Papal Texts

To His Eminence John
Metropolitan of Korça

Locum Tenens of the Orthodox Church of Albania
Monday, 27 January 2025

Message of condolences for death of His Beatitude Anastas

Having learned of the death of His Beatitude Anastas, Archbishop of Tirana, Durrës and All Albania, I wish to express my condolences to you, to the Members of the Holy Synod and to all the priests, monks, nuns and lay faithful of the beloved Orthodox Church of Albania, together with the assurance of my prayers that God our merciful Father may grant him the reward of his labours.

The faith of the Orthodox community of Albania was certainly embodied in the life of our dear brother, whose zealous pastoral service helped the people rediscover its richness and beauty following the years of state-imposed atheism and persecution. In this regard, I have fond memories of my meeting with His Beatitude on my first Apostolic Journey outside of Italy, and I cherish the fraternal embrace and words exchanged on that occasion.

Throughout his long life and ministry as a priest and as a bishop, he always manifested a profound dedication to the Gospel, serving and proclaiming the Lord in various geographical and cultural contexts, in Greece, Africa and Albania. He did so by following the example of Saint Paul, who dedicated himself so much to Christ that he could say, “I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some” (1 Cor 9:22).

When assuming the responsibility of guiding the Orthodox Church in Albania, he desired to enter deeply into the hearts of those entrusted to his care, especially their traditions and identity, without ever losing communion with the other Orthodox Churches. At the same time, he also engaged willingly in dialogue and promoted peaceful coexistence with other Churches and religions.

When he first arrived in Albania, some priests welcomed him with the Easter greeting in Greek, “Christos Anesti!” He replied in Albanian manifesting a fervent desire to live with his people and bear witness to the love of God, which overcomes all darkness and oppression, in the midst of those who had suffered greatly.

Now that his earthly life has come to an end, I pray that, through the mercy of God the Almighty Father, His Beatitude may eternally praise the Blessed Trinity, together with all the confessors of the faith and the pastors who have proclaimed the word of salvation to peoples everywhere and at all times.

Address to the Officials of the Tribunal of the Roman Rota for the Inauguration of the Judicial Year

Clementine Hall
Friday, 31 January 2025

Marriage causes should focus on the good of the faithful

Dear Prelate Auditors,

The inauguration of the Judicial Year of the Tribunal of the Roman Rota offers me the opportunity to reiterate my expression of appreciation and gratitude for your work. I warmly greet the Monsignor Dean and all of you who provide your service in this Tribunal.

This year will be the 10th anniversary of the two Motu Proprios, Mitis Iudex Dominus Iesus and Mitis et Misericors Iesus, with which I reformed the process for the declaration of nullity of marriage. It seems timely to take this traditional opportunity to meet with you to recall the spirit that permeated this reform, which you applied with competence and diligence, for the benefit of all the faithful.

The need to modify the norms regarding the procedure for annulment was made manifest by the Synod Fathers gathered in the extraordinary Assembly of 2014, formulating the request to make trials more accessible and streamlined (cf. Relatio Synodi 2014, 48). The Synod Fathers expressed in this way the urgency to complete the pastoral conversion of structures, already called for in the Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium (cf. no. 27).

It was all the more opportune that such conversion should also touch the administration of justice, so that it would respond in the best way possible to those who turn to the Church to shed light on their marital situation (cf. Address to the Tribunal of the Roman Rota, 23 January 2015).

I wanted the diocesan bishop to be at the centre of the reform. Indeed, he is responsible for administering justice in the diocese, both as a guarantor of the closeness of tribunals and supervision of them, and as a judge who must decide personaliter in cases in which nullity appears manifest, that is via the processus brevior as an expression of care for the salus animarum.

Therefore, I urged the inclusion of the activity of the tribunals in diocesan pastoral care, instructing the bishops to ensure that the faithful are aware of the existence of the procedure as a possible remedy to the situation of need in which they find themselves. It is sometimes saddening to learn that the faithful are unaware of the existence of this avenue. Furthermore, it is important “that processes remain free of charge, [so] that the Church ... manifest ... the gratuitous love of Christ by which we have all been saved” (Mitis et Misericors Iesus, Preface).

In particular, the solicitude of the bishop is implemented in guaranteeing by law the constitution, in his diocese, of the tribunal, equipped with well-trained persons — clerics and laity — suited to this function; and ensuring that they carry out their work with justice and diligence. Investment in the training of such workers — scientific, human and spiritual formation — is always to the benefit of the faithful, who are entitled to careful consideration of their petitions, even when they receive a negative response.

The reform was guided — and its application must be guided — by the concern for the salvation of souls (cf. Mitis Iudex, Preface). We are called upon by the pain and hope of so many faithful who seek clarity regarding the truth of their personal situation and thus, regarding the possibility of full participation in the sacramental life. For many who have experienced “an unhappy marriage, verification of the presence or lack of validity of the bond represents an important possibility. And these people must be helped along this road in the swiftest manner” (Address to participants in the course promoted by the Roman Rota, 12 March 2016).

The norms that establish the procedures must guarantee some fundamental rights and principles, primarily the right of defence and the presumption of validity of the marriage. The purpose of the process is not “to complicate the life of the faithful uselessly, nor far less to exacerbate their litigation, but rather to render a service to the truth” (Benedict xvi, Address to the Roman Rota, 28 January 2006).

I am reminded of what Saint Paul vi said, after completing the reform carried out by the Motu Proprio Causas matrimoniales. He observed that “in the simplifications [...] introduced in the treatment of marriage cases, it is desired to make this exercise easier, and therefore more pastoral, without detriment to the principles of truth and justice by which a trial must honestly abide, in the confidence that the responsibility and wisdom of Pastors will be religiously and more directly involved” (Address to the Roman Rota, 30 January 1975).

Likewise, the recent reform was intended to favour “not the nullity of marriages, but the speed of processes as well as the simplicity due them, lest the clouds of doubt overshadow the hearts of the faithful” (Mitis Iudex, Preface). Indeed, to keep the saying “summum ius summa iniuria” (Cicero, De Officiis, i, 10, 33) from becoming a reality as a result of overly complex procedures, I abolished the need for a doppia sentenza conforme [two conforming sentences] and encouraged more rapid decision-making in trials in which nullity is manifest, aiming at the good of the faithful and wishing to bring peace to their consciences. It is evident — but I would like to reiterate it here — that the reform strongly challenges your prudence in applying the norms. And this “requires two great virtues: prudence and justice, which must be informed by charity. There is an intimate connection between prudence and justice, because the exercise of the prudentia iuris is aimed at the knowledge of what is just in the specific case” (Address to the Roman Rota, 25 January 2024).

Every protagonist of the process approaches the conjugal and family reality with veneration, because the family is a living reflection of the communion of love that is God the Trinity (cf. Amoris Laetitia, 11). Moreover, spouses united in marriage have received the gift of indissolubility, which is not a goal to be achieved by their own efforts, nor even a limitation to their freedom, but a promise from God, whose faithfulness makes that of human beings possible. Your work of discernment on the existence or otherwise of a valid marriage is a service, it is a service to the salus animarum, inasmuch as it allows the faithful to know and accept the truth of their own personal situation. Indeed, “every correct judgement of the validity or nullity of a marriage contributes to the culture of indissolubility, in the Church and in the world” (Saint John Paul ii, Address to the Roman Rota, 28 January 2002).

Dear sisters, dear brothers, the Church entrusts to you a task of great responsibility, but above all of great beauty: to help purify and restore interpersonal relationships. The Jubilee context in which we find ourselves fills your work with hope, the hope that does not disappoint (cf. Rm 5:5).

I invoke upon all of you, peregrinantes in spem, the grace of joyful conversion and the light to accompany the faithful towards Christ, who is the meek and merciful Judge. I bless you from my heart, and I ask you, please, to pray for me. Thank you!

Jubilee Audience

Paul vi Hall
Saturday, 1 February 2025

To hope is to turn around

Dear brothers and sisters!

The Jubilee is a new beginning for people and for the Earth. It is a time when everything must be reimagined within God’s dream. And we know that the word “conversion” indicates a change of direction. Everything can be seen, at last, from another perspective, and so our steps also go towards new goals. This is how hope, which never disappoints, arises. The Bible tells of this in many ways. And in our case too, our experience of faith was inspired by encounters with people who were able to change in life and who, so to speak, entered into God’s dreams. For even though there is much evil in the world, we can distinguish those who are different: their greatness, which often coincides with littleness, wins us over.

In the Gospels, the figure of Mary Magdalene stands out above all others for this. Jesus healed her with mercy (cf. Lk 8:2), and she changed. Sisters and brothers, mercy changes, mercy changes the heart, and for Mary Magdalene, mercy brought her into God’s dreams and gave new purpose to her journey.

The Gospel of John tells of her encounter with the Risen Jesus in a way that makes us think. It repeats several times that Mary turned around. The Evangelist chooses his words well! In tears, Mary looks first inside the tomb, then she turns around: the Risen One is not on the side of death, but on the side of life. He can be mistaken for one of the people we encounter every day. Then, when she hears her name spoken, the Gospel says that Mary turns around again. And this is how her hope grows: now she sees the tomb, but not like before. She can dry her tears, because she has heard her own name: only the Teacher pronounces it in this way. The old world still seems to be there, but it is no more. When we feel that the Holy Spirit is acting in our heart, and we feel that the Lord is calling us by name, do we know how to distinguish the voice of the Teacher?

Dear brothers and sisters, from Mary Magdalene, whom tradition calls “the apostle of the apostles”, we learn hope. One enters the new world by converting more than once. Our journey is a constant invitation to change perspective. The Risen One takes us into his world, step by step, on the condition that we do not claim to know everything already.

Let us ask ourselves today: do I know how to turn around to see things differently, with a different outlook? Do I have the desire for conversion?

An overconfident ego that is too proud prevents us from recognizing the Risen Jesus: even today his appearance is that of ordinary people who easily remain behind us. Even when we weep and despair, we turn our back on him. Instead of looking into the darkness of the past, into the emptiness of a tomb, from Mary Magdalene we learn to turn towards life. There our Teacher awaits us. There our name is spoken. For in real life there is a place for us, always and everywhere. There is a place for you, for me, for everyone. No one can take it, because it has always been meant for us. It is bad, as they say in the common parlance, it is bad to leave an empty seat: “This place is for me; if I don’t go...”. Everyone can say: I have a place, I am a mission! Think about this: what is my place? What is the mission that the Lord gives us? May this thought help us to take a courageous attitude in life. Thank you.

