took hold of the reality of mercy, then our world would change. Over the past 12 years, Pope Francis has has given us four encyclicals. These are magisterial teaching documents. The first, in 2013, not long after he had become pope, was called Lumen Fidei, the Light of Faith.
And he spoke here about faith during a year of faith proclaimed by Pope Benedict xvi and recognizing that in our rational world, faith was thus understood either as a leap in the dark to be taken in the absence of light, driven by blind emotion, or as a subjective light capable perhaps of warming the heart and bringing personal consolation, but not something which could be proposed to others as an objective and shared light which points the way faith communicates to others the Church’s memory. And at the heart of this remembrance is our personal encounter with God’s mercy towards us. This is one way that Pope Francis presents us with this truth, absorbed and deepened in the Family faith becomes a light capable of illuminating all our relationships in society.
As an experience of the mercy of God the Father, it sets us on the path of brotherhood. I love those words, and I think that here we see God’s mercy compels Pope Francis to seek relational bonds with others, especially those who are on the edge of society. Two years later, Pope Francis gifted us his second encyclical letter, Laudato si, and he chose his papal name in light of the example of Francis of Assisi. And in this letter, Pope Francis draws upon the witness of this most attractive saint. I must confess, this encyclical, Laudato si, came alive for me a few weeks ago during our diocesan pilgrimage to Rome and Assisi.
In St Francis Basilica, we saw frescoes of an important moment in his story. Francis and his companions had gone to Rome to seek an audience with Pope Innocent iii. He was not too impressed by this somewhat eccentric band of young men and sent them packing. But that night, he had a dream of the poor Francis holding up the church, the Lateran Basilica to be precise, and called Francis back again. The rest, as they say, is history for Pope Francis. The whole mystery of creation, which St. Francis sings of in his canticle, witnesses to the greatness of God and his loving mercy. That’s what creation is about, the recipient of God’s mercy. And that’s why we should care for our universal home, because it is God’s gift of mercy to us.
In the autumn of 2020, as you will remember, the world was trying to recover from the pandemic, and we received Pope Francis third encyclical letter, Fratelli Tutti. This again draws upon the witness of St Francis of Assisi, reminding us of the fundamental fraternal relationships which bind together every human being. This is a challenging teaching letter which invited us to notice the shattered dreams that and the political realities which place economic progress above everything else. But using the parable of the Good Samaritan, Pope Francis helps us to appreciate the mercy which lies at the heart of this story. There is something very direct about Pope Francis teaching. He writes, so this encounter of mercy between a Samaritan and a Jew is highly provocative.
It leaves no room for ideological manipulation and challenges us to expand our frontiers. It gives a universal dimension to our call to love, one that transcends all prejudices, all historical and cultural barriers, all petty interests. And let’s keep this in mind. If these words are so life giving to some, to others, they are indeed challenging. Yet, as Pope Francis put it, truth, in fact is an inseparable companion of justice and mercy. Last autumn we received Pope Francis final encyclical letter, Dilexit Nos on the human and divine love of the Heart of Jesus Christ. The grandeur of this project was presented to us from the depths of Pope Francis own prayer.
He tells us, in the presence of the Heart of Christ, I once more ask the Lord to have mercy on this suffering world in which he chose to dwell as one of us. Full of compassion for our broken world, Pope Francis taught us to drink deeply from the well of compassion which is mercy shown in every aspect of our Lord’s life amongst us. The Holy Father again teaches us the whole purpose of the Church is to be an instrument of mercy in this fractured world. When he digs into the spirituality of saints such as Saint Therese and Saint Charles de Foucault, Pope Francis is very clear about the need for us to be generous with our understanding of mercy and not stingy. And on this Feast of Divine mercy, how beautiful it would be for us to understand what Pope Francis has gifted to us and to live this in our own discipleship of the Lord.
