DESPITE the different personalities and pastoral approaches of soon-to-be-canonised Popes John XXIII and John Paul II, “they were very much united at a deeper level”.
Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge said this united approach was “in their witness to Christ crucified and risen”.
He made the comments in response to recent media statements the two popes had been selected for canonisation in “an unprecedented joint ceremony in a bid to unite the Catholic Church’s conservatives and liberals”.
“To see this as some sort of political gesture to placate left and right in the Church is too politicised a reading of the Pope’s decision,” he said.
“Rather the decision is designed to move beyond a politicised view of life in the Church.
“It is only at that deeper level you discover that John XXIII and John Paul II, for all their differences, were both Peter in our midst.
“The ministry which they shared was the Petrine ministry, conferred by Christ on the Church as a gift.
“Only at that deeper level do you move beyond politics and the ideology that politics always contains.
“The Pope’s (Francis) decision is a vote against a politicised or ideologised view of the Church and a summons to understand what the Papacy really is – not Angelo or Karol but Peter in our midst.”
Pope Francis announced on Monday, September 30 Popes John XXIII and John Paul II will be declared saints on April 27, 2014.
The decision was announced during the first consistory the pope has convened.
