Encyclical, planned visit to Corsica: “Francis reminds us that popular piety has not disappeared! »

In the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council, people began to think that popular piety was going to disappear by itself… even if it meant cleaning things up a bit! And for good reason: the liturgy would now be lived in the vernacular language (thus encouraging the participation of the faithful) and personal reading of the Bible was now accessible to as many people as possible. Everything pointed to the fact that the people of God would no longer need to resort to their devotional practices to maintain their bond with God. But that was failing to anticipate two things and forgetting a third.

It was, first of all, not anticipating the rapid and radical disconnect between Catholicism and postmodern culture, which we are witnessing. Today, in fact, Christianity is no longer the matrix of our culture. However, when a culture is no longer closely linked to a religion (whatever it may be), everyone finds themselves sent back to themselves, everyone sees themselves summoned to construct, for themselves, their own own universe of meaning by picking, here and there, what he needs from the great supermarket of contemporary religiosity.

Need for meaning and religion

Because when religion fades, religiosity unfolds since the need for meaning does not disappear with religion. However, among everything that the contemporary world offers to seekers of meaning, there are the treasures of popular piety: practical, concrete, easy to use, from the common heritage… they prove much more accessible to those who no longer have link with Christianity than the liturgy or the Bible!

It is these objects (medals, statues, incense, holy water, candle, rosary, etc.) which connect us to the concreteness of existence; these rites (blessings, pilgrimages, processions, novenas, stations of the cross, etc.) which say something of our trust in God; these places (sanctuaries and churches) where we feel safe; these people (the Virgin, first of all, but also the saints and the angels) who allow us to no longer feel alone…

It was, then, not anticipating the shift of the center of gravity of the Church from the countries of the North to those of the South, that is to say towards those countries where popular piety remained very alive, because ‘it has never been called into question by a disembodied rationalism any more than by a poorly understood secularism… Thus of Brazil, which I know having served there for several years, this country where nothing opposes that piety popular is displayed publicly. However, due to this mixing of peoples caused by globalization, it is the faithful who come from these countries who join our parish communities, bringing their uninhibited piety!

Popular piety, theological place

It was, finally, forgetting a fundamental thing, namely that popular piety is not a simple superstition or even a sort of by-product of a Catholicism which itself would be “perfect”. No, popular piety is, to use an expression from Pope Francis in the joy of the Gospel (n. 126), “a theological place” that is to say, neither more nor less, a means that God uses to reveal himself. By contemplating the faith of the little and the poor, by contemplating the piety of the people of God and popular wisdom, I discover something of God which, until now, had escaped me!

This is what the Pope illustrates thus (EG 125) : “I think of the solid faith of these mothers at the foot of their sick child’s bed who apply themselves to the Rosary although they do not know how to outline the sentences of the Creed; or to all these acts full of hope manifested by a candle that we light in a humble home to ask for help from Mary, or to these looks of deep love towards the crucified Christ. He who loves God’s holy and faithful people cannot view these actions only as a natural search for divinity. These are the manifestations of a theological life animated by the action of the Holy Spirit who has been poured out in our hearts (see Rm 5:5). »

Devotion to the Sacred Heart

If, in the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council, people began to think that popular piety would probably disappear by itself, it is clear that this is not the case! Not only does it remain very much alive, offering a great opportunity for the new evangelization, which Pope Francis still points out (EG 126) : “The expressions of popular piety have much to teach us, and, for those who know how to read them, they are a theological place to which we must pay attention, especially as we think about the new evangelization. »

What’s more, it is now honored by this same pope who has just dedicated an encyclical to one of the treasures of popular piety: devotion to the Sacred Heart, an encyclical in which it “asks that no one mocks the expressions of believing fervor of the holy and faithful people of God who, in their popular piety, seek to console Christ. » Who would have believed it?