We need a truly great pope
Looking to the past for a model for the future
In 2001, I was studying Latin as a seminarian in Rome, and I lived a few blocks from St. Peter’s Square. Each morning, I arrived at the doors of St. Peter’s when it opened at 7:00 a.m., often seeing Cardinal Ratzinger and other prominent churchmen walking through the square on their way to their offices.
If you have ever been at St. Peter’s at 7:00 a.m., you know that there are a flood of priests, bishops, and cardinals who leave the sacristy with a server and the materials for Mass to find an open altar. Just around the corner from the sacristy door is the altar of Pope St. Gregory the Great, who reigned from 590 to 604. Anyone leaving the sacristy to say Mass will pass near the altar, and it’s an altar where the cardinals should spend some time in prayer before this conclave.
Gregory the Great was an ambitious man, but in the best sense of the word. Ambition not only refers to the desire to obtain high office or some kind of honor, like modern political ambition. It can also mean striving to do your work well, to carry out the tasks given to you with tact and skill, without a view to promotion or praise. If the cardinals choose a truly ambitious man to be pope, they should not for someone who is vying for the job, but someone who, as Benedict XVI said after his election, is “a simple and humble laborer in the vineyard of the Lord.”
I’ve had two wonderful examples of real ambition in my life, and they came to mind when reading in The Pillar about Msgr. Burrill’s lawsuit and his assertion that outing him as a frequent user of a gay hookup app meant that the “upward trajectory to the position of bishop has been permanently derailed.” Now, I’m a lawyer and I understand how lawyers can embellish things or phrase things in ways that may sound odd outside the courtroom. Nevertheless, Msgr. Burrill surely saw what was submitted to the court and approved the specific language. And rather than acknowledging his errors and seeking forgiveness, Burrill revealed far more than his download history from the App Store. Burrill revealed that he was ambitious for all the wrong reasons, that he believed his job was a stepping-stone to something that was, in his mind, greater. He was going through the motions as the General Secretary of the USCCB until such time that he could be counted among the members of the Conference.
When I was a seminarian, I thought that bishops or others getting promoted to high places took on their roles with fear and trembling. Countless saints hesitated to take on a mission because they felt unworthy or unequipped. And in those cases, they knew that the only way they could carry out an effective ministry—whatever it was—was through a generous outpouring of God’s grace. Being appointed to high office was not a reward for long service, for particular success in fundraising, or kissing up to the right people.
A pope with true ambition would not be putting himself out there for consideration. Rather, he would be the one that the other cardinals see as being excellent in his current role. He would be someone willing to step up if offered, but someone who wants to serve in the way he can do best.
When I was thinking about ambition, the first person that came to mind was Msgr. William Fay. While I was in the seminary in D.C., Msgr. Fay was my spiritual director. At the time, he had been ordained just over 25 years and was serving as the General Secretary for the USCCB—the same post Burrill had years later. Msgr. Fay is an extremely competent administrator, a deft navigator of political systems, and well educated. He received his doctorate in philosophy, writing about phenomenology under Msgr. Robert Sokolowski. And beyond that, he was a spiritual man with a pastoral heart. He essentially had all the qualities one might look for in a bishop. And given his position at the time, he seemed primed to be tapped for the next vacant see.
But after Msgr. Fay served 11 years with the USCCB, he did not become a bishop. Msgr. Fay, rather, returned to his home in the Archdiocese of Boston and has served there faithfully since 2006. He has overseen the diaconate program, the campus ministries in the Archdiocese, and the Pontifical Missions, all while serving as a faculty member at John XXIII Seminary. In other words, Msgr. Fay did what God asked of him, and did it well. I don’t know whether Msgr. Fay ever turned down an opportunity to become a bishop, but it seems likely. But even if he did not, he is a sharp contrast to Msgr. Burrill. Far from seeing the work of the General Secretary as being a baby-bishop or a path to the episcopacy, Msgr. Fay saw it as the ministry to which he was called, which had to be done to the best of his ability. That seems like true Christian ambition.
Another lesson in true ambition came to me years later when I finished law school. My bishop at the time, Thomas Olmsted, had been my first rector in the seminary. When I finished law school, we had known each other for more than a decade, so when I returned to Phoenix as a freshly minted attorney, I thought that he would want me to serve on a diocesan council, board, or something. We met shortly after I got back into town and I asked what I could do to serve the Diocese of Phoenix. His response floored me: “Be a good husband and father. That is the best thing you can do for the Diocese of Phoenix.”
