Praying for the Big Meeting

Who can keep up with our good Pope Francis? Today there is another interview, this time with La Repubblica. This morning on Twitter I saw some exasperated soul wish out loud that Pope Francis would 'switch to decaf.'

And today begins the first official meeting of Francis's council of Cardinals, including, of course, our own Seán Patrick O'Malley, from whose prayer and hands I am a priest of Jesus Christ and a presbyter of the Roman Church, though I bear both poorly and awkwardly.

I find their meeting coming into my prayer. I pray for them, for their courage, their wisdom, their humility, their willingness. I keep thinking about how often you open the breviary to the feast of some bishop or other and it says that he was a reformer of his diocese, the clergy, etc. Perhaps it takes saints for true reform, and so we should pray for saints and serve each other's holiness. But I think reform itself--in the struggles and energy released in the work of reforming--also makes saints.

So I want to pray in thanksgiving for the holiness of our Holy Father and his council of Cardinals as they begin to meet today, that their discernment and effort may serve the holiness of the Universal Church, at once the bride of Christ and his Body, born in poverty, working to heal and reconcile, suffering, crucified, and Risen.