Pope Francis Pleads with Catholics not to Gossip

“How many times have we had this experience: someone comes and tells us: ‘But, listen, you are wrong in this. You should change a little in this.’ Perhaps at first we get angry, but then we are grateful because it is a gesture of brotherhood, of communion, of help, of recovery,” the pope said.

Acknowledging that at times this private disclosure of another’s fault may not be received well, Pope Francis pointed out that the Gospel says not to give up but to seek the support of another person.

“Jesus says: ‘If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses,’” the pope said.

“This is the attitude of recovery that Jesus wants from us,” he added.

The third step of Jesus’ pedagogy of rehabilitation is to tell the community, that is the Church, Francis said. “In some situations the whole community gets involved.”

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“Jesus’ pedagogy is always a pedagogy of rehabilitation; He always tries to recover, to save,” the pope said.

Pope Francis explained that Jesus expanded upon existing Mosaic law in going on to explain that community intervention may be insufficient. “It takes a greater love to rehabilitate a brother,” he said.

“Jesus says: ‘And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.’ This expression, seemingly so scornful, in reality invites us to put the brother in God's hands: Only the Father will be able to show a greater love than that of all brothers and sisters put together … It is the love of Jesus, who had embraced the tax collectors and Gentiles, scandalizing the conformists of the time.”

This is also a recognition that after our human attempts may fail, we can still entrust our brother who is in error to God “in silence and prayer,” he added.

“Only by being alone before God can the brother face his own conscience and responsibility for his actions,” he said. “If things don't go right, prayer and silence for the brother and sister who is wrong, but never gossip.”

After praying the Angelus, Pope Francis greeted pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square, including the newly arrived American seminarians living at the Pontifical North American College in Rome and women with multiple sclerosis who completed a walking pilgrimage from Siena to Rome along the Via Francigena.

“May the Virgin Mary help us to make fraternal correction a healthy practice, so that in our communities ever new fraternal relationships, founded on mutual forgiveness and above all on the invincible power of God's mercy, may be instilled,” Pope Francis said.

Courtney Mares is a Rome Correspondent for Catholic News Agency. A graduate of Harvard University, she has reported from news bureaus on three continents and was awarded the Gardner Fellowship for her work with North Korean refugees.