Pope Leo: "We are the Church of the Lord, a Church of the poor, all precious"

Albano Laziale (Agenzia Fides) – The Church of Christ is "a Church of the poor, all precious, all active participants, each one bearing a unique word from God." And the charity of Christ, which animates the Church, does not distinguish "between those who assist and those who are assisted, between those who seem to give and those who seem to receive, between those who appear poor and those who feel they offer time, skills, help." Pope Leo XIV recalled this in his homily during Mass in the Church of Santa Maria della Rotonda in Albano on Sunday, August 17. A Shrine "whose walls embrace us," as Pope Francis noted, referring to the circular shape of the ancient Shrine and using this architectural detail as an opportunity to point out some characteristics of the nature of the Church: "From the outside, the Church, like every human reality," the Successor of Peter observed, "may appear angular. However, its divine reality is revealed when we cross its threshold and receive hospitality." Then, "our poverty, our vulnerability, and above all, our failures" are "finally welcomed into the gentle strength of God, a love without rough edges, a love that is unconditional." And "Mary, the Mother of Jesus, is for us a sign and anticipation of the motherhood of God. In her, we become a Mother-Church that generates and renews, not by virtue of a worldly power, but through the virtue of love."

"Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but division (Luke 12:51)," Pope Leo quotes the Sunday Gospel, "which may surprise us." Yet Jesus does not give his peace "as the world gives it," which, as the Pope reminds us, "accustoms us to confusing peace with ease, good with tranquility."

Jesus "courageously immersed himself in our humanity." The "Baptism," to which he himself refers in the day's Gospel, "is the baptism of the cross, a total immersion in the risks that love entails." And "when we, as they say, 'receive Communion,' we are nourished by this bold gift of his." Attending Mass "nourishes the decision" to "no longer live for ourselves, but to bring fire to the world. Not the fire of weapons, nor the fire of words that burn others," but "the fire of love that serves, that counters indifference with care and arrogance with gentleness; the fire of goodness that does not cost as much as weapons, but freely renews the world." A decision that "may cost misunderstanding, ridicule, even persecution, but there is no greater peace than carrying its flame within oneself."

The Bishop of Rome then thanked "together with the Bishop of Albano Laziale, Vincenzo Vita, and all of you who strive in the diocese to carry the fire of charity" and encouraged them "to distinguish between those who help and those who are helped, between those who seem to give and those who seem to receive, between those who appear poor and those who have time, skills, and help to offer." "We are the Church of the Lord, a Church of the poor," the Pope recalled, "all valuable, all subjects, each a bearer of a unique Word of God." And the Church is "a single body in which even the weakest participates with full dignity." This happens, the Pope continued, "when the fire that Jesus wanted to bring burns away the prejudices, precautions, and fears that still exclude those who bear the poverty of Christ inscribed in their own history." "Let us not exclude the Lord from our churches, our homes, our lives. Rather, let us allow him to enter into the poor, and then we will also make peace with our own poverty, which we fear and deny when we seek tranquility and security at all costs."
Following Mass and the Angelus prayer in Piazza della Libertà in Castel Gandolfo, Pope Leo XIV had lunch with the needy cared for by Caritas of Albano (see photo) at the "Borgo Laudato Si'" in the gardens of the Pontifical Villas of Castel Gandolfo. (GV) (Agenzia Fides, 17/8/2025)

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