Homily of His Holiness Pope Francis
First Vespers of the Presentation of the Lord

Saint Peter’s Basilica
Saturday, 1 February 2025

A reflection of God’s love

“See… I have come to do your will, O God” (Heb 10:7). With these words, the author of the Letter to the Hebrews describes Jesus’ complete obedience to the Father’s plan. We read those words on the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, the World Day for Consecrated Life, in this Jubilee of Hope and in a liturgical setting marked by the symbolism of light. All of you, dear sisters and brothers who have chosen the path of the evangelical counsels, have devoted yourselves, like a “Bride before her Spouse... surrounded by his light” (Saint John Paul ii, Apostolic Exhortation Vita Consecrata, 15); you have devoted yourselves to that same luminous plan of the Father, which goes back to the origins of the world. It will be fully accomplished at the end of time, but even now it is made visible through “the marvels wrought by God in the frail humanity of those who are called” (ibid., 20). Let us reflect, then, on how, through the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience that you have professed, you can bring its light to the women and men of our time.

First: by the light of your poverty, which is rooted in the very life of God, in the eternal and total mutual gift of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit (ibid., 21). By the practice of poverty, consecrated persons, by their free and generous use of all things, become bearers of blessing for them. They manifest the goodness of those things in the order of love, rejecting everything that can obscure their beauty — selfishness, greed, dependence, violent use and misuse for the purpose of death and destruction — and embracing instead all that can highlight that beauty: simplicity, generosity, sharing and solidarity. And Paul says: “All [things] belong to you, and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God” (1 Cor 3:22-23). This is poverty.

Second, by the light of your chastity. This too has its origin in the Trinity and is “a reflection of the infinite love which links the three divine Persons” (Vita Consecrata, 21). The profession of this vow, renouncing conjugal love and following the path of continence, reaffirms the absolute primacy of God’s love, to be received with an undivided and spousal heart (cf. 1 Cor 7:32-36), and points to it as the source and model of every other love. We know that we are living in a world often marked by distorted forms of affectivity, in which the principle of pleasure — that principle — drives people to seek in others the satisfaction of their own needs rather than the joy born of a fruitful encounter. It is true. In relationships this gives rise to superficial and unstable attitudes, selfishness and hedonism, immaturity and moral irresponsibility. The chosen spouse of a lifetime is replaced by the “partner” of the moment, while children freely accepted as a gift are replaced by those demanded as a “right” or eliminated as “unwanted”.

Sisters, brothers, in light of this situation, and the “growing need for inner honesty in human relationships” (Vita Consecrata, 88) and greater human bonds between individuals and communities, consecrated chastity shows us and points out to the men and women of the twenty-first century a way to heal the malady of isolation through the exercise of a free and liberating way of loving. A way of loving that accepts and respects everyone, while coercing or rejecting no one. What a balm it is for the soul to encounter religious women and men capable of a mature and joyful relationality of this kind! They are a reflection of God’s own love (cf. Lk 2:30-32). To this end, however, it is important that our communities provide for the spiritual and affective growth of their members, already during initial formation as well as in ongoing formation. In this way, chastity can truly reveal the beauty of a self-giving love, and avoid such harmful phenomena as the souring of the heart or questionable choices that are a symptom of unhappiness, dissatisfaction, and lead at times, in more fragile individuals, to living “double lives”. Daily there is a battle against the temptation of a double life. It is every day.

Third, by the light of your obedience. The reading we have heard also speaks of this, since it shows us, in the relationship between Jesus and the Father, the “liberating beauty of a dependence which is filial and non-servile, marked by a deep sense of responsibility and animated by mutual trust” (Vita Consecrata, 21). It is precisely in the light of God’s word that your obedience becomes a gift and a response of love, and a sign for our society. Today we tend to talk much but listen little, in our families, our workplaces and especially on social networks, where we can exchange floods of words and images without really encountering others, since we do not truly interact with them. This is something interesting. Many times, in everyday dialogue, before one finishes speaking, an answer already comes out because the other does not listen. We need to listen before responding. Welcome the other person’s word as a message, as a treasure, even as a help for me. Consecrated obedience can act as an antidote to this isolated individualism, for it promotes an alternative model of relationship marked by active listening, where “speaking” and “listening” are followed by the concreteness of “acting”, even at the cost of setting aside our own tastes, plans and preferences. Only in this way, in fact, can a person fully experience the joy of gift, overcoming loneliness and discovering the meaning of his or her existence in God’s greater plan.

I would like to conclude by mentioning something further. Nowadays in consecrated life there is much talk about “returning to the origins”. But not a return to the origin as in going back to a museum, no. A return to the very origin of our life. The word of God that we have heard reminds us that the first and most important “return to the origins” in every consecration and for every one of us, is the return to Christ and to his “yes” to the Father. It reminds us that renewal, even before meetings and “round tables” — which must be done, they are useful — takes place in front of the tabernacle, in adoration. Sisters, brothers, we have somewhat lost the sense of adoration. We are too practical, we want to do things, but…adore. Adore. There must be the capacity for adoration in silence. And in this way we come to appreciate our Founders above all as women and men of deep faith, repeating with them, in prayer and in oblation: “See… I have come to do your will, O God” (Heb 10:7).

Thank you very much for your witness. It is a leaven in the Church. Thank you.

Angelus

Saint Peter’s Square
Sunday, 2 February 2025

Jesus is salvation and light

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Happy Sunday!

Today the Gospel of the liturgy (Lk 2:22-40) tells us about Mary and Joseph who take the infant Jesus to the Temple of Jerusalem. In accordance with the Law, they present him in God’s dwelling, to recall that life comes from the Lord. And while the Holy Family carries out what was always done among the people of Israel, from generation to generation, something happens that had never occurred before.

Two elders, Simeon and Anna, prophesy about Jesus: they both praise God and talk about the child “to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem” (v. 38). Their moved voices resound among the ancient stones of the Temple, announcing the fulfilment of Israel’s expectations. Truly God is present in the midst of his people: not because he dwells within four walls, but because he lives as a man among men. This is the novelty of Jesus. In Simeon and Anna’s old age, a novelty takes place that changes the history of the world.

For their part, Mary and Joseph were amazed at what they heard (cf. v. 33). Indeed, when Simeon holds the child in his arms, he calls him in three beautiful ways, which are worthy of reflection. Three ways — he gives him three names. Jesus is salvation, Jesus is light; Jesus is a sign of contradiction.

First of all, Jesus is salvation. This is what Simeon says, praying to God: “Mine eyes have seen thy salvation which thou hast prepared in the presence of all peoples” (vv. 30-31). This always leaves us astounded: universal salvation concentrated in just one [person]! Yes, because in Jesus dwells the fullness of God, of his Love (cf. Col 2:9).

Second aspect: Jesus is “a light for revelation to the Gentiles” (Lk 2:32). Like the sun that rises over the world, this child will redeem it from the darkness of evil, pain and death. How much we need light, this light, even today!

Finally, the child embraced by Simeon is a sign of contradiction, so “that thoughts out of many hearts may be revealed” (v. 35). Jesus reveals the criterion for judging the whole of history and its drama, and also the life of each one of us. And what is this criterion? It is love: those who love, live; those who hate, die.

Jesus is salvation, Jesus is light, and Jesus is the sign of contradiction.

Enlightened by this encounter with Jesus, we can then ask ourselves: what do I expect in my life? What is my great hope? Does my heart wish to see the face of the Lord? Do I await the manifestation of his plan of salvation for humanity?

Let us pray together to Mary, mother most pure, that she may accompany us through the lights and shadows of history, that she may always accompany us to the encounter with the Lord.

After praying the Angelus the Holy Father continued:

[...] Tomorrow in the Vatican the International Summit on Children’s Rights will be held, entitled, “Love them and protect them”, which I had the joy of promoting and in which I will take part. It is a unique opportunity to bring the most pressing questions regarding the life of the little ones to the centre of the world’s attention. I invite you to join in prayer for its success.

And with regard to the primary value of human life, I reiterate a “no” to war, which destroys; it destroys everything, it destroys life and induces us to disregard it. And let us not forget that war is always a defeat. In this Jubilee year, I renew my appeal, especially to Christian governors, to do their utmost in negotiations to bring all ongoing conflicts to an end. Let us pray for peace in martyred Ukraine, in Palestine, Israel, Lebanon, Myanmar, Sudan and North Kivu. [...]

I wish you all a happy Sunday. Please, do not forget to pray for me. Enjoy your lunch. Arrivederci!

To Pilgrims from the Nordic Countries

Paul vi Hall
Monday, 3 February 2025

Beacons of fraternal solidarity

Your Eminence,

Dear Brother Bishops,

Dear friends,

I am pleased to greet all of you from Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland and Iceland, on the occasion of your pilgrimage to Rome, organized by the Nordic Bishop’s Conference.

Through this experience of journeying together as brothers and sisters in Christ, I pray that your hearts will grow strong in faith, hope and love, for they are the three essential elements of Christian life, three ways in which the Holy Spirit guides us on our journey, and on our pilgrimage, for we are all pilgrims (cf. General Audience, 24 April 2024).

The motto of this Jubilee, as you know well, is “Pilgrims of Hope”. It is my prayer, then, that your hope will be strengthened during these days. You are surely already aware of signs of hope in your home countries, for the Church in your lands, while small, is growing in numbers. It always grows. We can thank Almighty God that the seeds of faith planted and watered there by generations of persevering pastors and people is bearing fruit. Nor should this surprise us, because God is always faithful to his promises!

As you visit the various holy sites in the Eternal City, especially the tombs of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, I also pray that your faith in the Lord Jesus, and your awareness of belonging to him and to one another in the communion of the Church, will be nourished and deepened. In this way, with minds and hearts attuned more fully to Christ’s transforming grace, you will be able to return to your countries full of joyful enthusiasm for sharing the great gift that you have received, for, as Saint Paul tells us, we have been created in Christ for doing good works (cf. Eph 2:8-10).

Indeed, there can be no greater “work” than transmitting the saving message of the Gospel to others, and we are called to do this especially for those on the margins. Here, perhaps you can think of those who may be lonely or isolated — so many people are isolated or lonely — at heart or on the peripheries of your communities and more far-flung territories. Moreover, this task is entrusted to each of you, whatever your age, state in life or abilities. Even those of you who are elderly, sick or struggling in some way have a noble vocation to bear witness to the compassionate and tender love of the Father. As you return home, then, please remember that a pilgrimage does not end but shifts its focus to the daily “pilgrimage of discipleship” and the call to persevere in the task of evangelization. In this regard, I would encourage your vibrant Catholic communities to cooperate with your fellow Christians, for in these challenging times, scarred by war in Europe and around the world, how much our human family needs a unified witness to the reconciliation, healing and peace that can come only from God.

Likewise, in your multi-cultural contexts, you are called to dialogue and work together with the followers of other religions, many of them migrants whom you have welcomed so well into your societies. Indeed, I recall seeing this at first hand during my visit to Sweden in 2016. And for us Latin American countries, in the times of dictatorships — in Brazil, Uruguay, Chile, Argentina — our brothers and sisters fleeing dictatorships went there. Please carry on being beacons of welcome and fraternal solidarity!

