Author: Eric Deabill

ROME (OSV News) – On Ash Wednesday, Pope Leo XIV encouraged Catholics to ask the Lord for “the gift of true conversion” at the start of the 40-day penitential season of Lent.

Speaking to English-speaking pilgrims at his Wednesday general audience in St. Peter’s Square Feb. 18, the pope encouraged people to approach Lent as a time of “conversion of heart” so that “we may better respond to his love for us and share that love with those around us.”

“At the beginning of Lent, I urge you to live this liturgical season with an intense spirit of prayer so that you may arrive, inwardly renewed, at the celebration of the great mystery of Christ’s Resurrection, the supreme revelation of God’s merciful love,” Pope Leo added in Italian at the close of the audience on a sunny winter day in Rome.

Before the audience, the pope greeted pilgrims from the popemobile, frequently stopping to bless babies as he made his way through the square.

Continuing his weekly catechesis on the documents of the Second Vatican Council, Pope Leo offered a reflection on “Lumen Gentium,” the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, which he explained “presents the Church as both a sign and an instrument of this plan of salvation.”

He said the Church is a sign “because the Church community makes the unity established by Christ through his Cross and Resurrection visible to the world today” and an instrument as
“It is through the Church that God achieves the aim of bringing people to him and uniting them with one another.”

“As we journey through a world still marked by division, let us ask the Lord to continue to guide his Church in the mission of sanctification and reconciliation,” he said.

In his message for Lent this year, Pope Leo encouraged the faithful to embrace the “ancient ascetic practice” of fasting, as well as “refraining from words that offend and hurt our neighbor.”

Lent is a liturgical season of penance stretching from Ash Wednesday to Holy Thursday, during which Christians are encouraged to undertake voluntary acts of self-denial such as fasting and almsgiving, along with charitable and missionary works.

On Wednesday afternoon, Pope Leo will lead a solemn procession on Rome’s Aventine Hill from the Benedictine Basilica of Sant’Anselmo to the Dominican Basilica of Santa Sabina, retracing a papal procession route that dates back centuries.

The procession will culminate with the pope offering Ash Wednesday Mass at Santa Sabina, one of the oldest surviving Christian basilicas in Rome. Built in 422 A.D., the ancient church is the first stop in the Lenten Station Church pilgrimage, a tradition rooted in the early practice of the Bishop of Rome celebrating the liturgies of the church year at various churches throughout the city. By the latter half of the fifth century, a fairly fixed calendar had developed, with Mass held at different churches throughout Rome each day of the Lenten season.

The station church tradition has experienced something of an Anglophonic revival in recent decades, spearheaded by the Pontifical North American College, which has offered a 7 a.m. English-language Mass at the station churches each day of Lent in recent years.

On Feb. 18, hundreds of people, including many American college students and seminarians, attended an English-language Ash Wednesday Mass at Santa Sabina organized by the seminary.

WASHINGTON (OSV News) – As the U.S. prepares to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has encouraged Catholics to participate in initiatives including a collective 250 Hours of Adoration and 250 Works of Mercy.

To celebrate the occasion, “America 250,” the initiatives encourage prayer for the unity and healing of the U.S., according to a resource guide the USCCB has published. The conference previously said the U.S. bishops will consecrate the United States to the Sacred Heart of Jesus in June.

In his encyclical “Dilexit Nos,” Pope Francis “instructs us to ‘nourish our lives with the strength of the Eucharist’ in Holy Communion and Adoration, so that we might understand Christ’s love for all more deeply and live out this love ourselves,” the guide stated. “Our contemplation of the Sacred Heart leads us deeper into the mystery of our salvation and deeper into our love for Christ found in the faces of our sisters and brothers — especially those most in need.”

The guide said parishes can participate in 250 Hours of Adoration by offering a Holy Hour on a weekly or monthly basis leading up to the nation’s July 4 anniversary. It noted that this could include continuing current practices or inviting new people to join. It suggested similar efforts to carry out 250 Works of Mercy.

It includes resources for Holy Hours for life, peace, marriage, religious liberty, vocations, an end to racism, as well as a Sacred Heart Holy Hour.

