21/04/2025
It is with great sadness that we learnt of the death of Pope Francis, a great servant of Christ and leader of the Catholic Church for twelve years. Pope Francis was a man of great personal warmth and integrity, with a strong commitment to the poor and the marginalised. As his first great Apostolic Exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium, implied, he lived the joy of the Gospel, and to encounter him was to be enfolded in the joy of love. He was a great-hearted ecumenist too, who welcomed other church leaders to Rome and built strong personal relationships with them. Perhaps the most remarkable illustration of this was his inclusion of other church leaders in St Peter’s Square, with him standing beside them as they prayed together in the great prayer vigil on the eve of the first meeting of the Synod of Bishops in 2023. His commitment to synodality, the walking together of all the baptised in the way of Christ, underpinned his ecumenical vision. We have much for which to be grateful. May he rest in peace, and rise in glory.
Statement from the Council for Christian Unity (CCU) of the Church of England.
