Photo: FILIPPO MONTEFORTE / AFP / Getty Images
For: EFE
Monday, November 18
The poor, the forgotten and the sick on the mind of Pope Francis at Christmas
Pope Francis said that this Christmas he will think of the poor, the forgotten, abused children and exploited and those who are sick and will spend these holidays in hospitals and remembered moments of his childhood at this time as his grandmother cooking “cappelletti” (stuffed pasta), in an interview published by various Italian media.
“Sometimes we went to an aunt’s house at night, because in Buenos Aires and in our family there was no custom at that time to celebrate Christmas Eve like today. The day was celebrated 25, always with the grandparents . I remember once a curious thing: we arrived and my grandmother was still making cappelletti, she was making them by hand. Have done 400! We were amazed! Our whole family was there: uncles and cousins also came ”, Francisco recalled in an interview published by La Repubblica and La Stampa.
About of whom he will think these days, the pope did not doubt: “In the poor, always . Like Jesus, who was born poor : that day Mary was a woman from the street, because she did not have a suitable place to give birth. And then p I think of all the forgotten, the abandoned, the last and, in particular, the abused and enslaved children. It makes me cry and angry hearing the stories of vulnerable children and adults being exploited . And then I think of the sick children who will spend Christmas in the hospital, there are no words, we can only cling to faith, to God, and ask him: Why? ”
The pope told parents who have children outside of hospitals “do not forget how lucky you are.” “Hug them tightly and spend more time” and showed his admiration and gratitude for the doctors and health personnel who every day try to “alleviate the suffering of these little ones.”
Memory of his festivities
Jorge Bergoglio also assured that he loves Christmas carols because “they are full of poetry.”
When he has just celebrated his 85 years, Francisco remembered how he celebrated his birthdays . “We were five brothers in the house. Besides me there were Marta Regina, Alberto Horacio, Oscar Adrián and María Elena. Birthday was always a celebration for the whole family. Grandparents came, uncles … My mother made very thick chocolate to drink “, he explained.
He said that during his childhood he played soccer in a square near his house and “ there was not always someone who brought the leather ball, but rather it was played with a rag ball . In Argentina, the rag has become a cultural symbol of that time, to the point that a popular poet wrote a poem called ‘ball of rags’ ”and that he also played basketball.
He confessed that since he was not very good they put him as a goalkeeper and that “being a goalkeeper was a great school of life” because “the goalkeeper must be prepared to respond to the dangers that can come from everyone sides. ”
Fond memories
He explained that when he was a child “we did not have television at home “ and” several times, after dinner, dad would read volumes aloud to us “and that the first he read as a young man were” Don Segundo Sombra ”by Ricardo Güiraldes and then the novels by Jorge Luis Borges and Fëdor Dostoevskij, and the poems by Friedrich Hölderlin and in the“ Los Verdes ”by Archibald Joseph Cronin.
About what books Recommend laugh at the children, he stated that “more than a book, I would recommend reading. Because there is a danger that television will fill you with messages that later do not remain, while reading is something else, it is a dialogue with the book itself, it is a moment of intimacy that neither TV nor tablets can give. ”
He confessed that thinks a lot about his grandparents, but without “melancholy” and that he misses his three brothers who have passed away, but that he remembers them and all his friends with serenity, because he imagines them “in peace” . Regarding his health, he assures that he is well after the colon operation in July and that in 2022 he will make other trips international events and that nothing has changed in their daily routine.
“I always get up at 4 in the morning and immediately begin to pray. And then with the various commitments and appointments. I just allow myself a little nap after lunch ”, he explained.
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