“Consider hosting a holy hour or series of holy hours at your parish using the templates provided. … You may have other ways to invite members of your community to spend some time in prayer for our country with Jesus truly present in the Blessed Sacrament,” the guide said. “To prepare for the Consecration of the United States to the Sacred Heart, parishes can also incorporate the Litany of the Sacred Heart of Jesus into their Holy Hour.”

As examples of works of mercy, the guide encouraged parishes to find ways to assist women who are facing a crisis pregnancy; donate to food pantries and clothing closets, and community beautification programs; raise money for an overseas development project; sponsor a refugee family; tutor children; or volunteer at homeless shelters.

“The seven Corporal Works of Mercy come to us directly from the Scriptures in the Gospel of Matthew,” the guide said. “Rooted in our lives of faith, the actions that Jesus calls us to in feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, sheltering the homeless, visiting the sick and imprisoned, burying the dead, and giving alms are central elements of our Catholic identity.”

It quotes from Pope Leo XIV’s apostolic exhortation “Dilexi Te,” which itself draws on Pope Francis’ “Dilexit Nos”: “As we contemplate Christ’s love, ‘we too are inspired to be more attentive to the sufferings and needs of others, and confirmed in our efforts to share in his work of liberation as instruments for the spread of his love.'”

OSTIA LIDO, Italy (CNS) – An authentic Christian community knows how to sincerely and joyfully welcome everyone: Catholics, non-Catholics and people of no faith at all, Pope Leo XIV said.

“A true parish” is where “we all learn to say ‘Welcome,’ not only with words, but with a spirit of hospitality, opening the door and welcoming everyone,” he said, speaking to members of the community during his first visit to a parish in his Diocese of Rome.

The pope also celebrated Mass during which he encouraged the faithful to cultivate humble and peaceful hearts that are open to Christ, because “the evil we see in the world has its roots precisely there, where the heart becomes cold, hard and lacking in mercy.”

The pope’s early evening visit Feb. 15 was to the Roman parish of Santa Maria Regina Pacis in Ostia Lido — a seaside community 16 miles southwest of Rome.

Although it was his first visit to Ostia as pope, he had been to the area many times as an Augustinian friar because of the port town’s close connection to the story of St. Augustine and, especially, his mother, St. Monica, who died there in 387; her remains were moved to Rome in the 15th century.

Pope Leo emphasized the need to convert one’s heart for there to be peace in the world, in his homily during Mass inside the large 20th-century church of Santa Maria Regina Pacis.

The path to human fulfillment is fidelity to God based on respect and care for others, he said. But that has to be “cultivated first and foremost in the heart, even before in gestures and words.”

The heart is home to noble feelings and “painful profanations: closed-mindedness, envy, jealousy,” he said. “Those who think badly of their brother, harboring evil feelings toward him, are as if they were already killing him in their hearts.”

He recalled some of the difficulties facing residents in Ostia, including violence, substance abuse and criminal organizations.

He encouraged the parish community to continue its courageous efforts with other organizations “to spread the good seed of the Gospel in your streets and in your homes.”

“Do not resign yourselves to the culture of abuse and injustice. On the contrary, spread respect and harmony, beginning by disarming language and then investing energy and resources in education, especially for children and young people,” he said.

“Unfortunately, even today, many clouds still darken the world, with the spread of ideas contrary to the Gospel, which exalt the supremacy of the strongest, encourage arrogance, and fuel the seduction of victory at all costs, deaf to the cries of those who suffer and those who are defenseless,” the pope said.

“Let us oppose this tendency with the disarming power of meekness, continuing to ask for peace, and to welcome and cultivate its gift with tenacity and humility,” he said.

Pope Leo began the visit by greeting young people and families gathered behind the church. A clutch of gold mylar balloons — depicting a smiling lion and the numbers “one” and “four” — bopped and twisted in the strong breeze coming in off the Mediterranean Sea.

“You are the hope! And you must recognize that in your hearts, in your lives, in your youth, there is hope for today and tomorrow. Hope already begins here, because Jesus walks with us,” he told the small enthusiastic crowd outside.

Inside a nearby gym, home of the local “Starfish” basketball team, the pope thanked the community for their warm welcome. “This is one of the many signs of an authentic Christian community, of a true parish,” he said, emphasizing the need to receive “anyone who comes: Catholic, non-Catholic, believer, non-believer.”