Finally, a word to the younger pilgrims among you. As part of this year’s events, on 27 April we will celebrate the Canonization of Blessed Carlo Acutis. This young saint of and for our times shows you, and all of us, how possible it is in today’s world for young people to follow Jesus, share his teachings with others, and so find the fullness of life in joy, freedom and holiness. So allow me to repeat to you, and please share these words of the Pope with your young friends at home: “May the Holy Spirit urge you on… The Church needs your momentum, your intuitions, your faith. We need them!” (Christus Vivit, 299).

Dear friends, with these brief words, I wish you well for your pilgrimage, and for your lives, and entrust you to the intercession of Mary, Mother of the Church. I give you my heartfelt blessing. And, please, do not forget to pray for me.

Address to Participants in World Leaders Summit on Children’s Rights

Clementine Hall
Monday, 3 February 2025

Love them and protect them

Your Majesty,

Dear brothers and sisters, good morning!

I greet the Secretary of State, the Cardinals and the distinguished participants in this World Leaders Summit on Children’s Rights, entitled “Love them and Protect them”. I thank you for accepting the invitation and I am confident that, by pooling your experience and expertise, you can open new avenues to assist and protect the children whose rights are daily trampled upon and ignored.

Even today, too often the lives of millions of children are marked by poverty, war, lack of schooling, injustice and exploitation. Children and adolescents in poorer countries, or those torn apart by tragic conflicts, are forced to endure terrible trials. Nor is the more resource-rich world immune from injustice. Where, thank God, people do not suffer from war or hunger, there are problematic peripheries, where little ones are not infrequently vulnerable and suffer from problems that we cannot underestimate. In fact, to a much greater extent than in the past, schools and health services have to deal with children already tested by many difficulties, with anxious or depressed youngsters, and adolescents drawn to forms of aggression or self-harm. Moreover, a culture of efficiency looks upon childhood itself, like old age, as a “periphery” of existence.

Increasingly, those who have their whole life ahead of them are unable to approach it with optimism and confidence. It is precisely young people, who are the signs of hope in every society, who struggle to find hope in themselves. This is sad and troubling. Indeed, “it is sad to see young people who are without hope, who face an uncertain and unpromising future, who lack employment or job security, or realistic prospects after finishing school. Without the hope that their dreams can come true, they will inevitably grow discouraged and listless” (Bull Spes Non Confundit, 12).

What we have tragically seen almost every day in recent times, namely children dying beneath bombs, sacrificed to the idols of power, ideology, and nationalistic interests, is unacceptable. In truth, nothing is worth the life of a child. To kill children is to deny the future. In some cases, minors themselves are forced to fight under the effect of drugs. Even in countries without war, violence between criminal gangs becomes just as deadly for children, and often leaves them orphaned and marginalized.

The pathological individualism of developed countries is also detrimental to children. Sometimes they are mistreated or even put to death by the very people who should be protecting and nurturing them. They fall victim to quarrelling, social or mental distress and parental addictions.

Many children die as migrants at sea, in the desert or along the many routes of journeys undertaken out of desperate hope. Countless others succumb to a lack of medical care or various types of exploitation. All these situations are different, but they raise the same question: How is it possible that a child’s life should end like this?

Surely this is unacceptable, and we must guard against becoming inured to this reality. A childhood denied is a silent scream condemning the wrongness of the economic system, the criminal nature of wars, the lack of adequate medical care and schooling. The burden of these injustices weighs most heavily on the least and the most defenceless of our brothers and sisters. At the level of international organizations, this is called a “global moral crisis”.

We are here today to say that we do not want this to become the new normal. We refuse to get used to it. Certain practices in the media tend to make us insensitive, leading to a general hardening of hearts. Indeed, we risk losing what is noblest in the human heart: mercy and compassion. More than once, I have shared this concern with some of you who represent various religious communities.

Today, more than forty million children have been displaced by conflict and about a hundred million are homeless. There is also the tragedy of child slavery: some one hundred and sixty million children are victims of forced labour, trafficking, abuse and exploitation of all kinds, including compulsory marriages. There are millions of migrant children, sometimes with families but often alone. This phenomenon of unaccompanied minors is increasingly frequent and serious.

Many other minors live in “limbo” because they were not registered at birth. An estimated one hundred and fifty million “invisible” children have no legal existence. This is an obstacle to their accessing education or health care, yet worse still, since they do not enjoy legal protection, they can easily be abused or sold as slaves. This actually happens! We can think of the young Rohingya children, who often struggle to get registered, or the “undocumented” children at the border of the United States, those first victims of that exodus of despair and hope made by the thousands of people coming from the South towards the United States of America, and many others.

Sadly, this history of oppression of children is constantly repeated. If we ask the elderly, our grandparents, about the war they experienced when they were young, the tragedy emerges from their memories: the darkness — everything is dark during the war, colours practically disappear — and the stench, the cold, the hunger, the dirt, the fear, the scavenging, the loss of parents and homes, abandonment and all kinds of violence. I grew up with the stories of the First World War told by my grandfather, and this opened my eyes and heart to the horror of war.

Seeing things through the eyes of those who have lived through war is the best way to understand the inestimable value of life. Yet also listening to those children who today live in violence, exploitation or injustice serves to strengthen our “no” to war, to the throwaway culture of waste and profit, in which everything is bought and sold without respect or care for life, especially when that life is small and defenceless. In the name of this throwaway mentality, in which the human being becomes all-powerful, unborn life is sacrificed through the murderous practice of abortion. Abortion suppresses the life of children and cuts off the source of hope for the whole of society.

Sisters and brothers, how important it is to listen, for we need to realize that young children understand, remember and speak to us. And with their looks and their silences, too, they speak to us. So let us listen to them!

Dear friends, I thank you and encourage you, with God’s grace, to make the most of the opportunities afforded by this meeting. I pray that your contributions will help to build a better world for children, and consequently for everyone! For me, it is a source of hope that we are all here together, to put children, their rights, their dreams, and their demand for a future at the centre of our concern. Thanks to all of you, and God bless you!

Final word of thanks:

I wish to express my heartfelt gratitude to you at the end of this Meeting on children’s rights.

Thanks to you, today the halls of the Apostolic Palace have become an open “observatory” on the reality of childhood all over the world, a childhood that is often wounded, exploited, denied. Your presence, your experience and your compassion have brought to life an observatory and above all a “workshop”: in various thematic groups you have developed proposals for the protection of children’s rights, considering them not as numbers, but as faces.

All this renders glory to God, and we entrust it to Him, so that His Holy Spirit may make it productive and fruitful. Father Faltas used a word, a phrase that I like very much: “The children are watching us”. It was also the title of a famous film. Children are watching us: they are watching us to see how we move forward in life.

For my part, in order to provide continuity to this commitment and to promote it throughout the Church, I intend to prepare a Letter, an [Apostolic] Exhortation — I don’t know — dedicated to children.

Thank you once again, to all! Thanks to each and every one of you.

General Audience

Paul vi Hall
Wednesday, 5 February 2025

The Visitation and the Magnificat

Impromptu words before the Catechesis:

I would like to apologize, because with this heavy cold it is difficult for me to speak. Therefore, I have asked my brother to read the Catechesis. He will read it better than me.

Hereafter, Fr Pierluigi Giroli:

Dear brothers and sisters, good morning!

Today we will contemplate the beauty of Jesus Christ our hope in the mystery of the Visitation. The Virgin Mary visits Saint Elizabeth; but it is above all Jesus, in his mother’s womb, who visits his people (cf. Lk 1:68), as Zechariah says in his hymn of praise.

After the astonishment and wonder at the Angel’s announcement to her, Mary arises and sets out on a journey, like all those who are called in the Bible, because “the only act by which a human being can respond adequately to the self-revealing God is that of unlimited readiness” (H.U. von Balthasar, Vocation, Rome 2002, 29). This young daughter of Israel does not choose to protect herself from the world; she does not fear dangers and the judgements of others, but goes out towards other people.

When we feel loved, we experience a force that sets love in motion; as the apostle Paul says, “the love of Christ controls us” (2 Cor 5:14), it drives us, it moves us. Mary feels the pull of this love, and goes to help a woman who is her relative, but also an elderly woman who, after a long wait, is welcoming an unhoped-for pregnancy, difficult to deal with at her age. But the Virgin also goes to Elizabeth to share her faith in the God of the impossible and her hope in the fulfilment of his promises.

The encounter between the two women has a surprising impact: the voice of Mary, “full of grace”, as she greets Elizabeth, elicits a prophecy from the child inside the elderly woman’s womb, and inspires her to make a two-fold blessing: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb” (Lk 1:42), as well as a beatitude: “Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her from the Lord” (v. 45).

Faced with the recognition of the messianic identity of her Son and her mission as mother, Mary does not speak of herself but of God, and raises a prayer filled with faith, hope and joy, a canticle that resounds in the Church every day, during the prayer of Vespers: the Magnificat (Lk 1:46-55).

This praise to God the saviour, which gushed forth from the heart of his humble servant, is a solemn memorial that synthesizes and fulfils the prayer of Israel. It is interwoven with biblical references, a sign that Mary does not want to sing “apart from the choir” but to tune in with the forefathers, exalting her compassion for the humble, the little ones that Jesus would later proclaim “blessed” in his preaching will (cf. Mt 5:1-12).

The prominent presence of the paschal motif also makes the Magnificat a hymn of redemption, which has as its backdrop the memory of the liberation of Israel from Egypt. The verbs are all in the past, imbued with a memory of the love that lights up the present with faith and illuminates the future with hope: Mary sings of the grace of the past, but she is the woman of the present who carries the future in her womb.

The first part of this canticle praises God’s action in Mary, a microcosm of the people of God who adhere fully to the covenant (vv. 46-50); the second ranges from the work of the Father in the macrocosm of the history of his children (vv. 51-55), through three key words: memory, mercy, promise.

The Lord, who bent over the humble Mary to fulfil “great things” in her and make her the mother of the Lord, began to save his people starting from the exodus, remembering the universal blessing promised to Abraham (cf. Gen 12:1-3). The Lord God who is forever faithful, showered an uninterrupted stream of merciful love “from age to age” (v. 50) upon the people loyal to the covenant, and now manifests the fullness of salvation in His Son, sent to save the people from their sins. From Abraham to Jesus Christ and the community of believers, the Passover thus appears as the hermeneutical category for understanding every subsequent liberation, up to that realized by the Messiah in the fullness of time.

Dear brothers and sisters, let us ask the Lord today for the grace to be able to wait for the fulfilment of every one of His promises; and to help us to welcome Mary’s presence in our life. By following her example, may we all discover that every soul that believes and hopes “conceives and brings forth the Word of God” (Saint Ambrose, Exposition of the Gospel according to Luke, 2:26).

Appeal

And let us think about the countries that are suffering due to war: martyred Ukraine, Israel, Palestine ... Many countries are suffering there. Let us remember the displaced people of Palestine and let us pray for them.

