THE power that comes with being a leader is not meant to be used
for one’s own interests but to serve and reach out to others, a Vatican
official said.
Reflecting
on the gospel reading on today’s feast of Christ the King, Msgr. Paul Tighe,
secretary of the Pontifical Council for Social Communication, said Jesus’ idea
of kingship is “all about service, of reaching out to others, not about looking
after one’s own interests.”
Tighe
presided on November 24 the closing Mass of the Catholic Social Media Summit at
the Colegio de San Juan de Letran, which also coincided with the feast of the
Christ the King and the closing of the Year of Faith.
He
said that by his example, Jesus has given a representation of the power that
comes with authority and how it should be lived, different from the way the
world perceives it.
Tighe
noted the way of Jesus is of “giving yourself, of not controlling, not
dominating, not having power but of giving yourself and spending yourself in
the service of others.”
“So
Jesus was recovering a different form of leadership, a different way of
thinking, a different way of being powerful,” he said.
The
resignation of Pope Benedict from the papacy is one example of using the power
of the office at the service of the Church, Tighe noted.
Pope
Benedict “relinquished the power, because he was not sure he had the strength,
the physical ability any longer to do what was required. He saw that the
service of being pope was not about himself but about building up the church,” Tighe
said. “He did it because he saw his
power and his office as being all about service.”
Pope
Francis has also defined his own way of being a leader, a way of having power
through his simplicity, of reaching out to the sick and going to those who have
been cast aside, Tighe noted.
The
examples that Benedict XVI and Pope Francis have shown may tempt us to point
fingers to our political leaders and say they also should be different.
Instead
the question we should ask, according to Tighe, is what does having this power
mean for each of us.
“Usually
we are not inclined to think of ourselves as powerful. We are not inclined to
think ourselves as wealthy, as having huge authority, but we have to remember
we are exceptionally privileged, we are a people who have a gift of faith, and
by and large, we are a people with life with certain benefits, certainly there
are people who are poorer who are in greater need than we are,” he said.
He
said the real test of who we are as persons would depend on how we use the
little power that we have in us when we interact with people.
“Are we attentive to the people who are
begging in our streets? It’s not that we can have money always for them, but to
always see in them their dignity and their worth. How do I treat the less
fortunate?”
He
said our attitude and the way we treat people becomes the hallmark of the kind
of person that we are.
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