The Pope's ties with Catalonia: from his relationship with Omella to the years of the Trial

BarcelonaIn 1982, John Paul II became the first Pope to set foot in Catalonia. The pontiff went to Montserrat, visited the Sagrada Família, and gathered over 100,000 people at the Camp Nou stadium. However, that historic moment was marred by a heavy downpour, and then-Prime Minister Jordi Pujol would later claim that the visit had not gone well. In 2010, Benedict XVI also visited Barcelona and consecrated Antoni Gaudí's church, although the city greeted him with protests against his ultraconservative views. Unlike his predecessors, Pope Francis died without having set foot in the Principality, or even in Spain. However, according to those who knew him, his personal relationships and interest in certain social and political issues demonstrated his connection to Catalonia.

"He loved Catalonia very much," Dominican nun Sister Lucía Caram, who maintained a friendship and regular contact with the Pope, told ARA. "He was very informed about the Catalan reality and had a strong connection with Catalonia," agrees Peio Sánchez, parish priest of the Santa Anna church in Barcelona. The fact that the Holy Father was a Jesuit connected him to the Society of Jesus in Catalonia, and especially his relationship with Joan Josep Omella, Archbishop of Barcelona, ​​​​according to various sources. "One day he told me that Omella didn't always tell him what he wanted to hear, but rather what he thought, and that he was one of the most loyal people he had," explains Caram. Not in vain, two years ago, the Pope included him in the so-called Council of Cardinals, the group of nine advisors who helped him govern the Vatican. "That had never happened before," Sánchez emphasizes.

Omella has not been the only well-positioned representative of the Catalan Church during Jorge Mario Bergoglio's papacy. Another prominent name is that of the Tortosa priest Jordi Bertomeu, to whom the Pope entrusted several special missions since 2018 and who has even earned the nickname 007 of the Vatican. A member of the ministry of the Holy See that safeguards Catholic doctrine, has investigated cases of pedophilia in the Church in several countries and was one of those in charge of investigating the practices of the ultra-Catholic group Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana, dissolved by the Pope shortly before his death because it acted like an "abusive cult."

The pontiff took steps to combat abuse in the Church, but his obsession was to open it up to the poorest. And this approach served as inspiration for the creation in 2017 of the Santa Anna field hospital, where thousands of homeless people are cared for each year. The Pope quickly showed interest, and contact over the years was constant: "He told us he could make gestures and raise reflections, but he needed someone to do the work. We were his hands and feet," explains the parish priest of the Raval parish. Bergoglio also He received the Barcelona street vendors' union in Rome, to whom he expressed his support., and held several Meetings with the founder of the Badalona-based NGO Open Arms, Òscar Camps, who regrets having lost an "ally" in addressing the migration drama.

Aware of the Catalan social situation, the pontiff was also aware of its political reality. During the years of the Trial, he was "very aware of what was happening," Caram confirms, and emphasizes his commitment to "dialogue" to resolve the conflict. Omella, her husband, did it in CataloniaAnd although at no point did he publicly position himself in favor of independence, he never opposed it outright either. A sought-after position of neutrality that the Spanish right-wing media was unable to break. When asked about the Process in a 2021 interview on Cope, in fact, he even urged Spain to "reconcile" with "its own history" before thinking about "national unity."

With the repression following the 1-O referendum and the imprisonment of the government, the Pope did engage in "indirect dialogue" regarding political prisoners, as suggested a few days ago by former minister and now Speaker of the Parliament, Josep Rull. "We sent messages and we always felt very welcomed. One day we will explain it," he said on Catalunya Ràdio. Words that connect with those, as Antoni Bassas collected it in the pages of ARAThe pontiff reportedly said at one point regarding the pardons: "For my part, I'll do something." According to the journalist, it was shortly before the Catalan and Spanish bishops endorsed the pardon.

"If the machine works for me, I'd like to come."

The commitment to negotiation was repeated in theInterview that the Holy Father held in November 2023 with Pere Aragonès –the first president to meet with a pope at the Vatican since 1981– and in the one four months later with the then leader of the opposition, now President Salvador IllaThe interview with the Republican, according to sources close to the former Prime Minister, ended with the Pope's remark, "Keep it up." The same sources assert that Aragonès left the meeting with the feeling that Francis felt "affection" for Catalonia. This impression had also been felt three years earlier by representatives of Manresa City Council, who met with the Pope to invite him to the city to commemorate the 500th anniversary of Ignatius of Loyola's stay there. "If the machine works for me, I would like to come," the Pope replied, as Mayor Marc Aloy explained to this newspaper.

The visit would not materialize then, nor because of the celebration of the Millennium of the Abbey of Montserrat, to which the Pope was also invited. "He was very clear that he should measure his strength and go to places where his presence would contribute something, to the periphery or to areas in conflict," Caram argues. However, two details at the end of his life exemplify his connection with Catalonia once again. Last October, during a visit from the Brotherhood of the Virgin of Montserrat in Rome, expressed surprise that the Virgin's blessing text was in Spanish. "Shouldn't it be in Catalan?" he asked. "No," Omella replied, in a controversial response. And while he didn't set foot in the Sagrada Família like his predecessors, on April 14th approved the first step to sanctify Antoni GaudíA final gesture just seven days after his death.