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Callista and I attended the Basilica of the National Sanctuary of Immaculate Conception in Washington, DC, three times this last Holy Week.
The Basilica is the largest Catholic Church in America, and one of the 10 largest churches in the world. He attends more than 3,500 people, and Easter Sunday was only standing.
While looking at people to receive communion, I was surprised by the extraordinary diversity of people in the Basilica. In each of the three days, the variety of clothing and ethnicities was a tribute to the fact that the novel Catholic Church is truly universal.
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As the basilica points out on its website, with more than 80 chapels and oratories, the diversity of Catholic faith worldwide is well represented:
“Among the nationalities and ethnicities represented throughout the Basilica are Africans, Austrians, Chinese, Cubans, Czech, Filipinos, French, Germans, Guamanos, Hungarians, Indians, Irish, Italians, Koreans, Latin American, Lebanese, Lithuanians, Maltese, Poles, Slovacos, Slovacos, Slovacos, Slovacos, Slovacos, Slot
Pope Francis greets an audience with Hungarian pilgrims in Pablo VI Hall in the Vatican on April 25, 2024. (Fillipo Monteforte/AFP through Getty)
The emphasis of the late Pope Francis to help and love everyone dramatically promoted the attractiveness and growth of the Catholic Church. In Africa and South Special Asia, there has been a dramatic increase in those who adopt Catholicism. This was reflected in Easter Muerta in the Basilica.
When Archbishop Jorge Mario Bergoglio chose Francis as his papal name in 2013, it was a clear sign of commitment to a papacy centered and dedicated to serving the poor. Like San Francisco de Asís, Pope Francis was determined to rekindle the spirit of the Passion of Christ to help the less fortunate, oppressed and marginalized. Durdo during the day, deeply sick and only four days since his death, Pope Francis went to Regina Caeli, the central prison of Rome, to meet 70 inmates. He washed the feet of 12 of them in the tradition of Christ washing the feet of the apostles. Pope Francis’s commitment to communicate with everyone was a powerful sign of care and inclusion that opened the doors of the Church to those with spiritual and physical need throughout the planet.
This opening for all was exhibited in the Basilica last week.
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I have tied my long leg for something that Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. said on its great August 28, 1963, “I have a dream speech” in the Memorial Lincoln. He said: “I think it is one of the tragedies, one of the shameful tragedies, that 11 o’clock on Sunday morning is one of the most segregated hours, if not the most segregated time, in Christian America.”
The Reverend King gave us a powerful test to go beyond the baseline of legal degregation towards a genuinely integrated society for all Americans. I think that Reverend King and Pope Francis would have been proud of unity, sincerity and friendship that I witnessed in the Basilica last week.
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Now it may be that the most united time in the United States occurs in the Basilica and other great churches. When Callista and I attended Mass in the Cathedral of San Patricio in New York City, we had the same sense of people of all the background who joined to worship in a community of faith.
We are experiential, the same sense of universality for the three and a half years, Callista served as ambassador of the United States in the Holy See. With the second diplomatic representation of any country in the world (next to Washington, DC) sitting in the diplomatic corps for the Christmas Eve Mass in the Basilica of San Pedro reminded us how the diversity of the world is captured and how diversity is captured. Diversity.
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Despite his health challenges, Pope Francis visited countries like Mongolia and Timor-Stert. The continuing the tradition of the constant dissemination that was struck in the San Pope John Paul II. Now it is a routine to take the papacy far beyond the walls of the Vatican.
We must continue to reach each person from each fund. Together we can see salvation through faith in the heart of the Christian tradition. This would be an appropriate tribute to the memory of Pope Francis.
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