Literature in the News: Pope Frances Releases, Candor Lucis Aeternae

Today Pope Francis released an apostolic letter, Candor Lucis Aeternae, celebrating the great poet Dante Aligheri and his work The Divine Comedy. This year, 2021 marks the 700th anniversary of Dante's death, and so be prepared for a number of events marking it. I haven't read the apostolic letter yet but I have seen several articles about it. Oddly, two articles come from the same writer (Inés San Martín) from the same magazine (Crux) released on the same day, today. That’s certainly unusual. One article focuses on the apostolic letter, “Pope Francis calls Dante a ‘prophet of hope.’”  

 

Following in the footsteps of his predecessors, Pope Francis on Thursday released a document reflecting on the life and work of Italian poet Dante Alighieri, calling him a prophet of hope in a historic moment where inhumanity and lack of prospect loom large.

 

“At this particular moment in history, overclouded by situations of profound inhumanity and a lack of confidence and prospects for the future, the figure of Dante, prophet of hope and witness to the human desire for happiness, can still provide us with words and examples that encourage us on our journey,” Francis wrote in the closing lines of Candor Lucis Aeternae (“Splendor of Light Eternal”).

 

Dante, Francis writes, has an important message to convey, one that is meant to touch the hearts and minds of all, and still in present time has the ability to inspire change and transformation. The message his tale tells should help appreciate “who we are and the meaning of our daily struggles to achieve happiness, fulfilment and our ultimate end, our true homeland, where we will be in full communion with God, infinite and eternal.”

The other article by Ms. San Martin, “700 years after his death, Dante still inspires popes,” focuses on Dante's relationships with various Popes.  Here is an excerpt:

Though often labeled as a “pope of firsts,” Francis’s Candor Lucis Aeternae is not the first reflection by a pontiff on the poet: Benedict XV published the encyclical titled In Praeclara Sumorum (“Among the many celebrated geniuses”) in 1921, which was dedicated to Dante’s memory and written for the occasion of the sixth centenary of his death. Pope St. Paul VI also wrote apostolic letter in 1965, Altissimi Cantus, to mark the seventh centenary of his birth.

 

“Someone might perhaps ask why the Catholic Church, by the will and work of its visible Head, takes it to heart to celebrate the memory of the Florentine poet and to honor him,” Paul VI wrote. “The answer is easy and immediate: Dante Alighieri is ours by a special right: Ours, that is, of the Catholic religion, because everything breathes love for Christ; ours, because he loved the Church very much, of which he sang honors; ours, because he recognized and venerated the Vicar of Christ on earth in the Roman Pontiff.”

 

In 2015, ahead of the inauguration of the Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy, Francis said that Dante “is a prophet of hope, herald of the possibility of redemption, liberation and the profound transformation of every man and woman, of all humanity.”

 

Both of Francis’s most recent predecessors also praised the poet.

 

At a reading of The Divine Comedy in 1997, Pope St. John Paul II noted that “almost seven centuries later, Dante’s art evokes lofty emotions and the greatest convictions, and still proves capable of instilling courage and hope, guiding contemporary man’s difficult existential quest for the Truth which knows no setting.”

 

Benedict XVI also voiced great admiration for the poet, and when he was still a priest and wrote his famous book Introduction to Christianity in 1968, he uses The Divine Comedy to explain the “scandal of Christianity.” 

Now if you want the actual apostolic letter, you can read it here: 

I haven't read it yet, but I hope to. I will certainly post on it when I do. 

Those who read my posts of The Divine Comedy several years ago you know my love for Dante and his work. A few weeks ago I compiled all the links to my blog posts on Dante into one post for easy access.  Now I am adding a link on my header above to that post on my Dante links.  I hope people find the link and ultimately my commentary on Dante useful.

Photo Credit: Marco Bucco/Reuters via CNS, A bust of Italian poet Dante Alighieri is seen next to an etching of him at the University of Bologna in Ravenna, Italy.