Speaking to the young people, the elderly, people with disabilities, Caritas volunteers and the people they serve, the pope told those gathered that “Everyone is part of this parish family, and everyone has something to say, something to give, something to share.”

“May you have the courage to say ‘yes’ to the Lord!” he said. “Each person’s life has great value: whether I am young, whether I am old, whether I have difficulties or not, human life is a gift from God.”

Speaking to members of the parish’s pastoral council, the pope thanked them for generously offering their time and talent, helping the local clergy, church and faithful. However, “I also encourage you to go out and seek others.”

“Do not remain inside the church and say, ‘It’s OK, those who come are enough.’ It is never enough. Invite, welcome, accompany,” Pope Leo said.

(OSV News) – After Pope Leo XIV proclaimed the Jubilee Year of St. Francis from Jan. 10, 2026, to Jan. 10, 2027, the Vatican’s Apostolic Penitentiary also issued a decree granting a plenary indulgence to mark the 800th anniversary year of the popular saint’s death.

Listed among the “certain works” suggested to obtain the plenary indulgence is “a pious pilgrimage to Franciscan churches.”

But several Franciscans told OSV News they hope Catholics will do more than simply stop by — as much as they and their fellow friars would enjoy visitors.

They hope Catholics will also learn about the life and charism of their founder, and how St. Francis of Assisi (c.1181-1226) remains a model blend of contemplation and activity for contemporary Catholics.

“It’s an exciting year; I don’t think any of us would have anticipated that Pope Leo would have declared this,” said Father Jonathan St. Andre, a Third Order Regular Franciscan friar and vice president for Franciscan Life at Franciscan University of Steubenville in Ohio. “We figured the pope would go to Assisi; there would be different events. But to make this a jubilee, and to offer an indulgence … is just remarkable.”

The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains that an indulgence “is a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven.”

Bishop Krzysztof Nykiel, regent of the Apostolic Penitentiary, told Vatican News that the specific conditions to gain the Year of St. Francis indulgence include “sacramental confession, Eucharistic Communion, certain prayers according to the intentions of the Pope, interior detachment from sin, and the performance of certain works, such as a pious pilgrimage to Franciscan churches, participation in Jubilee celebrations, prayer and meditation in the Franciscan spirit, as well as daily acts of charity and humility that express the spirituality of St. Francis.”

The 13th-century Italian saint is known for renouncing his family’s wealth to embrace “Lady Poverty,” attracting followers who ultimately formed the first Franciscans, the Order of Friars Minor. His “spiritual sister” St. Clare of Assisi founded the likeminded Poor Clares.

Visitors to the 250-acre Franciscan University campus can see three Franciscan churches, including the newly renovated Christ the King Chapel. A fall academic conference — “Sister Death, Gate of Life” — will focus on St. Francis’ holistic vision of existence, the end of which he welcomed something like a cosmic relative by calling it “sister.” A Franciscan virtues series will be available to students, and the Transitus — an Oct. 3 remembrance of St. Francis’ death — will receive special attention.

All of it, Father St. Andre hopes, will get St. Francis out of the garden.

“Your typical person — and it’s not their fault — thinks of Francis as a bird bath. A lover of animals. And he was,” he said. “But I always try to bring people to the deeper vision of St. Francis; that even when it comes to the animals, he loved the animals because they were Christic — all things were created through the Father in (Jesus) Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit.

“St. Francis saw God’s presence imprinted on creation,” Father St. Andre continued. “That’s just one example, but I think this year will be an opportunity for people to come to a fuller, substantial, more authentic vision of St. Francis and the Franciscan tradition.”

The Franciscan Renewal Center in Scottsdale, Arizona, is offering a full slate of programs that will assist in that aim, including retreats, conversations and a movie night.

Franciscan Father John Aherne is also hopeful that the faithful will focus on St. Francis’ spiritual heritage.

“Maybe even the larger question is what can the Year of St. Francis do for the world?” he asked. “You know, especially in a time when our world is so divided — politically and ideologically and economically — we can look to St. Francis as a guide in how we can come together.”

