Lessons from Pope Francis on human dignity through the lens of mercy
By Natalie Hoefer
When Brie Anne Varick thinks of Pope Francis, she is stirred by many emotions and by memories of encountering him at points around the globe.
“When I think of Pope Francis, I remember the joy I felt when it was announced that he would be our new pope,” she says.
“I remember the love I immediately felt for him as our shepherd as I went to World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro [in Brazil] and Krakow, Poland, and saw him greeting and welcoming the pilgrims with pastoral and fatherly joy and love.
“I remember seeing him in Rome and had the closest view as I gathered with friends in St. Peter’s Square for Palm Sunday Mass.”
But for Varick, Pope Francis’ “lasting legacy” will be how “his heart conformed to the Father’s merciful heart. He was a pope who exhorted his people, especially the shepherds, to go out to the margins and seek the vulnerable and always extend the mercy of the Father.”
That same mercy is the lens through which she frames her ministry as director of the archdiocesan Office of Human Life and Dignity.
‘Let us not look the other way’
Looking back on Pope Francis’ papacy, Varick recalls times when he highlighted the dignity and needs of particular marginalized groups.
For instance, in 2015 he established an International Day of Prayer and Awareness Against Human Trafficking, to be observed annually on Feb. 8. In his 2013 apostolic exhortation “Evangelii Gaudium” (“The Joy of the Gospel”), he called all to awareness and action against human trafficking: “Let us not look the other way. There is greater complicity than we think. The issue involves everyone!” (#211).
Pope Francis also reached out with mercy time and again to people in prison. Almost every year of his papacy, he celebrated the Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Holy Thursday in a prison, where he would wash the feet of 12 inmates.
Even while still recovering from his recent critical lung issues and hospitalization, Pope Francis was present on Holy Thursday, April 17, at Regina Coeli Prison in Rome. He was unable to celebrate the Mass or perform the washing of the feet. But he greeted 70 inmates personally, offering them words of encouragement and gifting each of them with a rosary and a pocket-sized Gospel.
Varick recalls Pope Francis also reaching out in a unique way to those marginalized by abortion—a sin that causes immediate excommunication from the Church.
To break barriers to forgiveness, Pope Francis bestowed on priests the ability to forgive the sin of abortion during the 2015-16 extraordinary Holy Year of Mercy—an authority previously reserved for bishops.
Through the pope’s mercy on those hurting from the sin of abortion, says Varick, he “extended indefinitely the ability for priests to give absolution to anyone seeking forgiveness in the sacrament of confession for the sin of abortion.”
Opposed to ‘our modern culture of death’
That pronouncement did not diminish abortion as an evil act against life and human dignity—an act Pope Francis opposed.
“Archbishop Joseph [F.] Naumann mentioned once that he told the pope about U.S. bishops being criticized for identifying the protection of the unborn as a pre-eminent priority,” Varick says, referring to a Sept. 24, 2020, statement by the archbishop, who at the time was chair of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Pro-Life Committee. He currently serves as apostolic administrator of the Archdiocese of Kansas City, Kan.
His statement noted the pope’s “support for our efforts, observing that if we fail to protect life, no other rights matter. Pope Francis also said that abortion is not primarily a Catholic or even a religious issue, it is first and foremost a human rights issue.”
The pope’s approval in 2024 of “Dignitas Infinita” (“Infinite Dignity”), a declaration on human dignity by the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, shows more than his promotion of each person’s God-given dignity, says Varick.
With sections denouncing abortion, surrogacy, gender theory and sex change as attacks on dignity, the pope’s approval of the document also “shows his faithfulness in professing Church teachings that are controversial in our modern culture of death,” she says.
“But he always started with pointing us back to the Father’s love. He knew the importance of healing and removing barriers so the faithful could receive the fullness of truth that the Catholic Church holds, including our beautiful teaching on human life and dignity.
“Pope Francis exhorted the faithful to have mercy on the marginalized in front of us and to evangelize Christ to them first, knowing that a relationship with Christ must be the foundation to understand and receive the Church’s teaching.”
A ‘heart conformed to the Father’s’
Nothing revealed for Varick the importance the pope placed on mercy more than his declaration of an extraordinary Holy Year of Mercy from Dec. 8, 2015, through Nov. 20, 2016.
“Pope Francis commonly shared his view of the Church as a field hospital where we should be focused on healing the wounded,” she says. “That’s what the Year of Mercy was about.
“It revealed Pope Francis’ love for the people. It revealed Jesus’ heart of mercy speaking through Pope Francis. And it revealed how his heart conformed to the Father’s merciful heart.
“He wanted souls to seek that mercy and be healed. He once said [during a March 28, 2014, homily], ‘The God of mercy: he does not tire of forgiving. We are the ones who tire in asking for forgiveness, but he does not tire.’ ”
Human dignity seen through the lens of mercy—this is the approach Varick says she learned from the late pope.
“What I will take from Pope Francis is this: We should be seeking the lost and the marginalized, meeting people where they’re at, offering Christ’s healing and accompanying them to the fullness of the Church,” she says.
“We should be open to the Holy Spirit’s prompts to open wide the doors of mercy and to do so with the joy that comes from an encounter with Christ.” †
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