To then implement the vision that emerges from the synod, Francis has been naming a slew of unusually young bishops for key archdioceses – in his native Buenos Aires, Madrid and Brussels, among others. At the same time, he’s elevated several cardinals in their 50s – and in some cases their 40s – including the auxiliary bishop of Lisbon who is organising World Youth Day.
Putting such young clerics in such important positions ensures a generation’s worth of like-minded leadership in the Vatican and archdioceses around the world. While not all are cookie-cutter proteges of Francis, many are seen as similarly pastorally minded and thus more game to implement his reforms, especially as the older generation of bishops and cardinals dies out.
After Francis is gone, the youngest of these new cardinals will have some three decades’ worth of local leadership and conclave votes to select future popes, suggesting a generational and ideological shift in the church leadership is very much under way.
Francis’ most important young “legacy” appointment was that of the Vatican’s new doctrinal tsar, Argentine Cardinal-elect Victor Manuel Fernandez, 61. Francis’ theological ghostwriter ran into Vatican problems in the past over questions about his doctrinal orthodoxy, and his appointment sent shockwaves through the conservative and traditionalist wings of the church.
Fernandez sees his appointment as part of Francis’ longer-term agenda: “He is proposing a more inclusive church, more respectful of different ways of living, even of thinking,” Fernandez said in an interview.
Portuguese Cardinal-elect Americo Aguiar, who is in charge of World Youth Day, is another young churchman who also understands his appointment as part of a generational turning point for the Catholic hierarchy.
At age 49 he will become the second-youngest member of the College of Cardinals when he is installed on September 30. He is just six months older than the current youngest cardinal, whom Francis elevated this time last year: Cardinal Giorgio Marengo, head of the church in Mongolia where Francis will travel at the end of August.
“My reading of it is that this has to do with young people, it has to do with youth, it has to do with Portugal, it has to do with World Youth Day, it has to do with all of that,” Aguiar said in an interview. “I think that his objective and his underlining was exactly to send a signal to the young people, to every young person who is preparing the day, whether in Portugal or in the world, to feel identified with this decision.”
Francis said as much in his monthly prayer intentions for August, this time dedicated to the Lisbon event.
“In Lisbon, I would like to see a seed for the world’s future,” Francis said. “A world where love is at the centre, where we can sense that we are sisters and brothers.”
His words at the 2013 World Youth Day in Rio now seem prescient in outlining many of the key pastoral messages Francis has emphasised over the past decade. Delivering a spontaneous, off-the-cuff exhortation to a gathering of Argentine pilgrims that was organised at the last minute, Francis urged the young to get out into the streets, spread their faith and “make a mess”.
“I want to see the church get closer to the people,” Francis said then, speaking in his native Spanish. “I want to get rid of clericalism, the mundane, this closing ourselves off within ourselves, in our parishes, schools or structures.”
Realising the radical nature of his message, Francis apologised to the bishops for what was about to come, even though in the 10 years since, he has only gone farther than anyone could have imagined at the time.
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“The true reform of the church, you know, is not a revolution bringing something completely from outside,” said Becquart, the French nun, as she reflected on Francis’ agenda. “It’s a path of change that is a way to unfold tradition, but in a very dynamic way.”
AP
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