A member of the Order of Friars Minor and pastor of St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Pompton Lakes, New Jersey, Father Aherne offered examples from St. Francis’ life and legends, including the tale of the friar reasoning with a ravenous wolf terrorizing an Italian town.

“He brokered peace between the people of Gubbio and the wolf of Gubbio in that famous story. He brokered peace between the people of Assisi and the mayor of Assisi in the famous ‘Canticle of Creation.’ St. Francis … was as comfortable with the leper as he was with the pope, and he brought them together,” said Father Aherne.

“So I think — in fact, I know — there is something in our Franciscan charism, by looking to the person of St. Francis of Assisi, that can help to heal some of the divisions that are in our world today,” he said.

Father Edgardo Jara — also a member of the Order of Friars Minor and pastor of Mission San Luis Rey Parish in Oceanside, California — agreed.

“The jubilee will be a tool to remind people what Francis showed us and told us 800 years ago — to incarnate God in our lives, and especially in our actions,” he said.

Father Jara and his fellow Franciscans shepherd a modern parish next door to Mission San Luis Rey, a National Historic Landmark completed in 1815 and the largest of the 21 California missions.

And like Father Aherne, Father Jara sees St. Francis as a force for unity — a saint capable of issuing a global reminder “that we all are brothers and sisters, especially in this time of division and conflicts that the world is living right now, (and) that we need to see each other as all daughters and sons of God.”

“It’s a good reminder,” he added, “that the Gospel is still something that we can live and practice.”

Banners proclaiming the Year of St. Francis festoon the Mission San Luis Rey campus, and special prayers, services and gatherings will punctuate the liturgical and social calendar — including a torch-lit procession on the Oct. 3 Transitus featuring an effigy of St. Francis.

Ultimately, said Father Jara, St. Francis’ spirituality is “something that we can live in our different ways — married or not, religious, priest, pope — everyone can prayerfully bring the Gospel to live this way of life.”

He added: “So I think this year is going to teach us to not only think of ourselves — but to see how we can love our neighbor, love God, and love creation as well.”

(OSV News) – The ancient practice of fasting from food during Lent can free us from complacency and lead us to “hunger” for God, Pope Leo XIV said in his 2026 Lenten message.

Ahead of Ash Wednesday, which marks the start of the 40-day liturgical season of Lent, this year on Feb. 18, the pope encouraged people to embrace the “ancient ascetic practice” of abstaining from food, as well as “refraining from words that offend and hurt our neighbor.”

Lent is a time to “place the mystery of God back in the center of our lives, in order to find renewal in our faith and keep our hearts from being consumed by the anxieties and distractions of daily life,” the pope said.

“Abstaining from food is an ancient ascetic practice that is essential on the path of conversion,” he wrote. “Precisely because it involves the body, fasting makes it easier to recognize what we ‘hunger’ for and what we deem necessary for our sustenance.”

Fasting, he added, helps to identify and properly order our “appetites,” “keeping our hunger and thirst for justice alive and freeing us from complacency.”

In the message, titled “Listening and Fasting: Lent as a Time of Conversion,” and released by the Vatican on Feb. 13, the pope drew on the fifth-century theologian St. Augustine to reflect on “custody of the heart” regarding “the tension between the present moment and future fulfillment.”

Quoting Augustine’s work “The Usefulness of Fasting,” Pope Leo cited the saint’s observation, “‘In the course of earthly life, it is incumbent upon men and women to hunger and thirst for justice, but to be satisfied belongs to the next life.’”

Pope Leo said that “understood in this way, fasting not only permits us to govern our desire, purifying it and making it freer, but also to expand it, so that it is directed towards God and doing good.”

He cautioned that fasting must be “lived in faith and humility” rather than pride and should be grounded in communion with the Lord.

“As a visible sign of our inner commitment to turn away from sin and evil with the help of grace, fasting must also include other forms of self-denial aimed at helping us to acquire a more sober lifestyle, since ‘austerity alone makes the Christian life strong and authentic,'” Leo said.

The pope also highlighted what he called “an unappreciated form of abstinence: that of refraining from words that offend and hurt our neighbor.”

“Let us begin by disarming our language, avoiding harsh words and rash judgement, refraining from slander and speaking ill of those who are not present and cannot defend themselves,” he said, urging Catholics to cultivate kindness “in our families, among our friends, at work, on social media, in political debates, in the media and in Christian communities.”