Address to Participants in the Study Visit of Young Priests and Monks of the Oriental Orthodox Churches

Casa Santa Marta
Thursday, 6 February 2025

A symbol of visible communion

Dear Brothers,

“How very good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity!” (Ps 133:1). With these words of the Psalmist, I offer you a warm welcome and I express my joy for this visit of young priests and monks of the Armenian, Coptic, Ethiopian, Eritrean, Malankara and Syrian Oriental Orthodox Churches. My fraternal greeting goes to Archbishop Khajag Barsamian and to Bishop Barnabas El-Soryani, who are accompanying you. Through you, I wish to greet my venerable and dear brothers, the heads of the Oriental Orthodox Churches.

This is the fifth Study Visit for young Oriental Orthodox priests and monks organized by the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity. Similar visits for Catholic priests have been prepared by the Armenian Catholicosate of Etchmiadzin and the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church. I am most grateful for this “exchange of gifts” promoted by the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Catholic Church and the Oriental Orthodox Churches, because it enables the dialogue of charity to go hand in hand with the dialogue of truth.

Your visit has particular significance this year, as we celebrate the seventeenth centenary of the Council of Nicaea, the first ecumenical Council, which professed the Symbol of Faith shared by all Christians. I would like, then, to reflect with you on that term, “Symbol”, which in its threefold meaning has powerful ecumenical implications.

In the theological sense, a symbol sets forth the ensemble of the principal truths of the Christian faith, which harmoniously complement one another. In this sense, the Nicene Creed, which synthetically sets forth the mystery of our salvation, is exemplary and unparalleled.

The Symbol also has an ecclesiological significance. Not only does it unite truths, it also unites believers. In antiquity, the Greek word symbolon indicated half of a document broken in two, to be presented as a sign of identity. The Symbol thus serves as a sign of identity and communion between believers. Each individual possesses the faith as a “symbol”, which only finds its full unity together with others. We need one another in order to be able to confess the faith. That is why the Nicene Symbol, in its original version, uses the plural form, “We believe”. Carrying this image a step further, I would say that we Christians, still divided, are like “shards” who must recover unity in the confession of the one faith. For we hold the Symbol of our faith like a treasure in vessels of clay (cf. 2 Cor 4:7).

And so, we come to the third meaning of the Symbol, its spiritual significance. We must never forget that the Creed is above all a prayer of praise that unites us to God: union with God necessarily takes place through unity among us Christians who proclaim the same faith. Whereas the devil divides, the Symbol unites! How beautiful it would be if, each time we proclaim the Creed, we felt united with Christians of all traditions! The proclamation of our common faith, in fact, requires before all else that we love one another, as the Eastern liturgy exhorts us to do before the recitation of the Creed: “Let us love one another, that in unity of spirit we may profess our faith in the Father, in the Son and in the Holy Spirit”.

Dear brothers, I hope that your presence will become a “symbol” of our visible communion, as we persevere in pursuit of that full unity that the Lord Jesus so ardently desired (cf. Jn 17:21). I assure you of my prayer for each of you and for your Churches, and I count on your own prayers for me and for my ministry. May the Lord bless you and may the Mother of God protect you.

And now, I would propose that we proclaim together the Nicene Creed, each of us in his own language. [I believe...]

Message for World Mission Day 2025

Thursday, 6 February 2025

Missionaries of hope
among all peoples

Dear brothers and sisters!

For World Mission Day in the Jubilee Year 2025, the central message of which is hope (cf. Bull Spes Non Confundit, 1), I have chosen the motto: “Missionaries of Hope Among all Peoples”. It reminds individual Christians and the entire Church, the community of the baptized, of our fundamental vocation to be, in the footsteps of Christ, messengers and builders of hope. I trust that it will be for everyone a time of grace with the faithful God who has given us new birth in the risen Christ “to a living hope” (cf. 1 Pet 1:3-4). Here, I would like to mention some relevant aspects of our Christian missionary identity, so that we can let ourselves be guided by the Spirit of God and burn with holy zeal for a new evangelizing season in the Church, which is sent to revive hope in a world over which dark shadows loom (cf. Fratelli Tutti, 9-55).

1. In the footsteps of Christ our hope

Celebrating the first Ordinary Jubilee of the Third Millennium after that of the Holy Year of 2000, we keep our gaze fixed on Christ, the centre of history, “the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb 13:8). In the synagogue of Nazareth, Jesus declared that Scripture was fulfilled in the “today” of his presence in history. He thus revealed that he is the One sent by the Father with the anointing of the Holy Spirit to proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom of God and to inaugurate “the year of the Lord’s favour” for all humanity (cf. Lk 4:16-21).

In this mystic “today”, which will last until the end of the world, Christ is the fullness of salvation for all, and in a particular way for those whose only hope is God. In his earthly life, “he went about doing good and healing all” from evil and the Evil One (cf. Acts 10:38), restoring hope in God to the needy and the people. He experienced all our human frailties, save that of sin, even those critical moments that might lead to despair, as in the agony in the garden of Gethsemane and on the cross. Jesus commended everything to God the Father, obediently trusting in his saving plan for humanity, a plan of peace for a future full of hope (cf. Jer 29:11). In this way, he became the divine Missionary of hope, the supreme model of all those down the centuries who carry out their own God-given mission, even amid extreme trials.

Through his disciples, sent to all peoples and mystically accompanied by him, the Lord Jesus continues his ministry of hope for humanity. He still bends over all those who are poor, afflicted, despairing and oppressed, and pours “upon their wounds the balm of consolation and the wine of hope” (Preface “Jesus the Good Samaritan”). Obedient to her Lord and Master, and in the same spirit of service, the Church, the community of Christ’s missionary disciples, prolongs that mission, offering her life for all in the midst of the nations. While facing persecutions, tribulations and difficulties, as well as her own imperfections and failures due to the weakness of her members, the Church is constantly impelled by the love of Christ to persevere, in union with him, on her missionary journey and to hear, like him and with him, the plea of suffering humanity and, indeed, the groaning of every creature that awaits definitive redemption. This is the Church that the Lord always and for ever calls to follow in his footsteps: “not a static Church, but a missionary Church that walks with her Lord through the streets of the world” (Homily at the Concluding Mass of the Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, 27 October 2024).

May we too feel inspired to set out in the footsteps of the Lord Jesus to become, with him and in him, signs and messengers of hope for all, in every place and circumstance that God has granted us to live. May all the baptized, as missionary disciples of Christ, make his hope shine forth in every corner of the earth!

2. Christians, bearers and builders of hope among all peoples

In following Christ the Lord, Christians are called to hand on the Good News by sharing the concrete life situations of those whom they meet, and thus to be bearers and builders of hope. Indeed, “the joys and hopes, the grief and anguish of the people of our time, especially of those who are poor or afflicted, are the joys and hopes, the grief and anguish of the followers of Christ as well. Nothing that is genuinely human fails to find an echo in their hearts” (Gaudium et Spes, 1).

This celebrated statement of the Second Vatican Council, which expresses the sentiment and style of Christian communities in every age, continues to inspire their members and helps them to walk with their brothers and sisters in the world. Here I think especially of those of you who are missionaries ad gentes. Following the Lord’s call, you have gone forth to other nations to make known the love of God in Christ. For this, I thank you most heartily! Your lives are a clear response to the command of the risen Christ, who sent his disciples to evangelize all peoples (cf. Mt 28:18-20). In this way, you are signs of the universal vocation of the baptized to become, by the power of the Spirit and daily effort, missionaries among all peoples and witnesses to the great hope given us by the Lord Jesus.

The horizon of this hope transcends the passing things of this world and opens up to those divine realities in which we share even now. Indeed, as Saint Paul vi observed, salvation in Christ, which the Church offers to all as a gift of God’s mercy, is not only “immanent, meeting material or even spiritual needs… completely caught up in temporal desires, hopes, affairs, and struggles. Rather, it exceeds all such limits in order to reach fulfilment in a communion with the one Absolute, which is God. It is a salvation both transcendent and eschatological, which indeed has its beginning in this life, but is fulfilled in eternity” (Evangelii Nuntiandi, 27).

Impelled by this great hope, Christian communities can be harbingers of a new humanity in a world that, in the most “developed” areas, shows serious symptoms of human crisis: a widespread sense of bewilderment, loneliness and indifference to the needs of the elderly, and a reluctance to make an effort to assist our neighbours in need. In the most technologically advanced nations, “proximity” is disappearing: we are all interconnected, but not related. Obsession with efficiency and an attachment to material things and ambitions are making us self-centred and incapable of altruism. The Gospel, experienced in the life of a community, can restore us to a whole, healthy, redeemed humanity.

For this reason, I once more invite all of us to carry out the works mentioned in the Bull of Indiction of the Jubilee (Nos. 7-15), with particular attention to the poorest and weakest, the sick, the elderly and those excluded from materialistic and consumerist society. And to do so with God’s “style”: with closeness, compassion and tenderness, cultivating a personal relationship with our brothers and sisters in their specific situation (cf. Evangelii Gaudium, 127-128). Often they are the ones who teach us how to live in hope. Through personal contact, we will also convey the love of the compassionate heart of the Lord. We will come to realize that “the heart of Christ... is the very core of the initial preaching of the Gospel” (Dilexit Nos, 32). By drawing from this source, we can offer with simplicity the hope we have received from God (cf. 1 Pet 1:21) and bring to others the same consolation with which we have been consoled by God (cf. 2 Cor 1:3-4). In the human and divine heart of Jesus, God wants to speak to the heart of every man and woman, drawing all of us to his love. “We have been sent to continue this mission: to be signs of the heart of Christ and the love of the Father, embracing the whole world” (Address to Participants in the General Assembly of the Pontifical Mission Societies, 3 June 2023).

3. Renewing the mission of hope

Faced with the urgency of the mission of hope today, Christ’s disciples are called first to discover how to become “artisans” of hope and restorers of an often distracted and unhappy humanity.

To this end, we need to be renewed in the Easter spirituality experienced at every Eucharistic celebration and especially during the Easter Triduum, the centre and culmination of the liturgical year. We have been baptized into the redemptive death and resurrection of Christ, into the Passover of the Lord that marks the eternal springtime of history. Consequently, we are a “springtime people”, brimming with hope to be shared with all, since in Christ “we believe and know that death and hate are not the final word” pronounced on human existence (cf. Catechesis, 23 August 2017). From the paschal mysteries, made present in liturgical celebrations and in the sacraments, we constantly draw upon the power of the Holy Spirit in order to work with zeal, determination and patience in the vast field of global evangelization. “Christ, risen and glorified, is the wellspring of our hope, and he will not deprive us of the help we need to carry out the mission which he has entrusted to us” (Evangelii Gaudium, 275). In him, we live and bear witness to that sacred hope which is “a gift from God and a task for Christians” (Hope is a Light in the Night, Vatican City 2024, 7).

