The great media anticipation of the Pope’s visit to Belgium was the meeting with the victims of the abuses of the Catholic Church, which gave rise to a particular social protest in this country in recent years and even resulted in the judicial conviction of 18 religious. Francis I did not evade the question, which led him to expel them, and described the abuses as a “shame and humiliation” of the Church for which he once again asked for forgiveness. “Concrete measures must be taken,” reprimanded Prime Minister Alexander de Croo, who reminded him at the start of a visit marked by controversy that “there is a long way to go”.
The Pope’s meeting with 17 victims was one of the first events he attended during his trip to the “heart of Europe.” “This is the shame that we all have today, we must face and solve the problem,” he said in a speech to the country’s authorities. Belgium was one of the first places where investigations were encouraged, such as a parliamentary commission that recorded 327 cases of sexual violence in recent decades and which emanated from the highest levels of the Belgian Church.
“The murderous law” of abortion
These crimes haunted Francis I until the end of the trip, when the Vatican had to modify at the last minute the mass celebrated at the King Baudouin football stadium to prevent the broadcast of an attacker’s song. “The recent revelations about the composer of the closing song chosen for this celebration are shocking and hurtful. This is why we changed this election,” the organization said in a statement about composer Paul Schollaert, who recently died and had to go through the “Halsberghe commission” on abuse.
During the homily, the pope spoke of the abuses, which sparked the first applause from the approximately 30,000 participants. “Let the attackers be known and judged,” he declared two days after the victims themselves demanded that something be done beyond asking for forgiveness. “I ask everyone: do not cover up abuse! I ask the bishops: do not cover up abuse! Condemn the abusers and help them heal from this disease of abuse,” he said.
The visit aroused much anger because of the attitude of the Pope who, outside of the official program, went to the crypt where King Baudouin is buried and welcomed his decision “to abandon his position as king to not sign a deadly agreement.” law” in reference to the three-day abdication for not signing the abortion law in 1990. This interference in the politics of another country also placed the current kings Felipe and Matilde in a complicated situation, who have had to publish a statement in which they clarified that they accompanied the pope “as a courtesy”.
Machismo in the Church
The big stir came during the visit to the University of Leuven, where he took part in a meeting with teachers and students on the occasion of the 600th anniversary. “It’s ugly when a woman wants to play a man, a woman is a woman,” the pope reacted to a debate sparked by academics and students. “Where is the place of women in the Encyclical? “Women are the big ones missing,” they said after studying Pope Francis’ encyclical on environmental protection. “What then is the place of women in the Church? As usually happens in the history of the Church, women have been made invisible,” according to the EFE agency.
“The Church is the people of God, not a multinational company,” replied Francis I, who assured that “what is characteristic of woman, that is to say, what is feminine, is not established by consensus or by ideologies. “The vocation and mission of man and woman and their reciprocal being for each other is communion. Not against each other, in opposing demands – feminism and machismo – but one for the other.” He also appealed to “feminine holiness” as a “delicate and strong” model, in referring to the Carmelite nun Ana de Jesús, beatified during this mass.
The University of Louvain condemned the pope’s “conservative positions”. “In the face of words like: ‘A woman is a fruitful welcome, care and vital birth.’ UCLouvain can only express its disagreement with this determinist and reductionist position. UCLouvain is an inclusive university committed to the fight against gender-based and sexual violence. It reaffirms its desire that everyone can flourish within it and in society, whatever their origin, gender or sexual orientation. Calls on the Church to follow the same path, without any form of discrimination,” he lamented in a press release.
