REPORT: Pope Francis urges protection of creation, weak

Pope Francis on Tuesday issued a strong appeal for the protection of the environment and the defense of the weakest members of society, urging the world to shun, "the omens of destruction and death".
   
"It means respecting each of God's creatures and respecting the environment in which we live. It means protecting people, showing loving concern for each and every person, especially children, the elderly, those in need, who are often the last we think about," he said in the homily of his inaugural Mass.
   
Francis, the former Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio of Argentina, took his name in honor of St. Francis of Assisi, a symbol of poverty, charity and love of nature.

Pope Francis has officially begun his ministry as the 266th pope, receiving the ring symbolizing the papacy and a wool stole symbolizing his role as shepherd of his 1.2-billion strong flock.
    
A cardinal intoned the rite of inauguration at the start of Tuesday's Mass, saying "The Good Shepherd charged Peter to feed his lambs and his sheep; today you succeed him as the bishop of this church."
     
Later a half-dozen cardinals approached the Argentine-born pope to vow their obedience.
   
The installation occurred in sun-drenched St. Peter's Square before tens of thousands of people, princes, sheiks, rabbis and presidents.

Pope Francis thrilled tens of thousands of people on Tuesday gathered for his installation Mass, taking a long round-about through St. Peter's Square and getting out of his jeep to bless a disabled man  a gesture from a man whose papacy is becoming defined by concern for the disadvantaged.
    
The blue and white flags from Francis' native Argentina fluttered above the crowd that included princes, sheiks, rabbis and presidents. Civil protection crews closed the main streets leading to the square to traffic and set up barricades for nearly a mile (two kilometers) along the route to try to control the masses and allow official delegations through.
     
Italian media estimated some 1 million might attend, but the numbers at the start of the Mass appeared to be fewer.
     
For nearly a half-hour, Francis toured the square in an open-air jeep, waving, shouting "Ciao!" to well-wishers and occasionally kissing babies handed up to him as if he had been doing this for years. At one point, as he neared a group of people in wheelchairs, he signaled for the jeep to stop, hopped off, and went to bless a man held up to the barricade by an aide.
    
The installation Mass is a simpler affair than the 2005 ceremony that launched Pope Benedict XVI's papacy, in keeping with Francis' sober style, but it is still grand enough to draw 132 official delegations and religious leaders from around the world.
     
Among the VIPs is the spiritual leader of the world's Orthodox Christians, Bartholomew I, who will become the first patriarch from the Istanbul-based church to attend a papal investiture since the two branches of Christianity split nearly 1,000 years ago. His presence underscores the broad hopes for ecumenical and interfaith dialogue in this new papacy.
     
In a gesture to Christians in the East, the pope prayed with Eastern rite Catholic patriarchs and archbishops before the tomb of St. Peter at the start of the Mass.
 

AP/REUTERS


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