“Thank you Monsignor Claudio, because your testimony of love for Jesus and the Church, of love for the Amazon, is bearing fruit and you, from heaven, will intercede for the first Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon of which you were the first president”
“Monsignor Claudio managed to make the native peoples and traditional communities of the Amazon feel reflected as part of the Church and in the defense of life in the Amazon”
A man of hope, a simple man, a good Franciscan. This is how Cardinal Pedro Barreto, president of the Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon (CEAMA) and the Pan-Amazonian Ecclesial Network (REPAM) recalled Monsignor Claudio Hummes, the archbishop emeritus of São Paulo who died on July 4 at the age of 87.
“I am sure that Monsignor Claudio is already in the presence of God, that eternal and definitive presence to which we all aspire.”The Archbishop of Huancayo, in Peru, highlighted his figure as the man who knew how to accompany the Church and Pope Francis.
embodied spirituality
Testimony of a profound spirituality and great simplicity, that beautiful anecdote remains in the memory of Cardinal Pedro Barreto in which Monsignor Claudio approached Pope Francis in the first moments after his election as Bishop of Rome and Vicar of Christ, to embrace him and to tell him not to forget the poor, an instant that motivated in the heart and mind of the Pontiff the choice of the name that would accompany him when he began this new mission. “MgrClaudius He was very close to him and very close to each and every one of the members of the great family of the Amazon”, affirms the prelate.
Cardinal Barreto indicates that one of Monsignor Claudio’s greatest values is that as an emeritus he dedicated himself to the Amazon. Even from the early years of this stage of his spiritual life, he actively participated in all the pastoral activities related to this biome, a center of wealth as well as of marginalization. His experience allows him to assure that God had already placed him as the Francis of Assisi, the Francis of Rome, the Francis of the Amazon that he incarnated.
friendship and gratitude
Upon hearing the news of his disappearance, Cardinal Pedro Barreto can only thank God for the opportunity to have shared with him these last seven and a half years of his life. A time full of experiences of the heart and of which he remembers, in particular, the two visits they made together to the city of Sao Paulo, one in December 2021, the other in March of this year. The purpose was to attend the first Ordinary Assembly of the Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon, the Ceama, there he announced his resignation for health reasons.
On that occasion, Cardinal Barreto expressed his gratitude to him as a brother and colleague, because his work was evident in the consolidation of organizations such as the Pan-Amazonian Ecclesial Network (REPAM) and the Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon (CEAMA), achieving “That the native peoples and traditional communities of the Amazon feel reflected as part of the Church and in the defense of life in the Amazon.”
The legacy
For Cardinal Barreto, the strength of the Holy Spirit must continue to animate this path, “having a strategy of incarnation in the Amazonian territory in the complementarity between CEAMA and REPAM in this task”.
Teachings that Monsignor Claudio Hummes left behind in his sharing with the communities, the community organizations, the Amazonian peoples, always working for the dream of an incarnated Church with an Amazonian face. Given the road traveled and the infinity of memories, Cardinal Barreto can only express his gratitude.
“Thank you Monsignor Claudio, because your testimony of love for Jesus and the Church, of love for the Amazon, is bearing fruit and you, from heaven, will intercede for the first Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon of which you were the first president… opening the way for the Church in this synodal process that we live.Thus, Cardinal Barreto trusts that God will bless, accompany and strengthen his servant, whom he asks to enjoy the loving presence of God to bless us all in the Church together with Pope Francis.
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‘The Francis of the Amazon’: Cardinal Hummes in memory of Cardinal Barreto