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Pope: Liturgical formation must be renewed with ‘new paths and methods'

Pope Leo XIV encourages the formation of “those who proclaim the Word of God” to support the liturgical initiation of the faithful and a deeper understanding of Christian worship.

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Pope: Safeguard human dignity as health systems integrate AI

Pope Leo XIV reflects on the need for an ethical approach to healthcare systems, especially in light of the growing use of Artificial Intelligence and technological innovation as tools for management and optimisation of resources.

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Pope: No pain can extinguish our reflection of God’s goodness

Pope Leo XIV encourages consecrated religious to build communities that respect the dignity of every person, in a message sent to a conference promoted by the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors.

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Synod: Interim reports of Study Groups published

Established by Pope Francis in March 2024, the Study Groups have delivered reports on the work carried out so far, starting from the conclusion of the Synod on Synodality. The deadline for delivering the final reports to Leo XIV has been set for 31 December. Among the topics covered are the digital mission, the role of women, ecumenism, polygamy, liturgy, the ministry of nuncios, and the selection of bishops.

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Pope assures the poor they are loved by God, calls on governments to act

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Before joining hundreds of people for lunch, Pope Leo XIV celebrated Mass for the Jubilee of the Poor and prayed that all Christians would share "the love of God, which welcomes, binds up wounds, forgives, consoles and heals."

With thousands of migrants, refugees, unhoused people, the unemployed and members of the trans community present in St. Peter's Basilica or watching from St. Peter's Square, Pope Leo assured them, "In the midst of persecution, suffering, struggles and oppression in our personal lives and in society, God does not abandon us."

Rather, "he reveals himself as the one who takes our side," the pope said in his homily Nov. 16, the church's celebration of the World Day of the Poor. 

Pope Leo gives his homily at Mass for the Jubilee of the Poor
Pope Leo XIV gives his homily as he celebrates Mass for the Jubilee of the Poor in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican Nov. 16, 2025. (CNS photo/Lola Gomez)

Volunteers with Vatican, diocesan and Rome-based Catholic charities joined the people they assist for the Mass. The French charity Fratello organized an international pilgrimage, bringing hundreds of people to Rome for the Mass, visits to the major basilicas of Rome and prayer services.

The Vatican said 6,000 people were at Mass in the basilica and another 20,000 people watched on screens from St. Peter's Square. By the time Pope Leo led the recitation of the Angelus prayer, some 40,000 people were in the square.

After the Angelus, as part of the celebration of the 400th anniversary of their foundation, the Vincentian Fathers sponsored and served lunch for the pope and his guests. Members of the Daughters of Charity and volunteers from Vincentian organizations helped serve the meal and handed out 1,500 backpacks filled with food and hygiene products.

The luncheon featured a first course of vegetable lasagna, followed by chicken cutlets and vegetables and ending with baba, a small Neapolitan cake soaked in syrup. Rolls, fruit, water and soft drinks also were on offer. 

Pope Leo speaks before lunch for the Jubilee of the Poor
Pope Leo XIV speaks to attendees before having lunch with hundreds of people assisted by church charities in the Paul VI Audience Hall at the Vatican Nov. 16, 2025. (CNS photo/Lola Gomez)

Before the Mass, Father Tomaž Mavrič, superior general of the Vincentians, symbolically gave Pope Leo house keys from the Vincentians' "13 Houses Campaign." The name of the project, which has constructed homes for the poor around the world, is an homage to St. Vincent de Paul and his decision in 1643 to use an endowment from French King Louis XIII to build 13 small houses near the Vincentian headquarters in Paris to care for abandoned children.

In his homily at the Mass, Pope Leo noted how the Bible is "woven with this golden thread that recounts the story of God, who is always on the side of the little ones, orphans, strangers and widows."

In Jesus' life, death and resurrection, "God's closeness reaches the summit of love," he said. "For this reason, the presence and word of Christ become gladness and jubilee for the poorest, since he came to proclaim the good news to the poor and to preach the year of the Lord's favor."

