by Bishop Thomas Gumbleton
Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace
I’m sure all of us have noticed over the past few weeks now how many times Pope Francis comes into the news because of the kind of unusual things that he’s begun to do, the way he’s carried out his understanding of the role of what it means to be the bishop of Rome. One of the things that he did quite recently that I find very instructive, especially as we reflect on the Trinity today: He was at St. Peter’s Square and, of course, as is so often, there were tens of thousands of people there and at one point, they all began to cry out in unison, “Francesco! Francesco! Viva Francesco!”
They were just celebrating this new pope, and he began to quiet down, saying, “No, wait a minute! Yes, that’s good — I like to be recognized and praised, but it’s not Francesco. It’s Jesus! You should be saying Gesu! Gesu! Gesu!” So he began to lead the crowd in that cry: “Viva Gesu!” — “Long live Jesus.” That’s the one, not Francesco, not any other pope, bishop, anyone: Jesus is the one that we should be acclaiming and rejoicing in and glorify.
Because more than anything else, the blessing of Jesus coming into our human history, becoming one of us, a human, one like us in every way except sin. The main thing is that Jesus begins to open up for us who God is. We are beginning to get the fullness of revelation about God. The coming of Jesus really brought something very new, because if you remember the Hebrew Scriptures, the Old Testament, the Jewish people, throughout all of their history, would never even name God. They wouldn’t say the name of God because God was so above, beyond anything they could comprehend…