Pope Francis' trip to Corsica in December will be dedicated to “popular religiosity in the Mediterranean.” This is the theme of a meeting organized in Ajaccio, which the Pope will conclude. It’s an opportunity to reflect on his appreciation for these devotional practices, which he continues to promote.
“I ask, then, that no one make light of the fervent devotion of the holy faithful people of God, which in its popular piety seeks to console Christ,“ writes Francis in his recent encyclical on devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Dilexit nos (”He loved us").
Making the faith accessible, visible, accessible to the senses and easy to memorize for the “people of God” is an essential axis for Francis.
He has never ceased to advocate in his life as priest, bishop, and pope, for an approach to faith that draws not only on intellectual resources, but also on sensitivity and emotions ... even if this means promoting practices that are a bit surprising from a certain point of view.
As Archbishop of Buenos Aires, for example, he used to offer children a provocative catechesis in which he literally “burned the devil.”
“I'd prepare a big cloth devil and slip firecrackers inside. I’d give a catechism class and then light the fire ... It was an explosion of firecrackers! Everyone was shouting. The kids were having fun. It was theater, but it helped them remember. For me, it was a way of getting them to experience the ‘third exercise’ in the first week of the Spiritual Exercises. In this exercise, St. Ignatius wants to stimulate the ability to condemn evil and arouse hatred of sin,” Pope Francis recounted in 2016.
In 2001, the Vatican published a Directory on Popular Piety and Liturgy, which gives an overview of how the Church understands these devotions -- from processions to certain traditions linked to a particular sanctuary, or other acts -- as well as warning against misunderstandings and excesses.
Immunizing the Church
As early as his first apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, published in the autumn of 2013, Pope Francis explained that popular devotions “have much to teach us; for those who are capable of reading them, they are a locus theologicus which demands our attention.”
In that document, the Pope made the point that popular religiosity is what he would later call the Church's “immune system” against all the reductionisms and intellectualisms that exclude part of God's people from understanding the Christian mysteries.
In a similar vein, in March 2020, Pope Francis sought to “immunize” the Church against an approach to the global shock caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, based solely on physical health and safety. To do so, he offered the world an exceptional Urbi et Orbi blessing, in an empty St. Peter's Square in the rain that poured down on the Christ of San Marcello al Corso.
A few days earlier, he had gone to that church near Piazza Venezia, in the center of Rome, to pray before this crucifix. Romans have venerated it since a procession with this Christ on the Cross put an end to a plague epidemic in 1522.
In so doing, Francis touched the popular soul of the Italian capital by referring to this historic symbol, just as he has done more than a hundred times by going to pray before the icon of Mary Salus Populi Romani in the Basilica of St. Mary Major.
A treasure to be purified
The success of popular devotions, from the Stations of the Cross on Good Friday to the Marian processions on August 15 and December 8, reflects a real need on the part of “God's faithful people” to live out their faith using powerful, visible symbols.
But this can imply certain ambiguities. Particularly in southern Italy, for example, religious processions bring together a significant proportion of the population, but are sometimes hijacked by the mafia.
In September 2020, on the sidelines of a visit to Calabria, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Pope's Secretary of State, spoke of the need to “purify popular religiosity of elements that are not its own, a fortiori if they are elements of the underworld or criminality.”
The Directory on Popular Piety and Liturgy published in 2001 by the Congregation for Divine Worship, which to this day remains the Vatican's main reference document on the subject, also warns of certain excesses.
“Forms of popular religiosity can sometimes appear to be corrupted by factors that are inconsistent with Catholic doctrine,” warned John Paul II in the document's introductory message. “In such cases, they must be patiently and prudently purified through contacts with those responsible and through careful and respectful catechesis - unless radical inconsistencies call for immediate and decisive measures,” he explained, without denying the positive impact of these devotions.
The end of “iconoclasm”?
Beyond these nuances, Pope Francis' insistence on the value of these popular practices marks a clear break with a certain “iconoclasm” that marked Catholicism in some regions in the second half of the 20th century.
In the name of a misinterpretation of the “spirit of the Council,” some parish priests rejected certain religious traditions as superstition, going so far as to throw away certain statues of saints.
Particularly prevalent from the 1960s to the 1980s, this logic of liquidating traditional practices contributed to certain divisions. Behind the rehabilitation of popular traditions and symbols of Catholic piety that Pope Francis wishes to emphasize, therefore, the promotion of Church unity is also at stake.