While the pope thanked Catholics who assist the poor, he said he wanted the poor themselves to hear "the irrevocable words of the Lord Jesus himself: 'Dilexi te,' I have loved you." 

Pope Leo holds the Book of the Gospels
Pope Leo XIV elevates the Book of the Gospels during Mass for the Jubilee of the Poor in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican Nov. 16, 2025. (CNS photo/Lola Gomez)

"Yes, before our smallness and poverty, God looks at us like no one else and loves us with eternal love," the pope said, "And his church, even today, perhaps especially in our time, still wounded by old and new forms of poverty, hopes to be 'mother of the poor, a place of welcome and justice,'" he said, quoting his exhortation on love for the poor.

While there are many forms of poverty -- material, moral and spiritual -- the thing that cuts across all of them and particularly impacts young people is loneliness, he said. 

Pope Leo with his lunch guests
Pope Leo XIV and his guests enjoy a luncheon marking the Jubilee of the Poor Nov. 16, 2025, in the Vatican audience hall. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)

"It challenges us to look at poverty in an integral way, because while it is certainly necessary at times to respond to urgent needs, we also must develop a culture of attention, precisely in order to break down the walls of loneliness," the pope said. "Let us, then, be attentive to others, to each person, wherever we are, wherever we live."

Poverty is a challenge not only for those who believe in God, he said, calling on "heads of state and the leaders of nations to listen to the cry of the poorest."

"There can be no peace without justice," Pope Leo said, "and the poor remind us of this in many ways: through migration as well as through their cries, which are often stifled by the myth of well-being and progress that does not take everyone into account, and indeed forgets many individuals, leaving them to their fate."
 

Pope Leo celebrates Jubilee of the Poor

Pope Leo celebrates Jubilee of the Poor

Pope Leo celebrated the Jubilee of the Poor with a Mass in St. Peter's Basilica Nov. 16.

St. Margaret of Scotland: Saint of the Day for Sunday, November 16, 2025

St. Margaret of Scotland, or Margaret of Wessex, was an English princess born in Hungary to Princess Agatha of Hungary and English Prince Edward the Exile around 1045. Her siblings, Cristina and Edgar the Atheling were also born in Hungary around this time. Margaret and her family returned to England when she was 10-years-old and her father was called back as a potential successor to the throne. However, Edward died immediately after the family arrived, but Margaret and Edgar continued to ...

Pope asks big names in film to continue to challenge, inspire, give hope

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Meeting an international cast of film directors and actors, Pope Leo XIV spoke about the power of cinema to help people "contemplate and understand life, to recount its greatness and fragility and to portray the longing for infinity." 

Pope Leo shakes hands with actor Cate Blanchett
Pope Leo XIV greets Australian actor Cate Blanchett during a meeting with film directors and actors in the Clementine Hall of the Apostolic Palace at the Vatican Nov. 15, 2025. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)

Sitting in the front row of the Vatican's frescoed Clementine Hall Nov. 15 were, among others: directors Gus Van Sant and Spike Lee and actors Monica Bellucci, Cate Blanchett, Viggo Mortensen and Sergio Castellitto, who played the traditionalist Cardinal Tedesco in the 2024 film "Conclave."

In a video released a few days before the meeting, Pope Leo said his four favorite films were: "It's a Wonderful Life," the 1946 film directed by Frank Capra; "The Sound of Music," the 1965 film by Robert Wise; "Ordinary People," the 1980 film directed by Robert Redford; and "Life Is Beautiful," Roberto Benigni's 1997 film.

Pope Leo asked the directors and actors to "defend slowness when it serves a purpose, silence when it speaks and difference when evocative."

"Beauty is not just a means of escape," he told them; "it is above all an invocation." 

Pope Leo speaks to film actors and directors
Pope Leo XIV meets with film directors and actors in the Clementine Hall of the Apostolic Palace at the Vatican Nov. 15, 2025. Director Gus Van Sant is second from the left. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)

"When cinema is authentic, it does not merely console, but challenges," he said. "It articulates the questions that dwell within us, and sometimes, even provokes tears that we did not know we needed to express."

