Vatican City, Feb 6, 2025 /
12:00 pm
Pope Francis on Thursday encouraged midwives and OB-GYNs to carry out their mission not only with professional skill but also with “a great sense of humanity.”
The pope’s words were conveyed in a written speech handed out during an audience with an association of midwives and OB-GYNs from the southern Italian region of Calabria on Feb. 6.
With Francis suffering from bronchitis, the pontiff’s meetings on Thursday were held in halls at his Santa Marta residence rather than at the Apostolic Palace.
The Vatican Press Office said Feb. 6 Francis would continue to hold his meetings at the Casa Santa Marta on Feb. 7 and 8 due to the illness.
“At a crucial moment of existence such as the birth of a son or daughter, one may feel vulnerable, fragile, and therefore most in need of closeness, tenderness, and warmth,” the pope said to the group of midwives and OB-GYNs.
“It does so much good, in such circumstances, to have sensitive and delicate people beside you. I therefore recommend you to cultivate, in addition to professional skill, a great sense of humanity, which confirms ‘in the parents’ souls the desire and joy for the new life, blossomed from their love’ (St. John Paul II, Address to Midwives, Jan. 26, 1980) and contributes to ‘assuring the child a healthy and happy birth.’”
The pope noted the loss of enthusiasm for parenthood in Italy and in other countries, where motherhood and fatherhood are no longer seen as “the opening of a new horizon of creativity and happiness.”
He also urged Christian midwives and doctors to use the “hidden but effective medicine” of prayer in their practices.
Whether it is appropriate to pray directly with patients or to offer a silent prayer in one’s own heart, prayer can “help strengthen that ‘admirable collaboration of parents, nature, and God, from which a new human being in the image and likeness of the Creator comes into being,’” he said, quoting Venerable Pius XII in a 1951 address to the Italian Catholic Union of Midwives.
“I encourage you to feel toward the mothers, fathers, and children whom God puts in your path the responsibility to pray for them as well, especially in holy Mass, Eucharistic adoration, and simple, daily prayer,” Pope Francis said.
Hannah Brockhaus is Catholic News Agency’s senior Vatican correspondent. After growing up in Omaha, Nebraska, she earned a degree in English from Truman State University in Missouri. In 2016, she moved to Rome, Italy, where in her spare time she enjoys reading and going on adventures with her husband and son.
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