She is My ‘Mamá’ – Pope Francis and Mary

“Ella Es Mi Mamá” (She Is My Mum) is the title of a 2014 book written in Spanish that contains a long interview with Pope Francis by the Brazilian priest Alexander Awi Mello.

During the interview, Francis highlights the filial affection and devotion that he has for Mary. Readers of the Vatican Files know that the Marianism of the Pope has often been covered and assessed on this blog. Here are some examples:

- “Hurrah to Madonna”. Pope Francis and the Re-Marianization of the Papacy (2013)

- The Word Entrusted to Mary. Why? (2013)

- “Without Mary the Heart isan Orphan”. Another Instance of Francis’ Marianism (2014)

- The Marian Message of Pope Francis to Korea (2014)

- “Holy Mother of God!” Three Times! (2015)

- “The Only Creature without Sin”. Pope Francis on the Immaculated Conception of Mary (2017).

This book, which was recently translated into Italian and includes a new preface, does not break any new ground in terms of the pervasive presence of the cult of Mary in Francis’ spirituality. What is interesting, though, are the biographical details that help to explain the personal context of his “applied” Marianism.

FIRST PERSONAL ENCOUNTERS

Born into a devout Roman Catholic family, the young Jorge Mario Bergoglio was exposed to the Marian dimension of the faith from his earliest days. He began praying using Marian prayers, and the first image he possesed was a little medal of Mary of Mercy. Marianism reached him intuitively as part of family life and was conveyed with deep affections and tender gestures. As Clodovis Boff argues, “the incubator of Mariology is the heart, not the mind” (p. 126). In the cult of Mary, experiences and feelings precede and dominate everything else.

Bergoglio’s first experiences of the Catholic Church were in a parish run by the Salesian order and dedicated to Mary the Auxiliatrix, so his first impressions of what “church” meant were thoroughly Marian. The most influential priest in his childhood was one who would impart Marian blessings and recite Marian prayers when visiting the Bergoglio family.

As a child, Jorge Mario would regularly bring flowers to the statue of Mary. At 19 years of age he decided to become a priest while praying in the Marian chapel of his parish church. His sweetest memories and most decisive moments were punctuated by the “presence” of Mary surrounding him. In a telling passage of the book, we are told that “Mary entered progressively and profoundly in his life, never to leave it again” (p. 49).

THE IMPORTANCE OF MARIAN SANCTUARIES

After becoming a priest, Bergoglio marked his pastoral activities around Marian devotions. The most popular ones were the diocesan pilgrimages to the Marian sanctuary of Our Lady of Luján (whose image oversees the room where he meets with Catholic bishops from around the world at the Vatican). It is here that he leads thousands of people to the sanctuary of the Blessed Virgin of the Rosary of Pompei. He has become so close to Our Lady of Luján that he carries close to his heart a little piece of cloth that was used to polish her statue back in Argentina. He wants a physical, on-going touch with something Marian.

Apart from the influence of the Mexican cult Mary of Guadalupe, and the devotions related to Mary Undoer of Knots, whose veneration he has introduced in Argentina, Bergoglio’s life has also been shaped by the cult associated with Our Lady of Aparecida in Brazil. In visiting Aparecida for World Youth Day in 2013, the Pope said in his speech there:

“What joy I feel as I come to the house of the Mother of every Brazilian, the Shrine of our Lady of Aparecida! The day after my election as Bishop of Rome, I visited the Basilica of Saint Mary Major in Rome, in order to entrust my ministry as the Successor of Peter to Our Lady. Today I have come here to ask Mary our Mother for the success of World Youth Day and to place at her feet the life of the people of Latin America”.

Yet another link to a centrally important Marian sanctuary in the life of the Pope is Saint Mary Major in Rome. He pays a visit there before and after his journeys around the world in order to commit them to Mary and ask for her protection.

BLURRED THEOLOGY

From childood to adulthood, from Argentina to the Vatican, from piety to theology, in his daily spiritual practices and devotions, Marianism is perhaps the most significant factor shaping the Pope’s life. The apartment he lives in is replete with Marian images. The rooms where he officially meets with people are furnished with portraits of Mary. His own daily clothes carry objects associated with Mary.

His prayers are directed to her. His affections and tender thoughts are oriented to Mary. The interview is a wide-open window into Francis’ Mariological vision. All aspects of his life, thought, and ministry – none excluded – are strongly impacted by his Mariology.

Of course, the pervasiveness of Mary is argued for in theological terms as well. For instance, Jesus is presented as someone who does not want to do all on his own, but instead wants Mary to collaborate in the work of salvation (p. 45). According to the Pope, Jesus always acts according to “the logic of inclusion,” and Mary’s mediation is therefore an example of such necessary mediation. Since there are “organic links” between the Son and the Mother, she is always involved in what the Son does. It is the “principle of incarnation” that sustains and supports Marian devotions and veneration (p. 86).

While Marianism has a primarily intuitive force and sentimental power, Mariology tries to connect it to Christology and therefore to Trinitarian theology, as Vatican II tries to do (Lumen Gentium 52-69). Quoting the 1979 Puebla document, the Pope goes on to say that “she is the point of contact between heaven and earth. Without Mary, the gospel becomes disembodied, defaced and tranforms itself in ideology, in spiritualistic rationalism” (n. 301).

So in this high Mariology, Christology is also at stake. If Mary is the point of contact between heaven and earth, isn’t Jesus Christ’s uniqueness as the God-man imperiled? If the gospel becomes disembodied without Mary, isn’t the incarnation of the Son blurred?

A MARIAN GOSPEL

A major assumption in most present-day ecumenical dialogues is that there is a solid agreement among all Christian traditions on basic orthodox Christology, and thus that Protestants and Roman Catholics share the same Christology.

However, a reading of this book challenges this poor argument, which is nurtured by theological myopia, and invites us to take Roman Catholic Mariology seriously in all of its implications for Christology, salvation, grace, and prayer – in other words, the whole of theology and practice. If the Pope sees Mary everywhere, even when he thinks of Christ and the Trinity, salvation, and the Christian life; if Francis continually prays to Mary; if he strongly feels and seeks the maternal presence of Mary all the time; is his gospel a Bible-based, Christ-centered, and God-honoring gospel at all?

Soon after Bergoglio became Pope Francis in 2013, one of the Argentinian theologians who had influenced him the most, Juan Carlos Scannone, said about him: “He will emphasize popular piety and spirituality, especially the Marian devotion which is so typical of Latin America” (p. 138). These words have proven true. Francis is promoting a “Marian” gospel that contradicts at fundamental points the biblical gospel of Jesus Christ.

Leonardo De Chirico is an evangelical pastor in Rome (Italy), theologian and expert in Roman Catholicism.