The recently concluded six-day visit to the United States of America by Pope Francis had several inspiring moments. In any case, this particular Pope has an incredible capacity to inspire, not the least owing to the ease and sincerity with which he is able to relate with people, especially those who are not numbered among the rich and powerful. The journalist, Amy Sullivan, in a Yahoo! write-up testifies of him: “… at lunch with those living on the streets of Washington, D.C., or joking with the children of immigrants in Harlem, his whole body lit up, animated and engaged.” Since Mother Theresa, it is not certain that there has been a world leader who genuinely felt so much at home with the common folk.
And so it was when Pope Francis visited the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility on the outskirts of Philadelphia where he met with about 75 inmates and their families. He was said to have moved slowly among them around the room, “stopping to clasp hands and look into each face, murmuring a blessing to those who requested one and wrapping his arms around those who rose for an embrace.” (Amy Sullivan) With this his immense capacity to make out time to demonstrate his love to the marginalised and hopeless, Pope Francis exhibits a profound understanding of the teachings of Jesus Christ. For Jesus Himself was accused by the leaders of His day of fraternising with “sinners”, with the poor and demon-possessed – whereupon He responded that it was precisely for such people that He came. It is the sick who need a physician; those who were well (in their own eyes) had no need of one.
Pope Francis served the world leaders gathered for the 70th United Nations General Assembly a steaming plateful of questions touching on morality, conscience, human compassion and social responsibility. They are issues we should never have relegated to the background in the first place, for it should have been clear to us that we are all bound together by our common humanity. In particular, leaders who hold so much power in trust for all of their citizens must always give these issues the topmost priority. It was surprising to learn that President Barack Obama was the very first sitting president of the United States of America to ever visit a federal prison, which he did just in the summer of this year – that is, towards the end of his second term. It does seem that in general, people condemned of criminal offences are locked up in prison and then forgotten there.
At the end of that prison visit, President Obama was said to have uttered a moving statement: “There, but for the grace of God.” As an African American having grown up in a society where racial tensions were still rife, he certainly knew that the probability of his ending up behind bars were pretty high; only God’s grace kept him out. He could have been one of them. Pope Francis, however, took his identification with the prisoners a notch higher; he is reported to have told the inmates at that correctional facility: “I am one of you.” This is a demonstration of Christian leadership and it does so far more eloquently than a hundred sermons.
Christian leaders need, very urgently, to address their growing distancing of themselves or estrangement from their followership. While it is true that the followers, especially in our culture, believe it is their duty to hold their leaders in the highest esteem and to lavish honour upon them in countless ways, it is actually the responsibility of the leaders to resist being made into “gods”, letting the people know that they are mere mortals, and to treat them as such. The story is told of a General Overseer of a big denomination who has a couple of private jets. When questioned by some visiting reporters about them, his answer was that it was the church members who insisted on their purchase; it was seen as a befitting thing for their revered pastor and also a clear testimony to God’s wonderful provision. Wise, indeed, is that Christian leader who keeps his Master’s teaching on leadership in constant view and reminds himself that the greatest in the Kingdom is the one who humbles himself, gets down on his knees and washes the dirty feet of his followers.
The lesson is actually for all leaders, as a matter of fact. If a leader is not touched and does not constantly bear in mind the needs of all the members of his or her constituency, what then is the whole point of having been elected into that position? If the plights of the disabled, the hungry, and all other groups of people living on the fringes of society do not touch the hearts of leaders and sometimes keep them from sleeping at night, then the governance of nations might as well be handed over to zombies! Pope Francis challenged the world’s leaders: “Any society, any family, which cannot share or take seriously the pain of its children, and views that pain as something normal or to be expected, is a society condemned to remain a hostage to itself, prey to the very things which cause that pain.”
One wonders, did those leaders really take that in? Are we going to begin to see evidence that such was indeed the case? Are the leaders of Nigeria listening?