Pope Leo acknowledged the challenges facing cinema with the closing of theaters and the increasing release of films directly to streaming services.

The theaters, like all public cultural spaces, are important to a community, he said.

But even more, the pope said, "entering a cinema is like crossing a threshold. In the darkness and silence, vision becomes sharper, the heart opens up and the mind becomes receptive to things not yet imagined." 

Pope Leo with actor Sergio Castellitto
Pope Leo XIV greets Italian actor Sergio Castellitto, who played the traditionalist Cardinal Tedesco in the 2024 film "Conclave," during a meeting with film directors and actors in the Clementine Hall of the Apostolic Palace at the Vatican Nov. 15, 2025. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)

At a time where people are almost constantly in front of screens, he said, cinema offers more. "It is a sensory journey in which light pierces the darkness and words meet silence. As the plot unfolds, our mind is educated, our imagination broadens and even pain can find new meaning."

People need "witnesses of hope, beauty and truth," Pope Leo said, telling the directors and actors that they can be those witnesses.

"Good cinema and those who create and star in it have the power to recover the authenticity of imagery in order to safeguard and promote human dignity," he said.

Being authentic, the pope said, means not being afraid "to confront the world's wounds. Violence, poverty, exile, loneliness, addiction and forgotten wars are issues that need to be acknowledged and narrated."

"Good cinema does not exploit pain," Pope Leo said. "It recognizes and explores it."

"Giving voice to the complex, contradictory and sometimes dark feelings that dwell in the human heart is an act of love," he told them. "Art must not shy away from the mystery of frailty; it must engage with it and know how to remain before it."

Coming to the Vatican during the Jubilee of hope, he said, the directors and actors join millions of pilgrims who have made the journey over the past year.

"Your journey is not measured in kilometers but in images, words, emotions, shared memories and collective desires," the pope told them. "You navigate this pilgrimage into the mystery of human experience with a penetrating gaze that is capable of recognizing beauty even in the depths of pain, and of discerning hope in the tragedy of violence and war."

The pope prayed that their work would "never lose its capacity to amaze and even continue to offer us a glimpse, however small, of the mystery of God."

 

Pope Leo meets cinema greats

Pope Leo meets cinema greats

Pope Leo met an international group of film actors and directors, including Spike Lee and Gus Van Sant at the Vatican Nov. 15, telling them their art can offer hope, reveal truth, and confront the world’s wounds with authenticity.

St. Albert the Great: Saint of the Day for Saturday, November 15, 2025

The saint and doctor of the Church who would be known as Albertus Magnus was born sometime before the year 1200. He was probably born in Bavaria, a fact we infer because he referred to himself as "Albert of Lauingen," a town which still stands today in southern Germany. We do not know for sure all the details of his family origins, but we know he was well educated. He attended the University of Padua where he learned about Aristotle and his writings. This instruction in philosophy would ...

St. Lawrence O'Toole: Saint of the Day for Friday, November 14, 2025

St. Lawrence, it appears, was born about the year 1125. When only ten years old, his father delivered him up as a hostage to Dermod Mac Murehad, King of Leinster, who treated the child with great inhumanity, until his father obliged the tyrant to put him in the hands of the Bishop of Glendalough, in the county of Wicklow. The holy youth, by his fidelity in corresponding with the divine grace, grew to be a model of virtues. On the death of the bishop, who was also abbot of the monastery, St. ...

St. Frances Xavier Cabrini: Saint of the Day for Thursday, November 13, 2025

St. Frances Xavier Cabrini was born as Maria Francesca Cabrini on July 15, 1850 in Sant' Angelo Lodigiano, Lombardy, Italy. She was born two months premature and the youngest of thirteen children. Unfortunately, only three of her siblings survived past adolescence and Frances would live most of her life in a fragile and delicate state of health. Frances became dedicated to living a life for religious work from a young age and received a convent education at a school ran by the Daughters of the ...