Rome Newsroom, May 24, 2021 / 11:00 am
Pope Francis met with Italy’s bishops Monday as the national bishops’ conference began a general assembly to “start a synodal journey.”
The pope gave unscripted remarks as he opened the Italian bishops’ spring assembly on May 24, speaking to a conference hall full of bishops for roughly five minutes before the live video feed of his speech was abruptly cut off by Vatican Media.
Before Pope Francis began speaking, he could be heard over the microphone asking those on stage if journalists were present in the room. When the response was negative, the pope replied: “Good, so we can speak freely.”
Earlier in the day, Pope Francis visited the offices of the Vatican Dicastery of Communication and spoke live on Vatican Radio about the importance of Vatican media reaching the people.
The pope said: “There are a lot of reasons to be worried about the Radio, L’Osservatore, but one that touches my heart: How many people listen to the Radio? How many people read L’Osservatore Romano?”
“Because our work is to reach the people: that what we work on here, which is beautiful, it is great, it is laborious, reaches the people, both with translations and also with short waves.”
In the broadcast portion of Pope Francis’ unscripted remarks to the Italian bishops, the pope said that Italy’s synodal journey must “begin from the bottom up” in parish communities.
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