Despite pushback, Pope hit 5 key themes in Belgium

From September 26 to 29, 2024, Pope Francis visited Belgium, a trip to the heart of Europe where he was confronted with many contentious and difficult topics, including sexual abuse within the Church, abortion, the role of women, and more.

Through his actions and words the Argentinian Pontiff did not shy away from addressing and responding to the local community’s concerns, and despite the scandal of abuse, holding a firm line on the Church's stance on abortion and the shared dignity of men and women.

Aleteia summarizes the main themes of this important trip by highlighting important quotes and key moments. 

In Belgium, Pope Francis found himself facing a society that is newly shocked about the sexual abuse crisis within the Church and its mishandling. Belgians were eager to hear the Pontiff on this subject.

In his first meeting with the country’s political and state authorities on September 27, both King Philippe of Belgium and the Prime Minister, Alexander de Croo, spoke of the Church's responsibility to repair the “irreparable.”

Pope answered with his own strong words.

“The Church must be ashamed, ask for pardon, and try to solve this situation with Christian humility and by putting in all the measures necessary to ensure that it does not happen again,” Pope Francis said during his first speech in the country, going off script. “This is our shame and humiliation.”

In the evening that same day Pope Francis met privately for two hours with a group of 17 victims of sexual abuse committed by the Belgian clergy. The victims had the opportunity to share their stories, suffering and skepticism, but also to demand real concrete change in how the Church handles these issues. The victims reportedly will meet the Pope again in a year. 

“I think of the stories of some of the “little ones” whom I met the other day. I listened to them. I felt their suffering stemming from abuse,” Pope Francis then said off-the-cuff, during the Mass on September 29, emphasizing the impact this visit had on him.

“On my return to Rome I will begin the process of beatification of King Baudouin: May his example as a man of faith enlighten those who govern,” Pope Francis said to cheers at the end of the Angelus prayer on September 29, at the stadium named precisely after this Belgian King, who ruled the country from 1951 until his death in 1993.

In 1990 this sovereign was made “unable to reign” for 36 hours, so that he did not need to sign an abortion law that was being passed by parliament. As a fervent Catholic he had refused to accept it and asked the government and parliament to find a way to prevent him from being responsible for the law.

The day before the Angelus, Pope Francis had already praised King Baudouin, as he had visited his tomb in the royal crypt of the Church of Our Lady of Laeken. He called Belgians to look to him as criminal laws are currently being discussed. The Pontiff may have been referring to laws surrounding euthanasia, which Belgium legalized in 2002 and has progressively expanded since.

Pope Francis’ tribute during the Angelus immediately prompted anger from certain pro-abortion sectors of Belgian society, such as the Centre d'action laïque (Secular Action Center) which denounced the “astounding remarks" as a “provocation.” 

But the Pope doubled down on his praise during the in-flight press conference on the way back to Rome on September 29. “The king was courageous because, faced with a law of death, he did not sign it and resigned. That takes courage, doesn't it? It takes a 'real' politician to do this,” he emphasized, highlighting that his beatification process will continue.

“Abortion is murder. [...] Doctors who engage in this are — allow me the word — hitmen,” he added. 

Pope Francis visited Belgium on occasion of the 600th anniversary of the Catholic University of Louvain, which split in 1968 into two independent institutions, one French-speaking and the other Dutch-speaking. During his visit to the French establishment on September 28, the Pontiff was confronted with questions and criticisms on the Church’s view of women and their role in society, in a letter written and read out by faculty and students. 

“We must go back to what is essential: Who is woman and who is the Church?” the Pope said in his speech, as he emphasized that the “Church is woman, female and not male. She is female, a wife. [...] A woman within the People of God is a daughter, a sister, a mother, just as a man is a son, a brother, a father.” 

“What characterizes women, that which is truly feminine, is not stipulated by consensus or ideologies, just as dignity itself is ensured not by laws written on paper, but by an original law written on our hearts,” the Pope explained.

However, despite his speech the French Catholic University of Louvain issued a statement shortly after expressing their “incomprehension and disapproval” for Pope Francis’ “conservative positions” on the role of women in society. 

This press release clearly did not sit well with the Pope, as during his press conference on the way back to Rome he said that the statement “was released at the moment when I was speaking. It was pre-written, and this is not moral.” He then explained that he always speaks about the “dignity of women” and “masculinizing the Church, masculinizing women is not humane; it is not Christian.” 

As the trip centered around the anniversary of two educational institutions, another important theme of the visit was how universities should be a space to search for truth through reason and go beyond the surface of things for the common good of humanity. 

Despite certain disagreements with the university community over social issues, such as the role of women, the Pope's speeches did also emphasize these establishment's important intellectual mission.

“Expanding boundaries and becoming an open space for humanity and for society is the great mission of a university,” Pope Francis said on September 27, at the Dutch–speaking Catholic University of Louvain.

He also warned against a “soulless rationalism” that we risk falling into due to our “technocratic culture” that reduces human beings to “mere matter.”

“Dear students, do you want freedom? Then seek and bear witness to the truth! And try to be credible and authentic in the simple and daily choices you make. In this way, your university will become, each day, exactly what it is meant to be: a Catholic University!” he emphasized at the French-speaking Catholic University of Louvain on September 28. 

During his meeting with the local Catholic community in Belgium at the Koekelberg Basilica of the Sacred Heart on September 28, Pope Francis encouraged the faithful and urged them not to lose hope in the face of their increasingly secular society. This meeting was marked by intense emotions, as the Church in Belgium has been greatly weakened and hurt by secularization, worsened by the scandal generated by abuse cases. Certain people in the crowd even became emotional at meeting and hearing the Pope.

“The changes in our time and the crisis of faith we are experiencing in the West have impelled us to return to what is essential, namely the Gospel,” Francis said. “The good news that Jesus brought to the world must once again be proclaimed to all and allowed to shine forth in all its beauty. This present crisis, like every crisis, is a time given in order to shock us, to make us question and to change. It is a valuable opportunity.” 

“We have moved from a Christianity located within a welcoming social framework to a 'minority' Christianity, or better, a Christianity of witness. This requires the courage to undertake an ecclesial conversion for enabling those pastoral transformations that concern our habitual ways of doing things, and the language in which we express our faith, so that they are truly directed to evangelization,” he insisted. 

Despite the difficulties and the suffering of the Church, the Pope encouraged the faithful to follow “the joy of hearts kindled by the Gospel.”