Saint Josemaria
Quotations from Saint Josemaria

Loving the Pope

Tags: Church, Pope, Unity
Love for the Roman Pontiff must be in us a delightful passion, for in him we see Christ.
In Love with the Church, 13

Thank you, my God, for that love for the Pope you have placed in my heart.
The Way, 573

Catholic, apostolic, Roman! I want you to be very Roman. And to be anxious to make your ‘path to Rome’, videre Petrum – to see Peter.
The Way, 520

I thought the comment on loyalty you had written to me was very appropriate to all those moments in history which the devil makes it his business to repeat. You said: “I carry with me every day in my heart, in my mind and on my lips, an aspiration: Rome.”
Furrow, 344

Every day you must grow in loyalty towards the Church, the Pope and the Holy See ... with a love that should be always more theological.
Furrow, 353

Welcome the Pope’s words with a religious, humble, internal and effective acceptance. And pass them on.
The Forge, 133

Your deepest love, your greatest esteem, your most heartfelt veneration, your most complete obedience and your warmest affection have also to be shown towards the Vicar of Christ on earth, towards the Pope.
We Catholics should consider that after God and the most Holy Virgin, our Mother, the Holy Father comes next in the hierarchy of love and authority.
The Forge, 135

May the daily consideration of the heavy burden which weighs upon the Pope and the bishops move you to venerate and love them with real affection, and to help them with your prayers.
The Forge, 136

Faithfulness to the Pope includes a clear and definite duty: that of knowing his thought, which he tells us in Encyclicals or other documents. We have to do our part to help all Catholics pay attention to the teaching of the Holy Father, and bring their everyday behavior into line with it.
The Forge, 633

Our Holy Mother the Church, in a magnificent outpouring of love, is scattering the seed of the Gospel throughout the world; from Rome to the outposts of the earth.
As you help in this work of expansion throughout the whole world, bring those in the outposts to the Pope, so that the earth may be one flock and one Shepherd: one apostolate!
The Forge, 638

Offer your prayer, your atonement, and your action for this end: ut sint unum! – that all of us Christians may share one will, one heart, one spirit. This is so that omnes cum Petro ad Iesum per Mariam – that we may all go to Jesus, closely united to the Pope, through Mary.
The Forge, 647

Mary continually builds the Church and keeps it together. It is difficult to have devotion to our Lady and not feel closer to the other members of the mystical body and more united to its visible head, the Pope. That’s why I like to repeat: All with Peter to Jesus through Mary! By seeing ourselves as part of the Church and united to our brothers in the faith, we understand more deeply that we are brothers of all mankind, for the Church has been sent to all the peoples of the earth.
Christ Is Passing By, 139

For me, in the hierarchy of love, the Pope comes right after the Most Holy Trinity and our Mother the Virgin. I cannot forget that it was his Holiness Pius XII who approved Opus Dei at a time when some people considered our spirituality a heresy. Nor can I forget that the first words of kindness and affection I received in Rome in 1946 came from the then Monsignor Montini (later Pope Paul VI). The affable and paternal charm of John XXIII, every time I had occasion to visit him, remains engraved in my memory. Once I told him: “In our Work all men, Catholics or not, have always been lovingly received. It is not from your Holiness that I learned ecumenism.” And Pope John laughed with obvious emotion.
What more can I tell you? The Roman Pontiffs, all of them, have always had understanding and affection for Opus Dei.
Conversations with Mons. Escrivá de Balaguer, 46

The Catholic Church is Roman. I savor that word, Roman! I feel completely Roman, since Roman means universal, Catholic. For it leads me to love tenderly the Pope, il dolce Cristo in terra, the sweet Christ on earth, as Saint Catherine of Siena, whom I count as a most beloved friend, liked to repeat.
…
We help to make that apostolic continuity more evident in the eyes of all men by demonstrating with exquisite fidelity our union with the Pope, which is union with Peter. Love for the Roman Pontiff must be in us a delightful passion, for in him we see Christ. If we talk with the Lord in prayer, we will go forward with a clear gaze that will permit us to perceive the action of the Holy Spirit, even in the face of events we do not understand or which produce sighs or sorrow.
In Love with the Church, 11

Through two thousand years of history, the apostolic succession has been preserved in the Church. (…) And, among the Apostles, Christ himself made Simon the object of special attention. ‘You are Peter and on this rock I will build my church! I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.’
Peter moves to Rome and there establishes the see of primacy of the Vicar of Christ. For this reason it is in Rome that the apostolic succession is seen most clearly. And for this reason Rome is quite properly called ‘the Apostolic See’.
In Love with the Church, 12

Love for the Roman Pontiff must be in us a delightful passion, for in him we see Christ. If we talk and listen to our Lord in prayer, we ill go forward with a clear gaze that will permit us to perceive the action of the Holy Spirit, even when faced with events we do not understand, or which produce suffering or sorrow.
In Love with the Church, 13

I venerate with all my strength the Rome of Peter and Paul, bathed in the blood of martyrs, the centre from which so many have set out to propagate throughout the world the saving word of Christ. To be Roman is not to be provincial, but authentically ecumenical. It means desiring to enlarge one’s heart, to open it to all mankind with the redemptive zeal of Christ, who seeks all men and takes in all men, for he has loved all men first.
In Love with the Church, 11