Ambrogetti: “There is an unjustified lack of appreciation of the Argentine Pope”

The former president of the Association of Foreign Correspondents in Argentina, Francesca Ambrogettiexplained why the Dad Francisco never returned to the country. “He has such a vocation that what he wants and desires should be in the background,” he argued in Fontevecchia modeby net tv and RadioProfile (FM 101.9).

On this tenth anniversary of the election of Pope Francis, will the second decade of his papacy be the moment of his reconciliation with the Argentines?

I don’t know, but I hope so. There is an unjustified lack of appreciation of the Pope by Argentines which is painful. It all stems from a deep misunderstanding.

What symptom is there? Is there something that transcends Bergoglio and that has to do with the crack?

The Argentines who do not understand Francisco is because we don’t know to Bergoglio. If they knew him, they would probably understand the delay in getting to Argentina.

In relation to that I want to tell you something: he was very attached to his family here and they all stayed in the country. And in Italy he has another part of his family, his father’s. They live very close to Rome, almost nothing. However, it took more than 9 years to go see them. Even Pope John Paul II took months to go to Poland to visit his family.

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But this has to do with his personality, he never spent the Holidays with his family and it was surely what he wanted the most. Francis has such a vocation that what he wants should be in the background.

Another thing: he never took anyone from Argentina, having the possibility of being able to surround himself with people from his own country.

But how would that personality be explained? Is he somewhat stoic, perhaps?

For Bergoglio, the other is before himself. At the time when he was rector at the Colegio Máximo de San Miguel he lived in a room without windows with only a small wooden panel that separated him from the rest. When I saw it I couldn’t believe it.

Something he told us was that when he became archbishop he never wanted to move to a better room. And this has to do with his Piedmontese essence, one inherits things from the place where he was born.

Neurologists relate it to phylogenetics. How would you specifically link it to Piedmont?

You should really study it. I will tell you an anecdote: I have a colleague who lives in a paradisiacal place called Castel Gandolfo, located in the Lazio region. He told me that he never went to visit him, despite the fact that the Pontiff has all the facilities to use.

Piedmontese are absolutely austere people. Even a well-known philosopher, norberto bobbio, said that the Piedmontese flag should have a motto that says “Let’s not exaggerate”, since they are precisely against that. They place a lot of value on the concept of not believing it.

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In fact in the first book, when we asked him, he replied that the worst of sins would be to believe it.

What is the relationship of the Italians with, as they call him, Pope Bergoglio?

The majority of the Italian people love him deeply. Perhaps the most conservative sectors of the church do not agree on everything.

Almost all the comments I receive are from a love of a town towards its parish priest. Someone once told me that when he speaks from the balcony he felt that he was speaking directly to each one of them.

AO JL