During the Chrism Mass in 2013, Pope Francis preached on the need for priests to anoint "with the oil of gladness" and to carry with them "the smell of the sheep." Included here are excerpts from that homily by Pope Francis:
A good
priest can be recognized by the way his people are anointed. This is a clear
test. When our people are anointed with the oil of gladness, it is obvious: for
example, when they leave Mass looking as if they have heard good news. Our
people like to hear the Gospel preached with “unction”, they like it when the
Gospel we preach touches their daily lives, when it runs down like the oil of
Aaron to the edges of reality, when it brings light to moments of extreme
darkness, to the “outskirts” where people of faith are most exposed to the
onslaught of those who want to tear down their faith. People
thank us because they feel that we have prayed over the realities of their
everyday lives, their troubles, their joys, their burdens and their hopes.
And
when they feel that the fragrance of the Anointed One, of Christ, has come to
them through us, they feel encouraged to entrust to us everything they want to
bring before the Lord: “Pray for me, Father, because I have this problem”,
“Bless me”, “Pray for me” – these words are the sign that the anointing has
flowed down to the edges of the robe, for it has turned into prayer. The
prayers of the people of God. When we have this relationship with God and with
his people, and grace passes through us, then we are priests, mediators between
God and men.
…We need
to “go out”, then, in order to experience our own anointing, its power and its
redemptive efficacy: to the “outskirts” where there is suffering, bloodshed,
blindness that longs for sight, and prisoners in thrall to many evil masters….
A priest
who seldom goes out of himself, who anoints little – I won’t say “not at all”
because, thank God, our people take our oil from us anyway – misses out on the
best of our people, on what can stir the depths of his priestly heart. Those
who do not go out of themselves, instead of being mediators, gradually become
intermediaries, managers. We know the difference: the intermediary, the
manager, “has already received his reward”, and since he doesn't put his own
skin and his own heart on the line, he never hears a warm, heartfelt word of
thanks. This is precisely the reason why some priests grow dissatisfied, become
sad priests, lose heart and become in some sense collectors of antiques or
novelties – instead of being shepherds living with “the smell of the sheep”,
shepherds in the midst of their flock, fishers of men.
… It is
not a bad thing that reality itself forces us to “put out into the deep”, where
what we are by grace is clearly seen as pure grace, out into the deep of the contemporary
world, where the only thing that counts is “unction” – not function – and the
nets which overflow with fish are those cast solely in the name of the One in
whom we have put our trust: Jesus.
…Dear
priests, may God the Father renew in us the Spirit of holiness with whom we
have been anointed. May he renew his Spirit in our hearts, that this anointing
may spread to everyone, even to those “outskirts” where our faithful people
most look for it and most appreciate it. May our people sense that we are the
Lord’s disciples; may they feel that their names are written upon our priestly
vestments and that we seek no other identity; and may they receive through our
words and deeds the oil of gladness which Jesus, the Anointed One, came to
bring us. Amen.