A marriage with no fights must be boring. Even if plates fly, the secret is to make up before the end of the day
Taoiseach introduced the Pope to some of the gathered dignitaries – and the unexpected happened. A woman stepped forward holding her infant child and a relieved looking Pope Francis beamed with a smile at the spontaneous gesture. Then that grey-haired man reached out for the Pope’s ringed right hand. The two, separated not only by advancing years from many of those present in St Patrick’s Hall, but also no doubt by their devout faith, acknowledged each other with a smile. It took a while, but the ice was broken between the prince of a Church and the gay leader of a country in which two-thirds of the population voted for marriage equality, many of them Catholics fully able to square that vote with their own vision of their faith.
Those who still think of ‘family’ primarily as the union of one man and one woman, and the children they might be blessed with, had their moment when the Pope proceeded to the Pro Cathedral. Looking at the congregation of young couples, he questioned those who claim people no longer want to get married.
‘Getting married and sharing your lives is a beautiful thing, he told them.’
Unexpectedly, he also did a bit of a Les Dawson, joking ‘even the mothers-in-law, even they are wise’, then offered some Frankie Byrne-style advice to couples who find themselves arguing.
‘A marriage with no fights must be boring,’ he said. ‘If even plates fly and crockery flies, the secret is to make up by the end of the day.’
In conclusion, he said the world needed ‘a revolution of love – let that revolution begin with you and your families’.
Speaking after the service, a
Belfast couple who married three weeks ago said they asked him to pray for continued peace and stability in the North.
‘We were keen to thank him for coming to Ireland and let him know he was very welcome,’ Caroline said, adding they invited him to visit in the future. ‘He nodded and agreed that he would continue to pray for peace in the North, and nodded again when we said we would love to have him come to Northern Ireland.
‘He asked that we pray for him. He was very humble. His speech was aweinspiring and he was very calm and modest, we absorbed every word he said.’
Her new husband said it was a great privilege to welcome Pope Francis to the cathedral. ‘We were also given the great honour of having a conversation with him and he was able to bless the two of us and give us a gift,’ said Ryan. ‘I think his speech was very personal. He told two anecdotes from his past, one about how, when he was a five-year-old, he walked in on his parents embracing.
‘You can tell, in terms of the theme of the week, that family is very important to him. It was a lovely story and he really highlighted how parents can instil in their children the importance of faith.’
Peadar and Ciara Kelly, from Roscommon and Tralee respectively, got married two months ago. Ciara shared the advice he passed on. ‘He said not to go to bed on an argument.’
Peadar thought the Pope was ‘very down to earth. He spoke about faith, and keeping our faith, and kept stressing that it all starts in the home. He also said that if we have kids, to make sure we bring faith and courage into their lives.’
The general public had their first chance to see Pope Francis when he took to the Popemobile for a tour of the capital’s streets, along O’Connell Street, Westmoreland St, College Green, Dame St, past Christ Church and on to the Capuchin Day Centre in Smithfield. It was a speedy affair, with highly visible security. Rubbish bins along the route were sealed, and signs warned that bicycles chained to railings would be removed. The barriers had been placed to allow for crowds several deep, but that proved unnecessary. Large groups congregated at corners, but for most of the route the numbers were maybe thinner than expected, with lots of tourists present. Indeed, the overall mood was one of watching a spectacle, an attraction, rather than out of devotion, which was a surprise. Certainly, you might have expected to see more elderly people, for whom the long walks to today’s Mass in Phoenix Park would prove impossible.
Not everyone on the route was there to celebrate. One group stood in front of dozens of pairs of baby shoes laid on the path outside Dublin Castle, holding a banner that read: ‘#protestthepope’, another illustration of the mixed feelings the visit has occasioned.
In the Capuchin Day Centre, run by Brother Kevin and which feeds hundreds of homeless people daily and provides food parcels to struggling families, the Pope seemed very much at ease. He
clearly has empathy with the less well-off – and, indeed, sometimes seems like he is constrained by his office from saying all he truly wants to say – and there was genuine warmth on show there.
Later, he met with eight survivors of abuse and mistreatment in a 90-minute private encounter at the Papal Nuncio’s residence in Dublin.
The first day of his visit, after a schedule anyone would find gruelling, never mind an octogenarian, ended with a concert at Croke Park, the final event of the World Meeting of Families. There, he was entertained by the ubiquitous Riverdance, and by Daniel O’Donnell, Nathan Carter and Clannad’s Moya Brennan. Andrea Bocelli closed procedings with a rendition of Nessun Dorma, though at almost 10pm, many thousands were surely actually asleep preparing for this morning’s early start.
Today, the second and final day of his visit, the Pope flies to Ireland West Airport, famously the brainchild of the indefatigable Monsignor James Horan, and makes the short trip to the Marian shrine at Knock, where he will visit the Apparition Chapel, and tour an expected audience of 45,000 on the Popemobile.
He then flies back to Dublin to celebrate Mass in Phoenix Park at 3pm, for which 500,000 tickets were issued. He will then fly home to Rome and the Vatican. In this, there is a genuine echo of 1979. As Pope John Paul II did then, Pope Francis will abandon Alitalia – and fly with our national airline Aer Lingus.