‘Heartstrings vibrating in a single melody’

Accompanied by your prayers, we (at the conclave) could feel the working of the Holy Spirit, who was able to bring us into harmony, like musical instruments, so that our heartstrings could vibrate in a single harmony.” Words from the homily of Pope Leo XIV during his inaugural mass at St. Peter’s Square in Rome on May 18, 2025.

A favorite symphony began playing in my mind. I knew what he meant music-wise.

(In there, the cardinal-electors wore lacy choir attire, not their regular black and red, because the election of a pope is a liturgy, not an election as we know it. It was a long and tedious process, we learned. Was there soft, piped-in Gregorian music at least?)

I was not fast enough to jot down that line in longhand as I do as a journalist when a good quote comes up, later to be replayed if recorded. I asterisked that portion in my mind. Of course, also the first sentence in his homily, St. Augustine’s famous “Lord, you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until it rests in thee.” That happens to be in the first chapter of the saint’s blockbuster and bestselling “Confessions” (written between AD 397 and 400) that I should be reading again.

I continued to listen to the translator in English while the pope went on in Italian with, surprisingly, no hint of an American twang. There were more profound messages in his homily, words that I took to heart—”to bring the hope of the Gospel into the ‘waters’ of the world, to sail the seas of life so that all may experience God’s embrace.”

Heartstrings, music, and harmony—also water—almost always come up in reflections on mystical experiences. Music as a divine manifestation or as part of divine machinations, if you will. Angels singing at Jesus’ birth, for one.

Wrote the saintly Indian poet Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore in his “Gitanjali”: “This little flute of reed thou hast carried over hills and dales, and has breathed through its melodies eternally new.” And: “Into the audience hall by the fathomless abyss where swells up the music of toneless strings I shall take this harp of life. I shall tune it to the notes of forever, and when it has sobbed out its last utterance, lay down my silent harp at the feet of the silent.” “Gitanjali” serves as my “psalter” once in a while.

“Silent music” was what Jesuit author and Zen practitioner William Johnston called the science of meditation. Indian social reformer and activist Basavanna’s (1106-1167) prayer to Siva: “Make of my body the beam of a lute/ of my head the sounding gourd/ of my nerves the strings/ of my thoughts the plucking rods. Clutch me close and play your 32 songs/ O lord of the meeting rivers.”

If you’ve noticed, the logo of the Jubilee Year of Hope 2025 for Catholics shows pilgrims on a boat sailing on rough seas and holding on to a cross connected to an anchor underneath. For many Catholics all over the world, it has been a roller coaster ride—from Pope Francis’ death and burial to the election of the new pope—all in a month. It’s been rough seas for countless people in war-torn areas, prompting the pope, shortly after his election to the Chair of Peter, to exclaim and plead: “No more war!”

In his homily at his inaugural, he asked: “How can Peter carry out his task? The Gospel tells us that it is possible only because his own life was touched by the infinite and unconventional love of God, even in the hour of his failure and denial.”

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His wish is for a “reconciled world”: “In this time, we still see too much discord, too many wounds caused by hatred, violence, prejudice, the fear of difference, and an economic paradigm that exploits the Earth’s resources and marginalizes the poorest. For our part, we want to be a small leaven of unity, community and fraternity within the world…In the One Christ we are one.” (“In illo uno unum,” is his papal motto.)

This namesake of Pope Leo XIII, the author of the papal encyclical “Rerum Novarum” (we took this up in college theology) published in 1891 that warned against the rampaging industrial revolution and in defense of those who labored in vain, is now making his own call: “Brothers and sisters, this is the hour for love. The heart of the Gospel is the love of God that makes us brothers and sisters. With my predecessor Leo XIII, we can ask ourselves today, if this criterion were to prevail in this world, would not every conflict cease and peace reign?” Again referencing St. Augustine, his hope: that we be made “restless” by history.

Me, paraphrasing the sinner turned saint: May it not be “too late to find beauty so ancient yet ever new.”

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