Pope Francis rejects ecclesiastical career

Pope Francis assured that the term “ecclesiastical career,” which refers to hierarchical promotion in the Catholic Church, should be abolished, since the essential thing is to let oneself be guided by Providence and respond to the needs of the poor.

He stated this during an audience this morning with the Calasancia Family, founded by San Faustino Míguez and Blessed Celestina Donati, under the charisma of San José de Calasanz, Spanish priest and educator.

At the beginning of his speech, the Holy Father recalled that the Lord inspired Saint Joseph, who founded the first free public school in Europe, to dedicate his life “to the education of young people, especially the little ones and the poor.”

Next, Pope Francis reflected on two aspects of this Spanish saint whose educational proposal gave rise to the so-called “Pious Schools”: his courageous docility to Providence and his care for the integral growth of the person.

The Pontiff recalled that Saint Joseph came from a wealthy family and therefore was probably destined to pursue an “ecclesiastical career,” a term that “repels me and should be abolished,” Pope Francis asserted.

Saint Joseph of Calasanz, who “arrived in Rome with positions of a certain level,” did not hesitate to disrupt “the plans and perspectives of his life to dedicate himself to the street children he found in the city.”

This work, according to Pope Francis, was not born from a defined and guaranteed program, “but from the courage of a good priest who allowed himself to be challenged by the needs of his neighbor, where the Lord put them before him.”

In this way, Pope Francis urged them to maintain in their decisions “the same openness and availability, without calculating too much, overcoming fears and hesitation, especially in the face of the new forms of poverty of our time.”

“Do not be afraid to venture down different paths from those already taken in the past to be able to respond to the needs of the poor, even at the cost of reviewing schemes and resizing expectations,” he added.

Secondly, the Holy Father stressed the importance of promoting the integral growth of people, “integrating spiritual and intellectual formation to prepare mature and capable adults.”

In this sense, he invited to integrate in the person what he called the three intelligences: “that of the head, that of the heart and that of the hands, so that one thinks what one feels and does, one feels what one feels. “Think and do and do what you feel and think.”

He specified that it is “extremely urgent” to help young people to make this type of synthesis, to “integrate within themselves” and with others, in a world that “drives them more and more in the direction of the fragmentation of feelings and knowledge, and individualism in relationships.

He also encouraged them to insist on “normal relationships, looking each other in the eyes” and not on virtual ones “through the mobile phone.”

Finally, he invited them to walk together “listening to the Spirit” and “be a family,” uniting their efforts and sharing their experiences “in a network of charity, for the service of their brothers.”