Cardinal Fernández: Poetry key to understanding Pope Francis
Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, speaks at the presentation of a book collecting Pope Francis’ reflections on poetry and literature in Rome March 21, 2025. (CNS photo/Pablo Esparza)
By Justin McLellan, CNS – Pope Francis’ love for poetry is not just a personal interest but a key to understanding his vision of faith and humanity, said speakers at the presentation of a new book collecting the pope’s reflections on poetry and literature.
“We cannot adequately appreciate Pope Francis’ immense contribution without including this aspect of the symbolic, poetic, evocative and even gestural language that he knows how to use,” said Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, during the presentation March 21.
“One does not come to understand Pope Francis by analysing his texts,” the Argentine cardinal said.
As an example, the cardinal referenced the pope’s encyclical “‘Dilexit nos’ (‘He loved us’): on the Human and Divine Love of the Heart of Jesus Christ,” in which the pope recalled sealing pies with a fork alongside his grandmother, a moment he described as a tender apprenticeship in both love and responsibility.
“No algorithm will ever be able to capture” the nostalgia one feels for such a childhood memory, Pope Francis wrote, reflecting on how such seemingly ordinary details embody the beauty of human dignity and care. “In this age of artificial intelligence, we cannot forget that poetry and love are necessary to save our humanity,” the pope added.
Such expressions, Cardinal Fernández said, go beyond doctrinal explanation. “There are certain truths that can only be communicated poetically, never without poetry.”
The book, “Viva la poesia” (“Long Live Poetry”), released in Italian March 21, combs through documents from the 12 years of Pope Francis’ pontificate to highlight his reflections on poetry, literature and the human imagination. Edited by Jesuit Father Antonio Spadaro, undersecretary of the Dicastery for Culture and Education, the volume includes excerpts from major papal texts, letters and speeches, as well as a handwritten note from the pope.
“We must recover the taste for literature in our lives but also in formation, otherwise we are like a dried fruit,” Pope Francis wrote in the letter included in the book and dated Jan. 25. “Poetry helps all of us to be human beings, and we are in such great need of that today.”
Father Spadaro said that the pope’s teaching is shaped by a poetic way of engaging with reality. “There is a poetic logic that moulds his magisterium,” he said, noting that the pope’s references to poetry are “primary, not secondary” to his teaching. He added, “For him, poetry is the first way of engaging with reality, especially in times of crisis.”
Pope Francis often begins not with abstract ideas but with artistic and poetic references, Father Spadaro said. In Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation “Querida Amazonia” (“Dear Amazonia”), for example, he begins each of its four chapters with poetry, drawing from both popular and local poets, some of whom are little known and unpublished outside of the internet. The pope cited more than a dozen poets throughout the document.
Maria Grazia Calandrone, an award-winning Italian poet who also spoke at the presentation, highlighted the pope’s emphasis on poetry’s grounding in the real and the material, particularly its role in shaping imagination, community and social engagement. “The basis of everything, whether it concerns faith or poetry, is the body, matter, reality, people,” she said.
Calandrone also praised the pope’s call for the creation of university “chairs of poetry” and his concept of “social poets” — individuals whose lives and actions reflect a poetic commitment to justice and dignity. “There is no difference between poetry and social activism,” she said. Both are about resisting “the danger of resignation” and building “the courage to hope.”
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