Here was a man who knew not only the value of serving well in your own particular vocation, but also knew my misplaced ambition. I fell into one of the ways that St. Thomas Aquinas said we can seek happiness in a disordered way—through wealth, pleasure, power, or honor. Bishop Olmsted reoriented me to true happiness through pursuing my vocation with dedication and love. I’ve told many men this story and seen several of them begin to cry after realizing that they have pursued other ends and perhaps fallen short of their main calling.
But what does this have to do with the conclave? For all its faults, there are a few good lines in the movie “Conclave.” One of the lines, ironically delivered by a cardinal sitting in a clandestine meeting about political maneuvering to elect the group’s chosen candidate, is about those men who would actively seek the papacy: “The men who are dangerous are the ones who do want it.” As the world waits to see whom the cardinals will elect as the next Holy Father, I have been pondering what kind of pope we need. And it strikes me that we need a “reluctant pope.” We need another Gregory the Great.
Think about it. Gregory was born in 540 in a time of great growth for the Church and great turmoil in the world. It was a time not unlike our own. He was well-educated and from an aristocratic family, which meant that he was thrust very early into secular administrative positions in Rome. There he showed great promise, eventually becoming the prefect of Rome, which was the highest administrative position in the city.
Gregory was certainly a strong administrator, and obviously knew the ways of secular politics. But Gregory also knew the value of the spiritual life (as did his mother and two aunts, all being canonized saints as well). So after inheriting vast sums and land when his father died, Gregory sold all that he had, endowed several monasteries around Italy, and entered one in Rome as a monk. There, Gregory’s leadership resulted in him being elected abbot.
The pope, Pelagius II, recognized Gregory’s skills and asked him to be the papal secretary and ordained him a deacon. Gregory was apparently quite good at that calling as well, and became known for his work. Then tragedy struck in the form of a plague, which killed Pelagius II. By popular acclaim, Gregory was asked to be the next pope and even though he initially resisted, he eventually agreed to the calling.
Gregory was always focused on the task at hand, and even though he accepted higher office, he did not seek it.
After becoming pope, Gregory once again employed all his administrative and spiritual skills. He was a skilled administrator for the Church, he brought a spiritual depth to the office based on his years in the monastery (for instance, naming and explicating the seven deadly sins), and he expanded the Church by sending out missionaries, especially to England. “Gregorian chant” bears his name because he promoted the development of liturgical chant in the Church and in the Mass. In fact, Gregory devoted a lot of work to the development of the theology of the liturgy. Gregory also clarified the Church’s teaching surrounding purgatory, which is why we have a tradition of saying Gregorian Masses for 30 consecutive days for someone who has died.
In addition to his more intellectual or administrative work, Gregory was also focused on the charitable works of the Church. He regularly gave money to the poor in Rome, sometimes selling sacred vessels to raise the funds. He is said to have subjected himself to discipline when someone died of starvation in the city of Rome because he felt personally responsible as their caretaker. Gregory’s generosity set the precedent for future charitable works of popes in the centuries to come.
In his foundational work, the Pastoral Rule, Gregory talks about true leadership and service in the Church: “But because, through the ordering of God, all the highest in rank of this present age are inclined to reverence religion, there are some who, through the outward show of rule within the holy Church, affect the glory of distinction. They desire to appear as teachers, they covet superiority to others, and, as the Truth attests, they seek the first salutations in the market-place, the first rooms at feasts, the first seats in assemblies Matthew 23:6-7, being all the less able to administer worthily the office they have undertaken of pastoral care, as they have reached the magisterial position of humility out of elation only.” (Pope St. Gregory the Great, Pastoral Rule, Book I)
Gregory saw the pope’s role correctly, as “the magisterial position of humility,” or, as he also phrased it—“the servant of the servants of God.” Gregory was a man who was a strong administrator, a lover of liturgy, an advocate for the poor, a scholar, a missionary, a contemplative, and an evangelist who came to power after the previous pope dealt with a pandemic and turmoil both inside and outside the Church.
Maybe there is not a Gregory among the current college of cardinals. Maybe there is not even a “great” among them. But it seems we should strive to find a truly great pope—someone who understands true Christian ambition. I’m praying for Pope St. Gregory the Great’s intercession for this conclave. I hope the cardinals will as well.