International News

Paul VI Is Beatified

October 24, 2014

by Francis X. Rocca

A tapestry of Blessed Paul VI hangs from the facade of St. Peter’s Basilica during his beatification Mass celebrated by Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican Oct. 19. The Mass also concluded the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the family.
A tapestry of Blessed Paul VI hangs from the facade of St. Peter’s Basilica during his beatification Mass celebrated by Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican Oct. 19. The Mass also concluded the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the family.

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Beatifying Blessed Paul VI at the concluding Mass of the Synod of Bishops on the family, Pope Francis praised the late pope as the “great helmsman” of the Second Vatican Council and founder of the synod, as well as a “humble and prophetic witness of love for Christ and his church.”

The pope spoke during a homily in St. Peter’s Square at a Mass for more than 30,000 people, under a sunny sky on an unseasonably warm Oct. 19.

“When we look to this great pope, this courageous Christian, this tireless apostle, we cannot but say in the sight of God a word as simple as it is heartfelt and important: thanks,” the pope said, drawing applause from the congregation, which included retired Pope Benedict XVI, whom Blessed Paul made a cardinal in 1977.

“Facing the advent of a secularized and hostile society, [Blessed Paul] could hold fast, with farsightedness and wisdom – and at times alone – to the helm of the barque of Peter,” Pope Francis said, in a possible allusion to “Humanae Vitae,” the late pope’s 1968 encyclical, which affirmed Catholic teaching against contraception amid widespread dissent.

The pope pronounced the rite of beatification at the start of the Mass. Then Sister Giacomina Pedrini, a member of the Sisters of Holy Child Mary, carried up a relic: a bloodstained vest Blessed Paul was wearing during a 1970 assassination attempt in the Philippines. Sister Pedrini is the last surviving nun who attended to Blessed Paul.

In his homily, Pope Francis did not explicitly mention “Humanae Vitae,” the single achievement for which Blessed Paul is best known today. Instead, the pope highlighted his predecessor’s work presiding over most of Vatican II and establishing the synod.

The pope quoted Blessed Paul’s statement that he intended the synod to survey the “signs of the times” in order to adapt to the “growing needs of our time and the changing conditions of society.”

Paul VI became the first pontiff of the modern era to travel abroad when he came to New York and spoke at the U.N. General Assembly in 1965. He made nine international pastoral visits, becoming the first pope to travel to the Western Hemisphere, Asia and Africa.