Leo encouraged Catholics to make room in their lives to listen to the word of God at Mass and by reading Sacred Scripture, noting that fasting is a concrete way to prepare to hear the word of God.

“The Lenten journey is a welcome opportunity to heed the voice of the Lord and renew our commitment to following Christ,” he said.

The pope also encouraged parishes, families and religious communities to “undertake a shared journey during Lent,” emphasizing “the communal aspect of listening to the word and fasting.”

On Ash Wednesday, Leo will preside over the traditional procession on Rome’s Aventine Hill from the Benedictine Monastery of St. Anselm to the Basilica of Santa Sabina, where he will celebrate Mass.

“Dear friends, let us ask for the grace of a Lent that leads us to greater attentiveness to God and to the least among us,” he said.

(OSV News) – “Are you leaving, too?”

The question, said Abena Amedormey – country representative for Catholic Relief Services in the west African nation of Ghana – came to CRS workers as they visited communities they serve after a January 2025 freeze on all U.S. foreign aid, ordered by the Trump administration.

By July 2025, the U.S. Agency for International Development — established in 1961, and which in 2024 provided $187 million in humanitarian funding to Ghana — effectively ceased to exist, with 85% of its programs cut. The result was that many in-country aid organizations also ceased operations.

But not CRS.

They’re surviving – yet the deep slashes to USAID funding have now made their annual Rice Bowl collection more essential than ever.

A familiar Lenten program of Catholic Relief Services — the official relief and development agency of the Catholic Church in the U.S. — CRS Rice Bowl offers faith communities in every diocese throughout the United States the opportunity to put their faith into action.

Since 1975, the titular rice bowl — a brightly colored, cardboard almsgiving box that’s a familiar annual Lenten sight in parishes nationwide — has invited Catholics to pray, fast, and give in solidarity with the world’s poor.

“We’re very much known across Ghana,” Amedormey told OSV News. “People know that we bring relief and we work with the most vulnerable people, where nobody wants to go. It’s the remotest parts of the country — the most hard to reach areas; the most vulnerable people — that we work with.”

Present in the country from 1958 onwards — just one year after Ghana gained independence from Great Britain — Catholic Relief Services Ghana works to tackle poverty with a holistic approach, operating projects to improve child and maternal health, increase access to clean water and sanitation, scale up farm production, and enhance community level savings and lending.

“We strongly believe in sustainability — because we don’t want to come in, support you and then we’re gone,” said Amedormey. “It’s like the saying, ‘Teach a man to fish’ — we don’t want to provide fish and leave. We want them to go out to fish.”

But with the shuttering of USAID, that mission is threatened.

“The (Ghanian) government suffered a huge shortfall of financing in the health sector,” shared Amedormey, “and this was also in education, where there were school feeding programs and teacher training programs.”

Those additional disruptions struck the work of other non-governmental organizations.

“A lot of organizations had to close shop overnight, had to lay off people, had to stop programming. These layoffs affected health care workers, agriculture extension officers, social workers and administrative staff,” Amedormey said. “And so names and faces that were known in a lot of communities as bringing support, overnight had to pack up and leave.”

Farmers lost subsidized fertilizer, improved seeds and training — which had all aimed to increase their crop yields.

Specialized teacher training was suspended, and children who looked forward to school meals could no longer be sure they’d have them.

All of it, said Amedormey, “had a huge impact.”

Yet, she remains committedly optimistic.

“One of the things that CRS has been faithful to is trying as much as possible to fill the gaps,” she said.

The Lancet, a peer-reviewed British medical journal published since 1823, estimated USAID assistance has saved more than 91 million lives, including that of 30 million children, over the past two decades.

The journal’s July 2025 prediction, however, was grim.

“Our estimates show that, unless the abrupt funding cuts announced and implemented in the first half of 2025 are reversed, a staggering number of avoidable deaths could occur by 2030,” the Lancet forecast. The study noted that almost 14.1 million people could die by that year, with over 4.5 million deaths being children younger than 5.

