Pope Francis told Vatican bureaucrats on Saturday to stop speaking ill of one another, as he once again used his annual Christmas greetings to admonish the backstabbing and gossiping among his closest collaborators.
A wheezing and congested-sounding Francis, who just turned 88, urged the prelates instead to speak well of one another and undertake a humble examination of their own consciences in the Christmas holiday season.
“A church community lives in joyful and fraternal harmony to the extent that its members walk in the life of humility, renouncing evil thinking and speaking ill of others,” Francis said. “Gossip is an evil that destroys social life, sickens people’s hearts and leads to nothing. The people say it very well: Gossip is zero.”
“Beware of this,” he added.
By now, Francis’ annual Christmas address to the priests, bishops and cardinals who work in the Vatican Curia has become a lesson in humility -– and humiliation -- as Francis offers a public dressing down of some of the sins in the workplace at the headquarters of the Catholic Church.
In the most biting edition, in 2014, Francis listed the “15 ailments of the Curia,” in which he accused the prelates of using their Vatican careers to grab power and wealth. He accused them of living “hypocritical” double lives and forgetting — due to “spiritual Alzheimer’s” — that they’re supposed to be joyful men of God.
In 2022, Francis warned them that the devil lurks among them, saying it is an “elegant demon” that works in people who have a rigid, holier-than-thou way of living the Catholic faith.
This year, Francis revisited a theme he has often warned about: gossiping and speaking ill of people behind their backs. It was a reference to the sometimes toxic atmosphere in closed environments such as the Vatican or workplaces where office gossip and criticism circulate but are rarely aired in public.
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Francis has long welcomed frank and open debates and even has welcomed criticism of his own work. But he has urged critics to tell it to his face, and not behind his back.
Francis opened his address Saturday with a reminder of the devastation of the war in Gaza, where he said even his patriarch had been unable to enter due to Israeli bombing.
"Yesterday, children have been bombed. This is cruelty, this is not war," he said.
The annual appointment kicks off Francis’ busy Christmas schedule, this year made even more strenuous because of the start of the Vatican’s Holy Year on Christmas Eve. The Jubilee is expected to bring some 32 million pilgrims to Rome in 2025, and Francis has a dizzying calendar of events to minister to them.
After addressing the Vatican prelates, Francis issued a less critical address to the Vatican’s lay employees who gathered in the city state's main audience hall along with their families. Francis thanked them for their service and urged them to make sure they take time to play with their children and visit their grandparents.
“If you have any particular problems, tell your bosses, we want to resolve them,” he added at the end. “You do this with dialogue, not by keeping quiet. Together we’ll try to resolve the difficulties.”
It was an apparent reference to reports of growing unease within the Vatican workforce that has been called out by the Association of Vatican Lay Employees, the closest thing the Vatican has to a labor union. The association has in recent months voiced alarm about the health of the Vatican pension system and fears of even more cost-cutting, and demanded the Vatican leadership listen to workers’ concerns.
Earlier this year 49 employees of the Vatican Museums — the Holy See's main source of revenue — filed a class-action lawsuit in the Vatican tribunal complaining about labor woes, overtime and working conditions.
Unlike Italy, which has robust labor laws protecting workers' rights, Vatican employees often find they have fewer legal recourses available to them when problems arise. Employment in the Vatican however is often sought-after by Italian Catholics: Aside from the sense of service to the church, Vatican employment offers tax-free benefits and access to below-market housing.
