Pope tells new priests to escape from illusion and money

During a mass celebrated today in St. Peter’s Basilica, the pope asked the new priests to separate themselves from “vanity, pride, and money” because “the devil enters through the pockets.”

“Please separate yourself from delusion, from the pride of money: the devil enters ‘through the pockets’, think about it,” the pope told the new deacons, urging him to be “poor who love the poor.” Think of the priesthood as a “church life.”

“It’s not a race, it’s a service,” he warned.

Thus, “you will become an officer”, “when the priest becomes a businessman, whether it comes from the church or from school, he loses that closeness to the people” when the businessman, the businessman priest, the “priests” are not servants. “

At the end of the ceremony, which was celebrated from the main altar of St. Peter, the Pope kissed on the chair under Baltachin and the palms of the nine deacons, which had not been used since the beginning of the epidemic.

Then, in a close gesture, he approached many relatives and friends of the new priests who were occupying the first benches of the basilica.

There, without a mask, Francisco shook hands with them, talked casually with many of them, and even stroked the hair of some children and the elderly.

Of the nine priests appointed by the pope as bishop of the capital diocese, Samuel Piermerini, a young Italian, has jumped into the media in recent days for his particular story: he was invited as a professional footballer, but he decided not to sign the club that gave him that opportunity, and the next year he entered the seminary.

Among the new appointees is former Italian film director Ricardo Sentano, who has also changed his life at the age of 40; Colombia Diego Armando Barrera Barra, 27, and Brazilian Matthias Enrique Atte de Cruz, 29.