Estimates of as many as 300,000 deaths in the less than six months since USAID funding stopped began to circulate from academic demographers, while philanthropist and Microsoft founder Bill Gates accused billionaire tech titan Elon Musk — who for less than a year headed President Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, and bragged about “feeding USAID into the woodchipper” — of callous negligence.

“The picture of the world’s richest man killing the world’s poorest children is not a pretty one,” Gates observed, while Musk struck back by daring Gates “to show us any evidence.”

While the two billionaires argued in the media, aid workers worldwide wrestled with providing the help they had previously.

“The big thing that has changed is our ability to deliver aid to the people that we are called to serve around the world,” said Beth Knobbe, CRS advisor on church mobilization. “It’s been limited in certain ways, given the dramatic cuts to U.S. humanitarian aid. Those cuts are just absolutely devastating to the people that CRS serves.”

Knobbe told OSV News that “the rise in hunger that has been happening because of things like inflation, tariffs, continual natural disasters and violence around the world.”

“Hunger is not going away,” she warned. “There was a time when we were actually making tremendous strides in the fight against global hunger. And what we have seen — really since the start of COVID — is just a complete reversal.”

According to the Global Report on Food Crises 2025, published by the Food Security Information Network in support of the Global Network against Food Crises, “In 2024, more than 295 million people across 53 countries and territories experienced acute levels of hunger – an increase of 13.7 million from 2023.”

“It’s even more important than ever that Catholics take seriously that call to live Lent,” Knobbe said. “CRS Rice Bowl gives people a chance to truly grow in solidarity with our global neighbors through their prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.

“And that almsgiving is so critical,” she added, “because the needs are so great — both at home and around the world.”

Some 11,000 Catholic parishes and schools will participate in 2026, Knobbe said.

In Honduras — where CRS has been since 1959, and programs primarily focus on agriculture, education, emergencies, and clean water — the challenges are also multiplying, and with it, the critical assistance from this year’s Rice Bowl collection.

“It’s a huge loss,” Haydee Diaz, CRS country manager for Honduras, told OSV News of the USAID cuts. “Because the government here doesn’t really have the resources to do the kind of improvements that tend to really change a school system over time, and lead to a better- educated population. More jobs, people are better off. They’re able to stay, and not be so desperate to migrate.”

Meanwhile, the Central American nation is braced for the next natural disaster it will experience without USAID assistance, which totaled $152 million in 2024.

“One of the things that really worries us is what’s going to happen if a major hurricane hits,” Diaz said. “Because it’s been the U.S. government that’s really been providing Honduras with the resources to improve hurricane response. What does a poor country like Honduras do?”

The cutting of U.S. aid in combination with increased U.S. immigration restrictions is, it seems, an ironic paradox.

“As Americans, we say that we want people to stay home and not migrate to the US,” observed Diaz. “But we’ve cut the programs that give people a chance to really stay in their communities and thrive there.”

In chain-like fashion, that also impacts other outcomes.

“Nobody wins when children don’t get an education — and the country stays poor and doesn’t have the ability to draw jobs or investments from other countries, because they don’t have a well-educated workforce,” she said.

“It doesn’t benefit the U.S. to have neighbors to the South that are poor, where people feel like they don’t have a future,” Diaz added. “And that’s what USAID programs used to do. USAID used to really give people that hope that they could make it here — that they had some support, and that they could thrive.”

Nonetheless — like Amedormey in Ghana — she hasn’t dimmed her outlook, particularly with the CRS Rice Bowl collection just around the corner.

“It’s been very inspiring to see the generosity of individuals in the middle of such a dark, difficult time, where so much international aid has been cut and international aid programs have really been dismantled,” Dia said. “It’s been wonderful to see how individuals have stepped up, and really started to contribute.”

(OSV News) – Pope Leo XIV prayed with the sick at the Lourdes grotto in the Vatican Gardens on Feb. 11, asking Our Lady of Lourdes to accompany all those who suffer in the world.

Shortly after his Wednesday audience, the pope lit a candle in the Marian grotto and knelt in prayer before the statue of Our Lady of Lourdes on the World Day of the Sick. He was joined by about a dozen people in wheelchairs accompanied by their caregivers who sang “Immaculate Mary,” the popular Lourdes hymn.

The pope thanked those present for joining him in prayer and reflected on Mary’s role in accompanying people through suffering.

