“We can also testify our joy to share the everyday of our neighbors, the everyday life of those who so often suffer a great material poverty, but also spiritual poverty and also a relational poverty,” said Thibault.
When Pope Francis arrived at the basilica, he spent a moment of silent prayer in the Portiuncula and placed flowers on the altar.
“Here at the Portiuncula, St. Francis welcomed St. Clare, the first brothers, and many poor people who came to him. He received them simply as brothers and sisters, sharing everything with them,” the pope said.
“This is the most evangelical expression we are called to make our own: hospitality. Hospitality means to open the door, the door of our house and the door of our heart, and to allow the person who knocks to come in.”
The pope pointed to the great example of St. Teresa of Calcutta of humble concern for the poor.
“Mother Teresa, who made hospitable service her life, used to love to say: ‘What is the best welcome? A smile.’ A smile, to share a smile with someone in need does good to both people — to me and the other person. A smile as an expression of sympathy, of tenderness,” he said.
In his speech, Pope Francis highlighted the presence of the French Cardinal Philippe Barbarin at the encounter with the poor.
Barbarin resigned as the archbishop of Lyon in 2020 after he was acquitted of a conviction of failing to report the sexual abuse of a minor by a diocesan priest.
The cardinal was present because of his association with a charitable group, Fratello, which helped to organize the event.
The pope said: “I would like to thank … His Eminence Cardinal [Barbarin] for his presence: he is among the poor, he too has undergone the experience of poverty, abandonment, distrust with dignity. And he defended himself with silence and prayer. Thank you, Cardinal Barbarin, for your witness that builds up the Church.”
This was Pope Francis’ fifth trip to Assisi. His encounter with the poor took place as part of the Catholic Church’s celebration of the fifth annual World Day of the Poor, which falls this year on Sunday, Nov. 14.
On arriving in Assisi, the pope went to the Convent of St. Clare to greet the Poor Clare sisters, who gathered to pray with them.
At the end of his encounter with the poor in Assisi, he stopped to have lunch with a community of Poor Clares in Spello, a nearby Umbrian hilltown, before returning to the Vatican by helicopter.
“May this meeting open the hearts of all of us to make ourselves available to each other; to open our hearts to make our weakness a strength that helps to continue the journey of life, to transform our poverty into a wealth to be shared, and thus improve the world,” the pope said in Assisi.
“Thank you to the poor who open their hearts to give us their wealth and heal our wounded hearts … Thank you all. I carry you in my heart. And, please don’t forget to pray for me, because I have my own poverty, and lots of it.”
Courtney Mares is a Rome Correspondent for Catholic News Agency. A graduate of Harvard University, she has reported from news bureaus on three continents and was awarded the Gardner Fellowship for her work with North Korean refugees.
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