Missionaries of hope are men and women of prayer, for “the person who hopes is a person who prays”, in the words of Venerable Cardinal François-Xavier Van Thuan, who was himself sustained in hope throughout his lengthy imprisonment thanks to the strength he received from faithful prayer and the Eucharist (cf. The Road of Hope, Boston, 2001, 963). Let us not forget that prayer is the primary missionary activity and at the same time “the first strength of hope” (Catechesis, 20 May 2020).

So let us renew the mission of hope, starting from prayer, especially prayer based on the word of God and particularly the Psalms, that great symphony of prayer whose composer is the Holy Spirit (cf. Catechesis, 19 June 2024). The Psalms train us to hope amid adversity, to discern the signs of hope around us, and to have the constant “missionary” desire that God be praised by all peoples (cf. Ps 41:12; 67:4). By praying, we keep alive the spark of hope lit by God within us, so that it can become a great fire, which enlightens and warms everyone around us, also by those concrete actions and gestures that prayer itself inspires.

To conclude, evangelization is always a communitarian process, like Christian hope itself (cf. Benedict xvi, Spe Salvi, 14). That process does not end with the initial preaching of the Gospel and with Baptism, but continues with the building up of Christian communities through the accompaniment of each of the baptized along the path of the Gospel. In modern society, membership in the Church is never something achieved once for all. That is why the missionary activity of handing down and shaping a mature faith in Christ is “paradigmatic for all the Church’s activity” (Evangelii Gaudium, 15), a work that requires communion of prayer and action. Here I would emphasize once more the importance of this missionary synodality of the Church, as well as the service rendered by the Pontifical Mission Societies in promoting the missionary responsibility of the baptized and supporting new Particular Churches. I urge all of you, children, young people, adults and the elderly, to participate actively in the common evangelizing mission of the Church by your witness of life and prayer, by your sacrifices and by your generosity. Thank you for this!

Dear sisters and brothers, let us turn to Mary, Mother of Jesus Christ our hope. To her we entrust our prayer for this Jubilee and for the years yet to come: “May the light of Christian hope illumine every man and woman, as a message of God’s love addressed to all! And may the Church bear faithful witness to this message in every part of the world!” (Bull Spes Non Confundit, 6).

Rome, Saint John Lateran,
25 January 2025, Feast of the Conversion of Saint Paul, Apostle

To the Delegation of Organizers of the World Day of Prayer and Awareness against Human Trafficking

Casa Santa Marta
Friday, 7 February 2025

A serious violation of fundamental human rights

Dear sisters and brothers,

I am pleased to meet you and to join you in your daily commitment to put an end to human trafficking. In particular, I thank Talitha Kum for your service. Thank you! We are meeting on the eve of the feast of Saint Josephine Bakhita, who was a victim of this terrible social scourge. Her story gives us strength and shows us that with the Lord’s grace, it is possible for those who suffered injustice and violence to shatter their chains, to go free and to become messengers of hope to others in difficult situations.

Human trafficking is a global phenomenon that claims millions of victims and continues unabated. It continually finds new ways to infiltrate our societies the world over. In the face of this tragedy, we must not remain indifferent. Like yourselves, we need to unite our forces and our voices, calling upon everyone to accept responsibility for combating this form of crime that profits from the most vulnerable.

We must not tolerate the shameful exploitation of so many of our sisters and brothers. Trafficking in human bodies, the sexual exploitation even of small children and forced labour are a disgrace and a very serious violation of fundamental human rights.

I know that you are an international group, and some of you have travelled very far for this week of prayer and awareness against human trafficking. Thank you! In a special way, I would express my appreciation to the youth ambassadors, who with creativity and vitality continue to find new ways of raising awareness of, and providing information about, the evil of human trafficking.

I encourage all organizations and individuals in this network to continue to work together, making victims and survivors your primary concern, listening to their stories, caring for their wounds and enabling them to make their voices heard in society at large. That is what it means to be ambassadors of hope, and it is my hope that during this Jubilee Year many others will follow your example.

I bless you and accompany you in my prayers. And I ask you, please, to pray for me. Thank you!

Message for the 11th International Day of Prayer and Awareness against Human Trafficking

Friday, 7 February 2025

Ambassadors of hope: together against human trafficking

Dear Brothers and Sisters!

It is with joy that I join you on the 11th International Day of Prayer and Awareness against Human Trafficking. This event falls on the liturgical commemoration of Saint Josephine Bakhita, a Sudanese woman and nun, who became a victim of trafficking as a child and has become a symbol of our commitment against this terrible phenomenon. In this jubilee year, let us also walk together, as “pilgrims of hope”, on the road against trafficking.

But how is it possible to continue to nourish hope in front of the millions of people, especially women and children, young people, migrants and refugees, trapped in this modern slavery? Where do we gain new impetus to combat the trade in human organs and tissues, the sexual exploitation of boys and girls, forced labour, including prostitution, drug and arms trafficking? How can we take note of all this in the world and not lose hope? It is only by lifting our eyes to Christ, our hope, that we can find the strength of a renewed commitment that does not allow itself to be overcome by the dimension of problems and tragedies, but in the darkness strives to ignite flames of light, which together can illuminate the night until the dawn breaks.

The young people around the world who are fighting against trafficking offer us an example: they tell us that we must become ambassadors of hope and act together, with tenacity and love; that we must stand by the victims and survivors.

With God’s help we can avoid becoming accustomed to injustice and ward off the temptation to think that certain phenomena cannot be eradicated. The Spirit of the Risen Lord sustains us in promoting, with courage and effectiveness, targeted initiatives to weaken and oppose the economic and criminal mechanisms that profit from trafficking and exploitation. He teaches us first of all to listen, with closeness and compassion, to the people who have experienced trafficking, to help them get back on their feet and together with them to identify the best ways to free others and to practice prevention.

Trafficking is a complex, constantly evolving phenomenon, and is fuelled by wars, conflicts, famine and the consequences of climate change. It therefore requires global responses and a common effort, at all levels, to tackle it. I therefore invite all of you, especially representatives of governments and organisations that share this commitment, to join us, animated by prayer, to promote initiatives in defence of human dignity, for the elimination of human trafficking in all its forms and for the promotion of peace in the world.

Together — trusting in Saint Bakhita’s intercession — we can make a great effort and create the conditions for trafficking and exploitation to be banned and for respect for fundamental human rights to prevail, in fraternal recognition of a shared humanity.

Sisters and brothers, I thank you for your courage and tenacity in carrying out this work, involving so many people of good will. Go forth with hope in the Lord, who walks with you! I bless you from my heart. I pray for you, and you pray for me.

Vatican, 4 February 2025

Homily during Holy Mass for Jubilee
of the Armed Forces, Police and
Security Personnel

Saint Peter’s Square
Sunday, 9 February 2025

Defending life against poison of hatred and war

Jesus’ actions at the Lake of Gennesaret are described by the Evangelist with three verbs: he saw, he went aboard and he sat down. Jesus saw, Jesus went aboard and Jesus sat down. Jesus is not concerned with showing off to the crowds, with doing a job, with following a timetable in carrying out his mission. On the contrary, he always makes it his priority to encounter others, to relate to them, and to sympathize with the struggles and setbacks that often burden hearts and take away hope.

That is why Jesus, on that day, saw, went aboard and sat down.

First, Jesus saw. He has a discerning gaze that, even amid the great crowd, makes him able to spot two boats approaching the shore and to see the disappointment on the faces of those fishermen, now washing their empty nets after a night of fruitless labour. Jesus looks with compassion at those men. Let us never forget this: the compassion of God. God’s three attitudes are closeness, compassion and tenderness. Let us not forget: God is near, God is tender and God is always compassionate. Jesus looks with compassion at the expressions of those men, sensing their discouragement and frustration after having worked all night and caught nothing, their hearts as empty as the nets they haul.

Excuse me, I will now ask the Master [of Liturgical Celebrations] to continue reading due to my difficulty in breathing.

Seeing their discouragement, Jesus went aboard. He asks Simon to put out a little way from the shore and he climbs aboard the boat. In this way, he enters into Simon’s life and shares in his sense of disappointment and futility. This is significant: Jesus does not simply stand by and watch as things go wrong, as we often do, and then complain bitterly. Rather, taking the initiative, he approaches Simon, spends time with him at that difficult moment and chooses to board the boat of his life, which that night had seemed fraught with failure.

Then, once aboard, Jesus sat down. In the Gospels, this is typical of a master, of one who teaches others. Indeed, the Gospel states that Jesus sat down and taught. Glimpsing in those fishers’ eyes and hearts the frustration of a night of fruitless toil, Jesus boards the boat in order to proclaim the good news, to bring light to the dark night of disappointment, to tell of the beauty of God even amid the struggles of life, and to reaffirm that hope endures even when all seems lost.

Then the miracle happens: when the Lord gets into the boat of our lives to bring us the good news of God’s love that constantly accompanies and sustains us, then life begins anew, hope is reborn, enthusiasm revives, and we can once again cast our nets into the sea.

Brothers and sisters, this message of hope accompanies us today as we celebrate the Jubilee of the Armed Forces, Police and Security Personnel. I thank all of you for your service, and I greet all the Authorities present, the military associations and academies, and the military Ordinaries and chaplains. All of you have been entrusted with a lofty mission that embraces numerous aspects of social and political life: defending our nations, maintaining security, upholding legality and justice. You are present in penitentiaries and at the forefront of the fight against crime and the various forms of violence that threaten to disrupt the life of society. I think too of all those engaged in relief work in the wake of natural disasters, the safeguarding of the environment, rescue efforts at sea, the protection of the vulnerable and the promotion of peace.

The Lord also asks you to do as he does: to see, to go aboard and to sit down. To see, because you are called to keep your eyes ever open, alert to threats to the common good, to dangers menacing the lives of your fellow citizens, and to environmental, social and political risks to which we are exposed. To go aboard, because your uniforms, the discipline that has shaped you, the courage that is your hallmark, the oath you have taken — all these are things that remind you of the importance not only of seeing evil in order to report it, but also of boarding the storm-tossed boat and working to ensure that it does not run aground. For that too is part of your mission in the service of the good, freedom, and justice. Then, finally, to sit down, because your presence in our cities and neighbourhoods to uphold law and order, and your taking the part of the defenceless, can serve as a lesson for all of us. They teach us that goodness can prevail over everything. They teach us that justice, fairness and civic responsibility remain as necessary nowadays as ever. They teach us that we can create a more human, just and fraternal world, despite the opposing forces of evil.

In carrying out your work, which embraces your whole life, you are accompanied by your chaplains, an important priestly presence in your midst. Their job is not — as has at times unfortunately happened in history — to bless perverse acts of war. No. They are in your midst as the presence of Christ, who desires to walk at your side, to offer you a listening and sympathetic ear, to encourage you to set out ever anew and to support you in your daily service. As a source of moral and spiritual support, they accompany you at every step and help you to carry out your mission in the light of the Gospel and in the pursuit of the common good.

