Pope Francis (Pastoral)

As you know by now, I tape everything I want to watch in advance. Then I normally watch it in segments. One of the weekly shows I tape is 20/20. Last week it was about Pope Francis. I was very interested and I watched it in segments, allowing it to penetrate and for me to discern. It was about poverty and the States. Our Pope and I will call him ours, because he is mine and I believe he belongs to the world. He has a great compassion for the poor. From the Vatican and with todays technology he was able to enter places in the States where he could communicate personally with people who had suffered. The impact he had on these people who spoke to him of their suffering was powerful. More than once I shed a tear in this process. There was a single mom with two children who had just found an apartment for the first time after living in shelters for so long. There was a youth, seventeen I believe who was supporting his entire family because his father was ill. This youth lost his scholarship when it was learned that they were not legal in the States. They had escaped Mexico. I do hope I have this all right because I don’t want to minimize the show or distract from it. What the most powerful aspect for me was watching the transformation of these suffering souls as the Pope validated their importance. I worry about this Pope more than the others. I worried about Obama as President more than the others. Every time I see a leader who is different, who brings a new perspective that is positive, I feel a bit of a concern because I know that they face new challenges. My focus is the Pope and Religion here. The Pope has many enemies. He has the Mafia who have a twisted distorted view of Catholicism. They forget that killing and terrorizing is not sanctioned. He has other Catholics too who do not agree with his views. Yet, the Pope is only preaching what it is to be a Catholic. Catholicism is about embracing, justice for others, sustaining others etc….Catholicism should be about helping. Too often I see disdain and criticism. Too often I see hate. I am not perfect either and remember going to my school one day and there was a homeless man sleeping outside my building and I flinched. I had disdain and concern. I had not noticed that it was a sculpture of a homeless man. I had not known that it had been turned down to display from every Religious Institution at the University but my own. After that I would sit beside the homeless man and discern. It forced me to look at myself. I love going to the States which has come to a halt after adopting my previously abused animals. What I always did when driving down there is taking detours off the main highway to see the landscape and with that I saw people and with that I saw a state of poverty I have never quite seen in Canada. I know we have it here and as I watch the news and see how people are now living in Ontario Housing, I realize how shameful it is becoming here. Our countries are rich and there should not be one person in either of our countries who do not have a clean place to live, good meals and opportunity for growth. We are failing our poor. We are trapping our poor. What the Pope did for me is make me proud of him. He teaches by example. I do not normally advertise I am a Catholic because I help so many people of so many religions and quite a few hate Catholics. As a Pastoral Counsellor Specialist which is one of my qualifications I deal with the spirituality and concerns of all people. They come from different religions or none. I have butted heads with some of my own when I say that there should be a coma after spirituality as an option, rather than integration. But, I also know that it is a question of interpretation. We may mean the same thing but I am coming from the perspective of a private practice where I deal with all kinds of people, trauma, couples, relationships, addictions etc…Some suffer because of their experiences with religion, some are confused about their religion, some stay in abusive relationships because of their perspective of religions. Ministers have told them that God wants them together, so they believe that God sanctions the beatings, etc…Ministers have all to often abused and because of this the religion is blamed rather than the man or woman. There is all to often a distortion of religion. People often commit horrendous acts and terrorism in the name of God. All this has nothing to do with God. All this has to do with their own twisted distortions. There is no room for hate for God. When I interned at a hospital often I would hear someone tell me how much they hate Catholics. I never took it personally. I was interested in why. What I heard was usually valid but it had nothing to do with being a Catholic, it had everything to do with being hateful and ignorant. These people exist everywhere but there is hope for them. There has to be or this vicious cycle will continue. As I look at our world I continue to have hope. There are so many good people in it. I believe that the majority of people are good. Often this is skewed from people who work with and only see the bad. I remember a Priest and Professor telling me how in the Philippines, in the poorest part, a Priest was badly beaten by Catholics. It was a Muslim who carried the Priest home and eased him back to health. I remember another Priest and friend tell me how when working in South America another Priest and friend of his was killed after he protested for the release of two young men who were scheduled to be killed. He succeeded, they were released and he was killed in kind. What did the mother of one of the youths say? She said it was his job. I saw how my Priest friend suffered and told him that he should write a book. He agreed but never did. He is resting with God now and his friends. There is so much I can share but I am not here to write a book. Perhaps in the future I will write one about Spirituality and Religion but not today. As you know I write for fun, right now, not to the pleasure of everyone. But after watching the program with the Pope capturing my heart all over again, I have re-examined myself. Instead of thinking how much I need to pay off this or that, I think of how much I have. I have a home that is bigger than I need, though much less than those I know. I can eat to my hearts content. I am healthy. I have an education that no one can take away. I have respect from my community. I have an office and private practice. I have so much when I really think about it. Ok, so my home is old and need of care and my car is old and should be replaced but that is not what I should be dwelling on. Therefore, I thank God that I have and have had the life I have. So, please I ask everyone today pray for Pope Francis because we really need him so we can all decide to be better people, including Catholics who have fallen in the wayside. I believe that we can end this cycle of hate and wars and terrorism and poverty. All people should be validated. What we are doing is not working so this is time to change. I hope I have touched one of you today. The Pope asked Americans to pray for him, but I ask it from world.