The Cathedral was packed on Monday night, as people from across the Diocese of Broken Bay gathered to farewell Pope Francis.
The Solemn Mass for the Repose of the Soul of Pope Francis in Broken Bay was celebrated two days after the Funeral Mass for the deceased Pontiff held in Rome. Julian Leeser, the local Member for Berowra, attended the Mass.
Father David Ranson, Vicar General of the Diocese of Broken Bay, celebrated the Mass in place of Bishop Anthony Randazzo, who was in Rome for the Funeral Mass.
In his homily, Fr David reflected on his own encounter with the Holy Father, on the 2019 Australian Bishops Ad Limina visit to Rome.
During an Ad Limina visit, Bishops meet and pray with Pope Francis and have discussions with various agencies of the Holy See. Fr David attended as the Diocesan Administrator for Broken Bay.
“On a stifling hot Roman June morning we met him as a group. Having been greeted by him individually, he then strode through us to take his seat in the circle, making us welcome, apologising for the deficiency of the air-conditioning, and pointing out the location of the bathrooms,” he said.
“For the following two hours, we could ask him any question we wished, and he engaged us in remarkable dialogue. Seated only some 10 feet away from him, it was one of the most extraordinary experiences of my life.
“About two-thirds of the way through the time he bent to his side to pour water into a glass. There was every expectation he was preparing a glass of water for himself. Yet without any prevarication, having poured the water into the glass, he immediately handed it to his interpreter seated beside him. And he continued on with his answer in which he was engaged. No thought to himself; thought only to the one beside him.
“A simple gesture, so unremarkable, but so utterly remarkable. It was the same kind of spirit that underscored the many gestures for which we remember Francis: the washing and kissing of the feet of women prisoners on Holy Thursday; the kiss of a man so incredibly disfigured by the tumours of neurofibromatosis; the embrace of a small boy struggling to make meaning of the death of his father; the kiss of the feet of South Sudan leaders. Each one of these gestures conveyed what was central for Francis – closeness, proximity, nearness, tenderness.”
He also reflected on how Pope Francis had been informed by the work of the French Jesuit Gaston Fessard, who used the Spanish word tensionante to describe a way of thinking that recognised opposite poles and sought to hold them in tension, rather than to resolve the apparent contradiction between them.
“Bergoglio struggled to bring about a holding together what seemed logically irreconcilable views – a way of living with apparently contradictory poles in tension,” he said.
“Rather than choosing one or the other, for Fessard the Christian life is found in the unresolved tension between them.”
For many in the Diocese, the Mass offered a chance for them to privately reflect on their own encounters and memories of Pope Francis.
The Mass occurred during the Novemdiales, a nine-day period of mourning following Pope Francis’ funeral on Saturday.
Read Fr David Ranson's Homily in full here.