Pope Francis visited the Pope Emeritus for lunch and prayer.
In this historic year of two living popes, it was heartwarming to see the embrace. Everything went the way you would expect. Pope Emeritus Benedict sat on the non-pope side of the seat in the car and then, when they went to prayer he tried to insist that Pope Francis go forward the altar and pray alone. Pope Francis refused to do this and so the two popes knelt in prayer side by side in a pew.
This is the first time in 600 years that we have had two living popes. It’s heartwarming to see them behave the way men of God should.
The Associated Press has details:
Associated Press/Osservatore Romano, HO – In this photo provided by the Vatican paper L’Osservatore Romano, Pope Francis meets Pope emeritus Benedict XVI in Castel Gandolfo Saturday, March 23, 2013. Pope Francis
CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy (AP) — The two men in white embraced and showed one another the deference owed a pope in ways that surely turned Vatican protocol upside down: A reigning pope telling a retired one, “We are brothers,” and insisting that they pray side-by-side during a date to discuss the future of the Catholic Church.
Pope Francis traveled Saturday from the Vatican to this hilltown south of Rome to have lunch with his predecessor, Benedict XVI, an historic and potentially problematic melding of the papacies that has never before confronted the church.
In a season of extraordinary moments, starting with Benedict’s resignation and climaxing with the election of the first Latin American pope, Saturday’s encounter provided perhaps the most enduring images of this papal transition as popes present and past embraced, prayed and broke bread together.
“It was a moment of great communion in the church,” said the Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi. “The spiritual union of these two people is truly a great gift and a promise of serenity for the church.” (Read the rest here.)
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