“It is a very beautiful day that reminds us of the closeness of Mary, our mother, who always accompanies us and teaches us so much: what suffering means, what love means, what it means to entrust our lives into the hands of the Lord,” Pope Leo said.

He prayed for God’s blessing on the sick and all those who care for them, including doctors, nurses and others who provide support in difficult moments.

The Catholic Church marks the World Day of the Sick each year on Feb. 11, the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes. The world day was instituted by Pope John Paul II in 1992, a year after he had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.

The feast day marks the anniversary of the first apparition of Our Lady of Lourdes to St. Bernadette Soubirous in 1858 in Lourdes, France. The 14-year-old girl saw the Blessed Virgin Mary standing in a small grotto. During a total of 18 apparitions over the course of six months, thousands of people gathered around Bernadette to witness these events. A new spring surged where Bernadette had been instructed to drink, and many miraculous healings occurred. Today, Lourdes is a Marian shrine visited by millions.

The Lourdes grotto in the Vatican Gardens dates back to Pope Leo XIII, who decided near the end of his life to install a reproduction of the Lourdes grotto in France. It was solemnly inaugurated in 1905 by his successor Pope Pius X.

In his message for the 2026 World Day of the Sick, Pope Leo urged Catholics to embrace a “Samaritan spirit” and to give of themselves “for the good of all who suffer, especially our brothers and sisters who are sick, elderly or afflicted.” The pope also imparted an apostolic blessing to all who are sick, to their families and to those who care for them, including pastoral and health care workers.

Pope Leo’s message concluded with the following prayer to the Blessed Virgin Mary, Health of the Sick, “Sweet Mother, do not part from me. Turn not your eyes away from me. Walk with me at every moment and never leave me alone. You who always protect me as a true Mother, obtain for me the blessing of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.”

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Ignorance of sacred Scriptures is ignorance of Jesus Christ, Pope Leo XIV said during his weekly general audience.

“The ultimate purpose of reading and meditating on the Scriptures,” he said Feb. 11, is “to get to know Christ and, through Him, to enter into a relationship with God, a relationship that can be understood as a conversation, a dialogue.”

Also, with the season of Lent beginning in one week, Feb. 18, the pope said the season “is a time for deepening our knowledge and love of the Lord, for examining our hearts and our lives, as well as refocusing our gaze on Jesus and his love for us.”

“May these coming days of prayer, fasting and almsgiving be a source of strength as we daily strive to take up our own crosses and follow Christ,” he said during his audience in the Paul VI Audience Hall.

In his main catechesis, Pope Leo continued his series of talks on Vatican II, specifically the Dogmatic Constitution “Dei Verbum,” on divine revelation and the Word of God.

The word of God is a source of comfort, guidance and strength for Christians, he said, and it should be shared with others, too, he said.

“Indeed, we live surrounded by so many words, but how many of these are empty!” he said.

“On the contrary, the Word of God responds to our thirst for meaning, for the truth about our life,” he said. “It is the only Word that is always new: revealing the mystery of God to us, it is inexhaustible, it never ceases to offer its riches.”

Sacred Scripture is “the means by which we come to know the incarnate living Word of God who is Jesus Christ,” the pope said in his summary in English. “Indeed, praying with Scripture opens the door for an intimate relationship with God who, through these sacred writings, invites us into conversation with him.”

“As St. Jerome rightly points out, ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of God,” he said, encouraging all faithful to read and reflect on the word of God every day, so that it may “nourish our hearts and our minds and lead us to the fullness of life.”

Speaking to Portuguese-speaking visitors, Pope Leo said prayerfully reading the word of God is a special kind of “nourishment” and an invigorating “medicine in moments of weakness”; from it, the faithful can draw “light and comfort.”

“Christians are called to listen to the word of God, to keep it in their hearts, and to put it into practice in their daily lives, because it is alive, effective and a light on their path,” he told Arabic-speaking visitors, which included members of the Sisters of Nazareth living in Haifa, Israel.

Pope Leo said in his English summary that there is a “profound and vital connection” between the word of God and the Catholic Church.

“Sacred Scripture, which has been entrusted to the Church and is guarded by her, reveals its meaning and manifests its strength in the life and faith of the Church, above all in the celebration of the Holy Eucharist,” he said.

