In his remarkable, much-discussed interview published last month in America, Pope Francis described himself with the phrase, “I am a sinner.” Patrick L. Gilger unpacks the quote:
[F]or those deeply immersed in the spirituality of Ignatius, being a “sinner” does not mean “having done things wrong” (although that is true). It doesn’t even mean that we will always do things wrong in the future (also true). It means that humans are – at root, ontologically – always in need of the living mercy of God. Michael Ives, author of Understanding the Spiritual Exercises, puts it this way: “sin is always considered in the Exercises in the light of mercy … The essential grace [ ] is that of a conversion arising out of the literally heart-breaking experience of being loved and forgiven.”
The literally heart-breaking experience. This is the reason Pope Francis calls himself a sinner. It is the reason he speaks so relentlessly about mercy. It is because he knows what all women and men who live deeply an Ignatian life know, that God’s mercy reframes our interpretation of everything, institutions included. It does so because, having understood the joy of being wrong, we have learned to hold our own plans loosely so as to be better lead by God. This is what St. Ignatius means by another of his famous spiritual terms, “indifference,” he means the ability to be lead by God into the previously unimaginable. The ability to do a new thing. The ability to let mercy be more fundamental than any plans or theo-political categories.
The Dish 