Dear brothers and sisters, we are grateful for what you do, at times at great personal risk. Thank you because by boarding our storm-tossed boats, you offer us protection and encourage us to stay our course. At the same time, I would encourage you never to lose sight of the purpose of your service and all your activity, which is to promote life, to save lives, to be a constant defender of life. And I ask you, please, to be vigilant. Be vigilant against the temptation to cultivate a warlike spirit. Be vigilant not to be taken in by the illusion of power and the roar of arms. Be vigilant lest you be poisoned by propaganda that instils hatred, divides the world into friends to be defended and foes to fight. Instead, be courageous witnesses of the love of God our Father, who wants us all to be brothers and sisters. Together, then, let us set out to be artisans of a new era of peace, justice and fraternity.

Angelus after
Holy Mass for the Jubilee of the Armed Forces, Police and Security Personnel

Saint Peter’s Square
Sunday, 9 February 2025

Armed service must be exercised in sacred respect for life

Dear brothers and sisters,

Before concluding the celebration, I wish to greet all of you, who have brought to life this Jubilee pilgrimage of the Armed Forces, Police and Security Forces. I thank the distinguished civil Authorities for their presence, and the military Ordinaries and Chaplains for their pastoral service. I extend my greeting to all military personnel throughout the world, and I would like to recall the teaching of the Church in this regard. The Second Vatican Council says: “Those too who devote themselves to the military service of their country should regard themselves as the agents of security and freedom of peoples” (Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et spes, 79). This armed service is to be exercised only for legitimate defense, never to impose dominion over other nations, always observing the international conventions on matters of conflict (cf. ibid.), and before that, in sacred respect for life and creation.

Brothers and sisters, let us pray for peace, in martyred Ukraine, in Palestine, in Israel and throughout the Middle East, in Myanmar, in Kivu, and in Sudan. Let arms be silent everywhere, and let the cry of the peoples, who are asking for peace, be heard!

Let us entrust our prayer to the intercession of the Virgin Mary, Queen of Peace.

Letter to Bishops of the United States of America

Monday, 10 February 2025

Christian love builds a fraternity open to all, without exception

Dear Brothers in the Episcopate,

I am writing today to address a few words to you in these delicate moments that you are living as Pastors of the People of God who walk together in the United States of America.

1. The journey from slavery to freedom that the People of Israel traveled, as narrated in the Book of Exodus, invites us to look at the reality of our time, so clearly marked by the phenomenon of migration, as a decisive moment in history to reaffirm not only our faith in a God who is always close, incarnate, migrant and refugee, but also the infinite and transcendent dignity of every human person.1

2. These words with which I begin are not an artificial construct. Even a cursory examination of the Church’s social doctrine emphatically shows that Jesus Christ is the true Emmanuel (cf. Mt 1:23); he did not live apart from the difficult experience of being expelled from his own land because of an imminent risk to his life, and from the experience of having to take refuge in a society and a culture foreign to his own. The Son of God, in becoming man, also chose to live the drama of immigration. I like to recall, among other things, the words with which Pope Pius xii began his Apostolic Constitution on the Care of Migrants, which is considered the “Magna Carta” of the Church’s thinking on migration:

“The family of Nazareth in exile, Jesus, Mary and Joseph, emigrants in Egypt and refugees there to escape the wrath of an ungodly king, are the model, the example and the consolation of emigrants and pilgrims of every age and country, of all refugees of every condition who, beset by persecution or necessity, are forced to leave their homeland, beloved family and dear friends for foreign lands.”2

3. Likewise, Jesus Christ, loving everyone with a universal love, educates us in the permanent recognition of the dignity of every human being, without exception. In fact, when we speak of “infinite and transcendent dignity,” we wish to emphasize that the most decisive value possessed by the human person surpasses and sustains every other juridical consideration that can be made to regulate life in society. Thus, all the Christian faithful and people of good will are called upon to consider the legitimacy of norms and public policies in the light of the dignity of the person and his or her fundamental rights, not vice versa.

4. I have followed closely the major crisis that is taking place in the United States with the initiation of a program of mass deportations. The rightly formed conscience cannot fail to make a critical judgment and express its disagreement with any measure that tacitly or explicitly identifies the illegal status of some migrants with criminality. At the same time, one must recognize the right of a nation to defend itself and keep communities safe from those who have committed violent or serious crimes while in the country or prior to arrival. That said, the act of deporting people who in many cases have left their own land for reasons of extreme poverty, insecurity, exploitation, persecution or serious deterioration of the environment, damages the dignity of many men and women, and of entire families, and places them in a state of particular vulnerability and defenselessness.

5. This is not a minor issue: an authentic rule of law is verified precisely in the dignified treatment that all people deserve, especially the poorest and most marginalized. The true common good is promoted when society and government, with creativity and strict respect for the rights of all — as I have affirmed on numerous occasions — welcomes, protects, promotes and integrates the most fragile, unprotected and vulnerable. This does not impede the development of a policy that regulates orderly and legal migration. However, this development cannot come about through the privilege of some and the sacrifice of others. What is built on the basis of force, and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly.

6. Christians know very well that it is only by affirming the infinite dignity of all that our own identity as persons and as communities reaches its maturity. Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups. In other words: the human person is not a mere individual, relatively expansive, with some philanthropic feelings! The human person is a subject with dignity who, through the constitutive relationship with all, especially with the poorest, can gradually mature in his identity and vocation. The true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the “Good Samaritan” (cf. Lk 10:25-37), that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.3

7. But worrying about personal, community or national identity, apart from these considerations, easily introduces an ideological criterion that distorts social life and imposes the will of the strongest as the criterion of truth.

8. I recognize your valuable efforts, dear brother bishops of the United States, as you work closely with migrants and refugees, proclaiming Jesus Christ and promoting fundamental human rights. God will richly reward all that you do for the protection and defense of those who are considered less valuable, less important or less human!

9. I exhort all the faithful of the Catholic Church, and all men and women of good will, not to give in to narratives that discriminate against and cause unnecessary suffering to our migrant and refugee brothers and sisters. With charity and clarity we are all called to live in solidarity and fraternity, to build bridges that bring us ever closer together, to avoid walls of ignominy and to learn to give our lives as Jesus Christ gave his for the salvation of all.

10. Let us ask Our Lady of Guadalupe to protect individuals and families who live in fear or pain due to migration and/or deportation. May the “Virgen morena”, who knew how to reconcile peoples when they were at enmity, grant us all to meet again as brothers and sisters, within her embrace, and thus take a step forward in the construction of a society that is more fraternal, inclusive and respectful of the dignity of all.

Fraternally,

Francis

------------------

1  Cf. Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration Dignitas infinita on human dignity, 2 April 2024.

2  Pius xii, Apostolic Constitution Exsul Familia, 1 August 1952: “Exsul Familia Nazarethana Iesus, Maria, Ioseph, cum ad Aegyptum emigrans tum in Aegypto profuga impii regis iram aufugiens, typus, exemplar et praesidium exstat omnium quorumlibet temporum et locorum emigrantium, peregrinorum ac profugorum omne genus, qui, vel metu persecutionum vel egestate compulsi, patrium locum suavesque parentes et propinquos ac dulces amicos derelinquere coguntur et aliena petere.”

3  Cf. Francis, Encyclical Letter Fratelli Tutti, 3 October 2020.

Message to the President of the
French Republic
H.E. Emmanuel Macron
on the occasion of the
“Artificial Intelligence Action Summit”

10 to 11 February 2025

A tool to fight poverty and protect local cultures

Mr President, Your Excellencies, Distinguished Participants,

Upon learning of your praiseworthy initiative to convene a Summit on Artificial Intelligence in Paris from 10 to 11 February 2025, I was pleased to see, Mr President, that you chose to devote the Summit to action in the area of artificial intelligence.

During our meeting in Puglia in the context of the G7, I had occasion to stress the urgent need to “ensure and safeguard a space for proper human control over the choices made by artificial intelligence programmes”. I am convinced that, lacking such control, artificial intelligence, albeit an “exciting” new tool, could show its most “fearsome” side by posing a threat to human dignity (cf. Address to the G7 Session on Artificial Intelligence, 14 June 2024).

I therefore appreciate the efforts under way to embark with courage and determination upon a political process aimed at defending humanity from a use of artificial intelligence that could “limit our worldview to realities expressible in numbers and enclosed in predetermined categories, thereby excluding the contribution of other forms of truth and imposing uniform anthropological, socio-economic and cultural models” (ibid.). I am likewise pleased that in this Paris Summit you have sought to include the greatest possible number of actors and experts in a reflection meant to produce concrete results.

In my most recent Encyclical Letter Dilexit Nos, I distinguished between the operation of algorithms and the power of the “heart”, a concept dear to the great philosopher and scientist Blaise Pascal, to whom I devoted an Apostolic Letter on the fourth centenary of his birth (cf. Sublimitas et Miseria Hominis, 19 June 2023). I did so in order to emphasize that, while algorithms can be used to manipulate and mislead, the “heart”, understood as the seat of our deepest and most authentic sentiments, can never deceive (cf. Encyclical Letter Dilexit Nos, 24 October 2024, 14-20).

I ask all those attending the Paris Summit not to forget that only the human “heart” can reveal the meaning of our existence (cf. Pascal, Pensées, Lafuma 418; Sellier 680). I ask you to take as a given the principle expressed so elegantly by another great French philosopher, Jacques Maritain: “L’amour vaut plus que l’intelligence” (Réflexions sur l’intelligence, 1938).

Your efforts, dear friends, represent an outstanding example of a healthy politics that situates technological innovations within a greater project that seeks the common good and is thus “open to different opportunities which do not imply stifling human creativity and its ideals of progress, but rather directs that energy along new channels” (Encyclical Letter Laudato Si’, 24 May 2015, 191).

Artificial intelligence, I believe, can become a powerful tool in the hands of those scientists and experts who cooperate in finding innovative and creative solutions that promote the eco-sustainability of the earth, our common home, while not overlooking the high consumption of energy associated with the operation of artificial intelligence infrastructures.

In my Message for the 2024 World Day of Peace, which was devoted to artificial intelligence, I insisted that “in debates about the regulation of artificial intelligence, the voices of all stakeholders should be taken into account, including the poor, the powerless and others who often go unheard in global decision-making processes” (cf. Message for the lvii World Day of Peace, 1 January 2024, 8). In this regard, I trust that the Paris Summit will work for the creation of a platform of public interest on artificial intelligence, so that every nation can find in artificial intelligence an instrument for its development and its fight against poverty, but also for the protection of its local cultures and languages. Only in this way will every people on earth be able to contribute to the creation of the data employed by artificial intelligence, so that the latter will reflect the true diversity and richness that is the hallmark of our human family.

