Pope Francis talked to a group of Bangladeshi priests and nuns about the "terrorism of gossip" and how it can

destroy
religious communities on Saturday, before returning to the Vatican.
The leader of the world's Roman Catholics spoke from his heart to the crowd at Dhaka's Holy Rosary Church.
He abandoned the speech he had prepared and instead gave a spontaneous 15-minute address about the highs and
lows of living in a religious community.
In the laughter-filled monologue, he urged his audience to tend to their religious vocations "with tenderness" and
warned them about the havoc gossip "bombs" can wreak when detonated in a closed religious life.
Francis said he was speaking from personal experience and urged the nuns and priests to "Please, bite your tongue"
which means to consider your words carefully before speaking.
Pope Francis asked for forgiveness from Rohingya Muslim refugees for all of their suffering Friday, using the
politically sensitive term "Rohingya" to describe the persecuted - a term he had not uttered during his trip that began
in Myanmar.
The presence of God today is also called Rohingya," he said after meeting refugees brought to the Bangladeshi
capital of Dhaka from Cox's Bazaar, where hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees have settled after fleeing
violence in Myanmar's Rakhine state.
The pontiff blessed the Rohingya refugees during an emotional meeting in which he held their hands and listened to
their stories.
Earlier Friday, Pope Francis ordained 16 priests at a huge outdoor Mass in the Bangladeshi capital. An estimated
100,000 people attended the Mass in Dhaka's Suhrawardy Udyan Park.
Before visiting Bangladesh, the pontiff spent four days in neighboring Myanmar, where he had been criticized by
human rights activists for not specifically mentioning the Rohingya.
The Rohingya are a minority ethnic group that has been denied basic rights for decades in the majority Buddhist-
majority Myanmar, which views them as immigrants from Bangladesh, despite the fact that many families have lived
in Myanmar for generations.
Their situation has worsened since August, when the military launched a scorched earth campaign against Rohingya
villages in northern Rakhine state in response to attacks on Myanmar police outposts on Rohingya militants. The
campaign, including reports of mass rapes and indiscriminate killings, triggered a mass exodus of more than 620,000
Rohingya into Bangladesh, which the United Nations has described as "a textbook example of ethnic cleansing."
The pope has denounced the treatment of the Rohingya in previous public remarks, but his advisers counseled him
not to speak about the issue while in Myanmar, for fear of a backlash against the 650,000 Catholics in the country.
Myanmar Bishop John Hsane Hgyi went even further Wednesday, casting doubt about the reported atrocities against
the Rohingya, and urging critics of the Myanmar government to go to the scene "to study the reality and history" of
the issue and learn the truth.
Vatican spokesman Greg Burke said Wednesday that Pope Francis has not lost his "moral authority" on the issue, and
suggested he may have been far more direct during his private talks with de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi and
powerful military chief Min Aung Hlaing.
Pope Francis urged Bangladeshi priests and nuns to resist the "terrorism of gossip" that can tear religious
communities apart as he brought his Asian tour to a close.
As he has done in similar encounters, Francis told the priests and nuns gathered in Chittagong's Holy Rosary Church
on Saturday that he was ditching the eight-page speech that he had prepared and would instead speak to them from
his heart.
"I don't know if it will be better or worse, but I promise it will be less boring," he quipped.
And then for the next 15 minutes, Francis drew laughter from the crowd, mixing paternal advice on how to tend to
religious vocations with gentle warnings about the havoc that gossip "bombs" can wreak when lobbed in closed
religious life.
"How many religious communities have been destroyed because of a spirit of gossip?" said Francis, adding that he
was speaking from personal experience. "Please, bite your tongue."
History's first Jesuit pope has frequently lamented the damage gossip can do within the church, where vows of
obedience, strict hierarchies and closed communities can breed jealousies and resentment.
It is a message Francis has brought to ordinary parishes riven by divisions and to the top of the Catholic Church
leadership. His most famous iteration came in his 2014 Christmas greetings to the Vatican bureaucracy, when he
listed the "terrorism of gossip" as one of the 15 maladies his closest collaborators were suffering, alongside "spiritual
Alzheimer's" and a "pathology of power".
The Bangladeshi edition was far more jovial in tone. It was a humour-filled end to a tense diplomatic trip that saw
Francis maintain public silence over the Rohingya refugee crisis while in Burma, only to address it head on in
Bangladesh with an emotional encounter with refugees themselves.
