“The priest is not reduced to his function”

What place does friendship have in your life?

For the party organized when I retired – at 75 – I met 400 people. Friendship has animated my life as a priest and justified my choices. According to the text of the Second Vatican Council on divine revelation, “the invisible God addresses men in his superabundant love as to friends” ( Dei Verbum, § 2). This is why, for me, the pastoral relationship consists first of all in entering into friendship with others. This is what I taught in seminary.

Concretely?

To the seminarians, I said: “Without friendship, you will be bored.” This is what allows us to remake the world together, to laugh, to live. This goes for everyone. To couples, I have often said: “Love has made you lovers, marriage has made you spouses, has made or will make you parents, but do not forget to remain friends. Because the greatest love, without friendship, sinks into boredom. This central place of friendship, by the way, is valid from a political point of view. The Church, as fraternal communion, contributes to keeping democracy alive today, threatened by withdrawals identity.

How does pastoral responsibility color the relationship between priests and laity?

The Church is a friendship which bears witness to a God who is a friend of men, structured by the ministry of priests. The challenge is to hold these two dimensions together, remembering that the priest is not reduced to what he is through his ordination, nor to what he does in the name of his ministry. His priestly being and his pastoral activity are carried by the vulnerable man that he is, by the believer that he becomes as he advances in the interior adventure in which he is engaged and in which he leads his brothers. On the other hand, his authority has nothing to do with a power of domination. On the contrary, it consists of authorizing, allowing people to exist, to unfold, to find their place.

Often, younger priests assert their priestly identity…

The demographic crisis of the clergy has enabled communities to take charge of themselves. This rebalancing has led to an identity malaise among certain young priests who seek to make their power felt and act as directors of conscience. I have often warned future priests in a hurry to be given “my Father” and to play spiritual fathers, telling them to start by being brothers, in solidarity with others and ready to learn from them!

What would you say to lay people so that they can build a fraternal relationship with their priests?

I would obviously tell them to listen and be kind, but also not to idolize them. Not to give in to clericalism. To become adults in their relationship with authority. This also applies to the relationship of priests to their bishop.

* Latest title published: Because nothing is ever finished, Ed. Albin Michel, 180 p. ; €17.90.