This year, the Holy See’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith and the Dicastery for Culture and Education jointly produced a “Note on the Relationship between Artificial Intelligence and Human Intelligence”. That document, published on 28 January last, examines several specific issues concerning artificial intelligence that this Summit is considering, as well as others that I believe to be of particular concern. It is my hope that future Summits will consider in greater detail the social effects of artificial intelligence on human relationships, information and education. Yet the fundamental question is, and will continue to be, human, namely: whether amid these technological advances, “man, as man, is becoming truly better, that is to say, more spiritually mature, more aware of the dignity of his humanity, more responsible, more open to others, especially the neediest and weakest” (cf. John Paul ii, Encyclical Letter Redemptor Hominis, 15). Our ultimate challenge will always remain mankind. May we never lose sight of this!

I thank you, Mr President, and I express my gratitude to all of you who have contributed to this Summit.

From the Vatican, 6 February 2025

Homily for Holy Mass
for the Jubilee of Artists

Sunday, 16 February 2025

Called to transform pain
into hope

The following homily was prepared by Pope Francis and read out by Cardinal José Tolentino de Mendonça.

In the Gospel we have just heard, Jesus proclaims the Beatitudes to his disciples and to a large crowd of people. We have heard them so many times, and yet they never cease to amaze us: “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh” (Lk 6:20-21). These words overturn our worldly mentality and invite us to look at reality with new eyes, with God’s gaze, so we can see beyond appearances and recognize beauty even amidst frailty and suffering.

The second part of the Gospel passage contains harsh and admonishing words: “But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. Woe to you who are full now, for you will be hungry. Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep” (Lk 6:24-25). The contrast between “blessed are you” and “woe to you” reminds us of the importance of discerning where we find our security.

As artists and representatives of the world of culture, you are called to be witnesses to the revolutionary vision of the Beatitudes. Your mission is not only to create beauty, but to reveal the truth, goodness and beauty hidden within the folds of history, to give voice to the voiceless, to transform pain into hope.

We live in a time of complex financial and social crises, but ours is above all a spiritual crisis, a crisis of meaning. Let us ask ourselves questions about time and about purpose. Are we pilgrims or wanderers? Does our journey have a destination, or are we directionless? Artists have the task of helping humanity not to lose its way and to keep a hopeful outlook.

Be aware, however, that hope is not easy, superficial or abstract. No! True hope is interwoven within the drama of human existence. Hope is not a convenient refuge, but a fire that burns and irradiates light, like the word of God. That is why authentic art always expresses an encounter with mystery, with the beauty that surpasses us, with the pain that challenges us, with the truth that calls us. Otherwise, “woe to us!” The Lord’s warning is stern.

As the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins wrote, “The world is charged with the grandeur of God. It will flame out, like shining from shook foil”. The mission of the artist is to discover this hidden greatness and reveal it, making it perceptible to our eyes and hearts. The same poet also perceived “the leaden echo” and “the golden echo” in the world. Artists are sensitive to these resonances, and through their work, they engage in discernment about the various echoes of the events of this world and help others to do the same. Men and women who represent the world of culture are called upon to evaluate these echoes, to explain them to us and to show us which path they lead us down: either they are seductive songs of sirens or authentic appeals to humanity. You are asked to provide insight in order to help distinguish between what is like “chaff scattered by the wind” and what is solid, “like trees planted by streams of water”, capable of bearing fruit (cf. Ps 1:3-4).

Dear artists, I see in you guardians of beauty who are willing to attend to the brokenness of our world, listen to the cry of those who are poor, suffering, wounded, imprisoned, persecuted or refugees. I see in you guardians of the Beatitudes! We live in a time when new walls are being erected, when differences become a pretext for division rather than an opportunity for mutual enrichment. But you, men and women of the world of culture, are called to build bridges, to create spaces for encounter and dialogue, to enlighten minds and warm hearts.

Some might say: “But what is the use of art in our wounded world? Are there not more urgent, more practical, more pressing things to do?”. And yet, art is not a luxury, but something that the spirit needs. It is not a flight from reality, but a charge, a call to action, an appeal and a cry. Educating about true beauty is educating about hope. And hope is never separated from the drama of existence; it runs through our daily struggles, the hardships of life and the challenges of our time.

In the Gospel we have heard today, Jesus proclaims as blessed those who are poor, afflicted, meek and persecuted. It is a change of mentality, a revolution of perspective. Artists are called to take part in this revolution. The world needs prophetic artists, courageous intellectuals and creators of culture.

Let the Gospel of the Beatitudes guide you, and may your art be a herald of a new world. Let us see your poetry! Never cease searching, questioning and taking risks. True art is never easy; it offers the peace of restlessness. And do not forget that hope is not an illusion; beauty is not a utopia. Yours is not a random gift but a calling. Respond, then, with generosity, passion and love.

Angelus after Holy Mass with artists

Sunday, 16 February, 2025

Art a universal language that spreads beauty

Brothers and Sisters, Happy Sunday!

A Eucharist was celebrated in the Vatican today, that was especially dedicated to the artists who have come from various parts of the world to experience the Jubilee days. I thank the Dicastery for Culture and Education for organizing this event, which reminds us of the importance of art as a universal language that spreads beauty and unites peoples, contributing to bringing harmony into the world and silencing every cry of war.

I wish to greet all the artists who have participated. I would have liked to be among you but, as you know, I am here at Gemelli Hospital because I still need some treatment for my bronchitis.

I greet all the pilgrims present in Rome today, especially the faithful from the Diocese of Parma, who have come on a diocesan pilgrimage, led by their bishop.

I invite everyone to continue to pray for peace in martyred Ukraine, Palestine, Israel and the entire Middle East, Myanmar, Kivu and Sudan.

Thank you for the affection, prayer and closeness with which you are accompanying me in these days, and I would like to thank the doctors and healthcare workers in this hospital for their care. They do such a valuable and tiring job. Let us support them with prayer!

And now let us entrust ourselves to Mary, “Full of Grace”, that she may help us be, like her, cantors and creators of the beauty that saves the world.

General Audience

Wednesday, 19 February 2025

For those attached to power Jesus is not hope but a threat

The following is the text of the catechesis of the Holy Father, prepared but not delivered, for the General Audience:

Dear brothers and sisters,

In the Gospels of Jesus’ childhood there is an episode which is exclusive to Matthew’s narrative: the visit of the Magi. Attracted by the appearance of a star, which in many cultures is the harbinger of the birth of an exceptional person, some wise men set out on a journey from the east, without knowing their exact destination. They were the Magi, people who did not belong to the people of the covenant. The last time, we spoke about the shepherds of Bethlehem, marginalized by Hebrew society because they were considered “impure”; today we encounter another category, the foreigners, who immediately went to pay homage to the Son of God who entered into history with an entirely unprecedented kingship. Hence, the Gospels tell us clearly that the poor and foreigners are invited among the first to meet God made child, the Saviour of the world.

The Magi were considered to be representatives of the primordial races, generated by the three sons of Noah; of the three continents known in antiquity: Asia, Africa and Europe; as well as the three phases of human life: youth, maturity and old age. Aside from all possible interpretations, they were men who did not stay still but, like the great chosen ones of biblical history, felt the call to move, to set out. They were men who were able to look beyond themselves, who knew how to look upwards.

The attraction for the star that appeared in the sky set them on the move to the land of Judaea, to Jerusalem, where they met King Herod. Their naivety and trust in asking for information about the newborn king of the Jews clashed with the shrewdness of Herod, who, troubled by the fear of losing his throne, immediately tried to obtain a clearer picture, contacting the scribes and asking them to investigate.

The power of the earthly ruler thus showed all his weakness. The experts knew the Scriptures and told the king the place where, according to Micah’s prophecy, the leader and shepherd of the people of Israel would be born (cf. Mi 5:1): little Bethlehem, and not great Jerusalem! Indeed, as Paul reminds the Corinthians, “God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong” (1 Cor 1:27).

However, the scribes, who were able to identify the Messiah’s birthplace with precision, showed the way to others, although they themselves did not move! Indeed, it is not enough to know the prophetic texts to tune in to divine frequencies. One must allow them to burrow within and let the Word of God revive the yearning to seek and to kindle the desire to see God.

Then, acting in secret as the deceitful and violent do, Herod asked the Magi the precise moment of the appearance of the star and incited them to continue their journey and to return to bring him news, so that he too could go and adore the newborn. For those attached to power, Jesus was not the hope to be welcomed, but a threat to be eliminated!

When the Magi set off again, the star reappeared and led them to Jesus, the sign that creation and the prophetic word represent the alphabet with which God speaks and lets himself be found. The sight of the star inspired irrepressible joy in those men, because the Holy Spirit, who stirs the heart of whoever sincerely seeks God, also filled it with joy. Having entered the house, the Magi prostrated themselves, adored Jesus and offered him precious gifts, worthy of a king, worthy of God. Why? What did they see? An ancient author wrote that they saw, “a humble little body that the Word had assumed; but the glory of divinity was not hidden from them. They saw an infant child; but they worshiped God” (cf. Chromatius of Aquileia, Comment on the Gospel of Matthew, 5:1). The Magi thus became the first believers among the pagans, the image of the Church drawn together from every language and nation.

Dear brothers and sisters, let us, too, follow in the footsteps of the Magi, these “pilgrims of hope” with great courage, who turned their steps, hearts and goods towards the One who is the hope not only of Israel but of all peoples. Let us learn to adore God in his smallness, in his kingship that does not crush but rather sets us free and enables us to serve with dignity. And let us offer him the most beautiful gifts, to express our faith and our love to him.

Homily for the Jubilee of Deacons
Holy Mass and Ordinations to the Diaconate

Saint Peter’s Basilica
Sunday, 23 February 2025

Selfless servants and builders of communion

Monsignor Rino Fisichella, Pro-Prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization read the homily on Pope Francis’ behalf, as the Pontiff was in the hospital being treated for pneumonia.

The message of today’s readings can be summed up in a single word: “gratuity”. That is surely a word dear to you as deacons, gathered here for the Jubilee celebration. So, let us reflect on three specific aspects of this fundamental dimension of the Christian life in general and your ministry in particular: forgiveness, selfless service and communion.

First: forgiveness. The proclamation of forgiveness is an essential part of your ministry as deacons. Indeed, forgiveness is an indispensable element of every ecclesial vocation and a requirement of every human relationship. Jesus points to its necessity and importance when he says, “Love your enemies” (Lk 6:27). This is certainly true: if we are to grow together and to share in one another’s strengths and weaknesses, achievements and failures, we need to be able to forgive and to ask forgiveness, to rebuild relationships and even to choose not to withhold our love from those who hurt or betray us. A world that feels nothing but hatred towards its adversaries is a world without hope and without a future, doomed to endless war, divisions and vendettas. Sadly, this is what we are witnessing today, on many different levels and in all parts of the world. Forgiveness means preparing a welcoming and safe future for us and our communities. Deacons, personally charged with a ministry that carries them to the peripheries of our world, are committed to seeing — and teaching others to see — in everyone, even in those who do us wrong and cause us suffering, a hurting sister or brother, and hence one in greater need than anyone of reconciliation, guidance and help.