"The presence of God today is also called 'Rohingya,'" he told a group of 16 refugees who travelled to Dhaka from
Cox's Bazar, the district bordering Burma where refugee camps are overflowing with more than 620,000 Rohingya
who have fled what the UN says is a campaign of ethnic cleansing by Burma's military.
Francis's final event in Bangladesh was a youth rally before boarding the plane for the flight home to Rome.
Devoting his last day in Bangladesh to the nations tiny Catholic community, Pope Francis told clergy and religious
that there was no way they could promote interreligious harmony in the country if their communities were marked by
gossip, division and bitterness.
There are many enemies of harmony, the pope told priests, religious, seminarians and bishops on December 2. One
of the deadliest, and most common, enemies is gossip.
You might want to criticize the Holy Father for being repetitive, but this is important to me, he told the church
workers gathered in Dhakas Holy Rosary Church.
Speaking badly of someone behind his or her back creates distrust, he said. Its a kind of terrorism, destroying
everything.
When the temptation to gossip arises, the Pope said, bite your tongue. You might harm your tongue, but you wont
harm your brother or sister.
Pope Francis began the day by visiting a home run by the Missionaries of Charity in Dhaka. Accompanied by the
sari-clad superior, he went from bed to bed in the wards for seriously ill adults and children.
Taken by either hand by two little girls in pink and white tulle dresses, Pope Francis was led to the nearby Church of
the Holy Rosary for the meeting with hundreds of priests, religious and seminarians from throughout the country.
Archbishop Moses Costa of Chattagong, president of the bishops commission for clergy and religious life, told the
Pope that the countrys Catholics make up less than 1 percent of the population. The 372 priests and more than 1,250
women religious are satisfactory for serving the Catholic community, the archbishop said.
But, he said, compared to the huge population of the country, the number of priests and nuns is negligible.
Pope Francis listened to the testimonies of several priests and a sister. Then he heard from Holy Cross Brother
Lawrence Dias, who has been a religious for 63 years. Currently he serves as a hermit at Mariam Ashram,
Bangladeshs national Marian shrine. His life is devoted to prayer.
Many priests and religious and also lay people have come to the ashram to quench their spiritual thirst, he told the
pope. I am serving as the guru.
Instead of waiting for the elderly brother to go up to him, as the others had done, Pope Francis rushed to Brother
Dias place and embraced him.
Joining the Pope and the Bangladeshi priests and sisters was Oblate Father Andrew Small, U.S. director of the
Pontifical Mission Societies. The U.S. arm of the Catholic mission support agency provided more than $1.15 million
in aid to the church in Bangladesh in 2017.
Ignoring his prepared text for the gathering, Pope Francis spoke in Spanish and had his words translated into English
by an aide.
I prepared a speech of eight pages for you, he said, evoking laughter and applause. But, he said, he didnt want
them to be bored.
First, he said, the church workers always must remember that ones vocation is a seed that does not belong to you or
to me. It is Gods. And it is God who provides for its growth.
With tenderness and prayer, each person is called to water the seed and be attentive as possible to providing all it
needs to grow.
If there is no such tenderness, the plant is very small, it doesnt grow and it will dry out, he said. But it also is true
that sometimes the enemy comes and sows another kind of seed and there is a risk that the seed can be threatened
and not grow. How awful it is to see weeds in the rectories where you live, in episcopal conferences, in religious
communities and seminaries.
In this garden of the kingdom of God, he said, there isnt just one plant growing; there are thousands, all of us, and
community life is not easy. Human defects, our limitations, threaten community life and they threaten peace.
But if the Catholic community itself is not marked by harmony, he said, there is no way it can contribute
authentically to strengthening harmony among the many religions present in Bangladesh.
The other essential characteristic is joy, Pope Francis told them. I assure you when you meet a priest, religious,
seminarian or bishop who is really unhappy, has a sad face, you want to ask, What did you have for breakfast,
vinegar?'
On the other hand, he said, I feel great tenderness when I meet elderly priests or nuns who have lived a happy life,
who are full of joy and peace. Elderly nuns who have cultivated joy, even through moments of pain, have impish
eyes sparkling eyes their eyes are acute because they have the eyes of God.