The Church of England’s most senior bishop has recalled how meeting the Pope and saying the Lord’s Prayer together “changed me”.
Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell said he had been privileged to meet Pope Francis on a few occasions, and remembered one encounter a few years ago when they prayed together.
Mr Cottrell said despite having said the Lord’s Prayer – also known as the Our Father – countless times before, it was when he said it with Francis that the significance of the word “our” came through.
He told Sky News: “I’ve said the Lord’s Prayer thousands of times – I say it every day – but sitting there saying the Lord’s Prayer with Pope Francis, the opening word of the Lord’s Prayer suddenly struck me – our.
“Our Father, our God, and what that means, therefore, is that everybody else who says this prayer is my sister and my brother, whether I like it or not, these are the people that God has made into his church.
“And just saying the Lord’s Prayer with Pope Francis changed me – changed and renewed and refreshed my understanding of what it is to be the church, that we belong to each other across these denominational barriers, and then I think, ‘what a message for the world’.
“We live in a world that’s so divided, you know, where the church itself has made many mistakes and failings. We need to be a humble church.
“We need to be a penitent church but we also need to be a church where we recognise our common humanity and our belonging one to another. That’s what Pope Francis reawakened in me, and I believe that will be his great legacy, both to the church but also to the world.”
A statement on the death of His Holiness, Pope Francis.@Pontifex pic.twitter.com/cqrT1dEQjB
— Archbishop of York (@CottrellStephen) April 21, 2025
Mr Cottrell has faced his own difficulties in recent times, including calls to resign over alleged safeguarding failures in the Church of England.
In February at the church’s General Synod – also know as the Church of England’s parliament – Mr Cottrell admitted he had “made mistakes” but vowed he is “determined” to do what he can to work with others “to lead the change we all know we need”.
Continuing his praise of Pope Francis on Sky News, the archbishop said the pontiff had died while still serving the faithful of the Catholic church.
Noting Francis’s appearance on Easter Sunday to bless the thousands of people gathered in St Peter’s Square in Vatican City, Mr Cottrell said: “It’s amazing, isn’t it, that, you know he, as it were, died with his boots on.
“Still serving, still praying, still blessing, still doing the things that Christian ministers do. And again, that characterizes his ministry.”