Today’s first reading speaks of this openness of heart, presenting us with David’s loyal and selfless love for Saul, his king but also his persecutor (cf. 1 Sam 26:2, 7-9, 12-13, 22-23). We see this again in the exemplary death of the deacon Stephen, who forgives those who are stoning him (cf. Acts 7:60). Above all, we find it exemplified in Jesus, the model of all diakonia, who, in “emptying” himself to the point of giving his life for us on the cross (cf. Phil 2:7), prays for those who crucify him and opens the gates of Paradise to the good thief (cf. Lk 23:34, 43).

This brings us to the second point: selfless service. The Lord describes it in the Gospel in words that are simple and clear: “Do good and lend, expecting nothing in return” (Lk 6:35). A phrase that is brief, yet evokes the beauty of friendship. First, God’s friendship towards us, but also our own friendship. For you as deacons, selfless service is not a secondary aspect of your activity, but an essential dimension of your very being. Indeed, through your ministry, you devote yourselves to being “sculptors” and “painters” of the merciful face of the Father, and witnesses to the mystery of the Triune God.

In many Gospel passages, Jesus speaks of himself in this light. He does so with Philip, in the Upper Room, when, shortly after washing the feet of the Twelve, he says: “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” (Jn 14:9). And again, when he institutes the Eucharist, he says: “I am among you as one who serves” (Lk 22:27). Yet even earlier, on the way to Jerusalem, when his disciples had argued among themselves about who was the greatest, he had explained that “the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (cf. Mk 10:45).

Brother deacons, the “gratuitous” work you carry out as an expression of your consecration to the charity of Christ thus becomes your primary proclamation of God’s word, a source of confidence and joy for those who encounter you. As often as possible, perform it with a smile, without complaining and without seeking recognition, supporting one another, also in your relationships with bishops and priests, “as the expression of a Church committed to growing in the service of the Kingdom by appreciating all the grades of the ordained ministry” (Italian Episcopal Conference, Permanent Deacons in the Church in Italy. Guidelines and Norms, 1993, 55). Through your cooperation and generosity, you will be a bridge linking the altar to the street and the Eucharist to people’s daily lives. Charity will be your most beautiful liturgy and the liturgy your humblest service.

Now, we come to the final point: gratuity as a source of communion. Giving and expecting nothing in return unites; it creates bonds because it expresses and nurtures a togetherness that has no other aim but the gift of self and the good of others. Saint Lawrence, your patron, when asked by his accusers to hand over the treasures of the Church, showed them the poor and said: “These are our treasures!” That is how communion is built: by telling your brothers and sisters by your words but above all by your actions, both individually and as a community: “You are important to us;” “We love you;” “We want you to be part of our journey and our life.” This is precisely what you do. Those of you who are permanent deacons do so as husbands, fathers and grandparents who, by your service, choose to extend your families to include the needy in all the places where you live.

Dear deacons, your mission sets you apart from society only to be re-immersed in it in order to enable it to be an ever more open and welcoming place for everyone. It is one of the finest expressions of a synodal Church, one that “goes forth.”

Soon some of you, in receiving the sacrament of Holy Orders, will “descend” the steps of the ministry. I deliberately say “descend,” and not “ascend,” because being ordained is not an ascent but a descent, whereby we make ourselves small. We lower ourselves and divest ourselves. In the words of Saint Paul, through service, we leave behind the “earthly man,” and put on, in charity, the “man of heaven” (cf. 1 Cor 15:45-49).

Let us all reflect on what we are about to do, even as we entrust ourselves to the Virgin Mary, the handmaid of the Lord, and to Saint Lawrence, your patron. May they help us to experience every expression of our ministry with a humble and loving heart, and to be, in “gratuity,” apostles of forgiveness, selfless servants of our brothers and sisters, and builders of communion.

Angelus

Sunday, 23 February 2025

Bringing God’s love and mercy to everyone

Brothers and Sisters,
Happy Sunday!

This morning, during a Eucharistic celebration in Saint Peter’s Basilica, some candidates to the diaconate were ordained. I greet them and participants in the Jubilee of Deacons, which recently took place in the Vatican. And I thank the Dicasteries for the Clergy and for Evangelization for organizing this event.

Dear brother Deacons, you dedicate yourselves to proclaiming the Word and to the service of charity. You carry out your ministry in the Church with words and deeds, bringing God’s love and mercy to everyone. I urge you to continue your apostolate with joy and — as today’s Gospel suggests — to be a sign of a love that embraces everyone, that transforms evil into goodness and engenders a fraternal world. Do not be afraid to risk love!

As for me, I am confidently continuing my hospitalization at Gemelli Hospital, carrying on with the necessary treatment. And rest is also part of the therapy! I sincerely thank the doctors and health workers of this hospital for the attention they are showing me and for the dedication with which they carry out their service among the sick.

Tomorrow will be the third anniversary of the large-scale war against Ukraine: a painful and shameful occasion for all of humanity! As I reiterate my closeness to the suffering Ukrainian people, I invite you to remember the victims of all armed conflicts, and to pray for the gift of peace in Palestine, Israel and throughout the Middle East, as well as in Myanmar, Kivu and Sudan.

I have received many messages of affection in the last few days, and I was particularly struck by the letters and drawings from children. Thank you for this closeness, and for the prayers of comfort I have received from all over the world! I entrust you all to the intercession of Mary, and I ask you to pray for me.

Message for Lent

Released Tuesday, 25 February 2025

Let us journey together in hope

Dear brothers and sisters,

We begin our annual pilgrimage of Lent in faith and hope with the penitential rite of the imposition of ashes. The Church, our mother and teacher, invites us to open our hearts to God’s grace, so that we can celebrate with great joy the paschal victory of Christ the Lord over sin and death, which led Saint Paul to exclaim: “Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” (1 Cor 15:54-55). Indeed, Jesus Christ, crucified and risen, is the heart of our faith and the pledge of our hope in the Father’s great promise, already fulfilled in his beloved Son: life eternal (cf. Jn 10:28; 17:3).1

This Lent, as we share in the grace of the Jubilee Year, I would like to propose a few reflections on what it means to journey together in hope, and on the summons to conversion that God in his mercy addresses to all of us, as individuals and as a community.

First of all, to journey. The Jubilee motto, “Pilgrims of Hope”, evokes the lengthy journey of the people of Israel to the Promised Land, as recounted in the Book of Exodus. This arduous path from slavery to freedom was willed and guided by the Lord, who loves his people and remains ever faithful to them. It is hard to think of the biblical exodus without also thinking of those of our brothers and sisters who in our own day are fleeing situations of misery and violence in search of a better life for themselves and their loved ones. A first call to conversion thus comes from the realization that all of us are pilgrims in this life; each of us is invited to stop and ask how our lives reflect this fact. Am I really on a journey, or am I standing still, not moving, either immobilized by fear and hopelessness or reluctant to move out of my comfort zone? Am I seeking ways to leave behind the occasions of sin and situations that degrade my dignity? It would be a good Lenten exercise for us to compare our daily life with that of some migrant or foreigner, to learn how to sympathize with their experiences and in this way discover what God is asking of us so that we can better advance on our journey to the house of the Father. This would be a good “examination of conscience” for all of us wayfarers.

Second, to journey together. The Church is called to walk together, to be synodal.2 Christians are called to walk at the side of others, and never as lone travellers. The Holy Spirit impels us not to remain self-absorbed, but to leave ourselves behind and keep walking towards God and our brothers and sisters.3 Journeying together means consolidating the unity grounded in our common dignity as children of God (cf. Gal 3:26-28). It means walking side-by-side, without shoving or stepping on others, without envy or hypocrisy, without letting anyone be left behind or excluded. Let us all walk in the same direction, tending towards the same goal, attentive to one another in love and patience.

This Lent, God is asking us to examine whether in our lives, in our families, in the places where we work and spend our time, we are capable of walking together with others, listening to them, resisting the temptation to become self-absorbed and to think only of our own needs. Let us ask ourselves in the presence of the Lord whether, as bishops, priests, consecrated persons and laity in the service of the Kingdom of God, we cooperate with others. Whether we show ourselves welcoming, with concrete gestures, to those both near and far. Whether we make others feel a part of the community or keep them at a distance.4 This, then, is a second call to conversion: a summons to synodality.

Third, let us journey together in hope, for we have been given a promise. May the hope that does not disappoint (cf. Rom 5:5), the central message of the Jubilee,5 be the focus of our Lenten journey towards the victory of Easter. As Pope Benedict xvi taught us in the Encyclical Spe Salvi, “the human being needs unconditional love. He needs the certainty which makes him say: ‘neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord’ (Rom 8:38-39)”.6 Christ, my hope, has risen!7 He lives and reigns in glory. Death has been transformed into triumph, and the faith and great hope of Christians rests in this: the resurrection of Christ!

This, then, is the third call to conversion: a call to hope, to trust in God and his great promise of eternal life. Let us ask ourselves: Am I convinced that the Lord forgives my sins? Or do I act as if I can save myself? Do I long for salvation and call upon God’s help to attain it? Do I concretely experience the hope that enables me to interpret the events of history and inspires in me a commitment to justice and fraternity, to care for our common home and in such a way that no one feels excluded?

Sisters and brothers, thanks to God’s love in Jesus Christ, we are sustained in the hope that does not disappoint (cf. Rom 5:5). Hope is the “sure and steadfast anchor of the soul”.8 It moves the Church to pray for “everyone to be saved” (1 Tim 2:4) and to look forward to her being united with Christ, her bridegroom, in the glory of heaven. This was the prayer of Saint Teresa of Avila: “Hope, O my soul, hope. You know neither the day nor the hour. Watch carefully, for everything passes quickly, even though your impatience makes doubtful what is certain, and turns a very short time into a long one” (The Exclamations of the Soul to God, 15:3).9

May the Virgin Mary, Mother of Hope, intercede for us and accompany us on our Lenten journey.

Rome, Saint John Lateran, 6 February 2025
Memorial of St Paul Miki and Companions, martyrs.

Francis

1  Cf. Encyclical Letter Dilexit Nos (24 October 2024), 220.

2  Cf. Homily for the Mass and Canonization of Giovanni Battista Scalabrini and Artemide Zatti, 9 October 2022.

3  Ibid.

4  Ibid.

5  Cf. Bull Spes Non Confundit, 1.

6  Encyclical Letter Spe Salvi (30 November 2007), 26.

7  Cf. Easter Sequence.

8  Cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1820.

9  Ibid, 1821.