Day two in Belgium: The Church’s ‘true treasure’

Our correspondent in Brussels reflects on the second day of the Pope’s visit to Belgium, which began with breakfast with the homeless and ended with a surprise encounter with 6,000 young people.

By Joseph Tulloch - Brussels

The Pope’s second day in Belgium was a busy one. The first item on his official schedule was a meeting with clergy and pastoral workers in Koekelberg's Basilica of the Sacred Heart – but before that even got started, he had two unscheduled encounters, the first with a handful of EU officials, and the second with a group of homeless people in the Church of Saint Giles.

Then, that afternoon, he held a public dialogue with students at the Catholic University of Louvain, met privately with Belgium’s Jesuit community, and, in the evening, paid a surprise visit to the 6,000 young people gathered at the Brussels Expo in preparation for the papal Mass the following morning.

Two moments in particular stood out to me from this fairly hectic day.

One of these came during the Louvain visit, when a letter written by students, junior researchers and professors was read aloud to the Pope. A thoughtful, well-written document, it takes inspiration from Pope Francis’ landmark encyclical Laudato Si', offering a reflection on subjects from the role of women in the Church to the value of non-Christian religious practices.

The other moment that struck me was the Pope’s stop in the beautiful neo-gothic Church of Saint Giles, which provides breakfast to a number of homeless people every morning. The Pope gifted the parish a statue of St Lawrence, a deacon and martyr who, he recalled, when asked to display the Church’s treasures, chose to present the poorest members of the Christian community.