The faithful are called to leave behind “all passivity and indifference” toward current events and the lives of others, especially amid the “rapid and profound changes we are experiencing today”, Pope Leo XIV said at his audience. Source: OSV News.
“We cannot remain as unengaged spectators; rather, we must listen with our hearts, allow ourselves to be challenged, and become involved,” the Pope said yesterday in St Peter’s Square.
“With Christ and sustained by the power of His Spirit, believers are called to take on the burdens of their brothers and sisters, especially those who are crushed by injustice, discrimination and violence,” he said.
Pope Leo began a new series of reflections on the Second Vatican Council’s pastoral constitution “Gaudium et Spes”, which examines the relationship between the Church and the modern world.
Recalling St John XXIII’s warning against the “prophets of doom” who regarded their own times as worse than the past, Pope Leo said Christians are instead called to share in the life of humanity as Christ did.
Such closeness to humanity, the Pope said, also opens the way to a deeper understanding of events and of Revelation itself.
“This is not, in fact, merely a moral imperative,” he said.
Addressing English-speaking pilgrims, Pope Leo said it is the Church’s pastoral responsibility to engage with the contemporary world, share in its joys and sorrows and advocate for the poor and marginalised.
The Church, he said, also must remain “attentive to the signs of the times” confronting “pressing issues such as the technological progress that benefits only some and the persistence of widespread poverty”.
His remarks came months after the publication of his first encyclical, “Magnifica Humanitas”, which detailed his account of the global implications of artificial intelligence and warned against allowing technological development to proceed without prioritising human dignity.
FULL STORY
Catholics cannot be ‘unengaged spectators’ amid current events, Pope says (By Josephine Peterson, OSV News)
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