“For this reason, the Church continually meditates upon and interprets Scripture because it is the means by which we come to know the incarnate living Word of God who is Jesus Christ,” he added.

To mark the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, celebrated Feb. 11, Pope Leo began the general audience with lighting a candle placed in front of a statue of Our Lady, and he joined in singing the “Immaculate Mary,” also known as the Lourdes Hymn, with the thousands of faithful in the hall.

After the general audience, he visited the replica of the grotto at Lourdes in the Vatican Gardens and lit a candle there, too, “as a sign of my prayer for all the sick, whom we remember with particular affection today, World Day of the Sick.”

Gathered together with a small group of people experiencing illness and those who care for them, the pope said, “We pray for you.”

Thanking them for taking part in the moment of prayer, he said, the feast day “reminds us of the closeness of Mary, our mother, who always accompanies us and teaches us so much: what suffering means, what love means, what it means to entrust our lives into the hands of the Lord.”

(OSV News) – Venerable Fulton J. Sheen will soon be beatified, now that the Vatican has given the green light, the Diocese of Peoria, Illinois, announced Feb. 9. No date or location for the beatification was given.

The announcement comes six years after the Holy See had postponed the beatification, initially scheduled for December 2019, only weeks before the event was to take place.

“The Holy See has informed me that the Cause for the Venerable Servant of God Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen can proceed to Beatification,” Bishop Louis Tylka of Peoria said in a Feb. 9 statement. “The next step in the process is the celebration of the Beatification, in which Fulton Sheen would be declared Blessed.”

He added, “We are working with the Dicastery of the Causes of Saints at the Vatican to determine the details for the upcoming Beatification.”

The bishop said the date and event details will be released soon through celebratesheen.com, the website for Archbishop Sheen’s cause.

“Archbishop Fulton Sheen was one of the greatest voices of evangelization in the Church and the world in the 20th century,” Bishop Tylka said. “I have long admired his lifelong commitment to serve the Church as a priest, rooted in his deep devotion to the Blessed Mother and the Eucharist. As he journeyed through the different stages of his life, his ability to share the Gospel and truly relate to people drew countless souls into an encounter with Jesus — one that transformed not only his life, but more importantly, the lives of those he touched.”

Archbishop Sheen’s cause for canonization, opened in 2002, has been stalled by two controversies — a public battle to relocate his remains from St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York to its current location, the side chapel of the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Immaculate Conception in Peoria; and, more significantly, concerns that as bishop of the Diocese of Rochester, New York, from 1966-1969, the prelate might have overlooked sexual abuse by at least one former diocesan priest there.

The latter concern was magnified after the state of New York adopted lookback laws that allowed hundreds of abuse claims to be considered, with the Diocese of Rochester ultimately filing for bankruptcy. The bankruptcy was finalized in September 2025, after the establishment of a $256.35 million settlement fund for abuse survivors.

In July 2019, then-Bishop Daniel R. Jenky of Peoria announced Pope Francis had approved a miracle attributed to the intercession of Archbishop Sheen, which led the way to the announcement he would be beatified. The announcement was made on Nov. 18, 2019, that Pope Francis had called for the beatification to be held Dec. 21, 2019, in Peoria.

A little more than two weeks later, a Dec. 3, 2019, news release from the Diocese of Peoria said it had been informed the previous day that the Holy See had decided to postpone the Dec. 21, 2019, ceremony “at the request of a few members” of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops over the possibility that abuse-related concerns might surface.

The Dec. 3 statement from the Diocese of Peoria said, “In our current climate it is important for the faithful to know that there has never been, nor is there now, any allegation against (Archbishop) Sheen involving the abuse of a minor.”

However, a Dec. 5 statement from the Diocese of Rochester, New York, said it had “expressed concern about advancing the cause for the beatification of Archbishop Sheen at this time without a further review of his role in priests’ assignments.” The statement said the Rochester Diocese, prior to the Vatican announcement Nov. 18 that Pope Francis approved the beatification, had provided documentation expressing its concern to the Diocese of Peoria and the Congregation for Saints’ Causes via the apostolic nunciature in Washington.

The one-time New York lookback window, part of the state’s Child Victims Act, was open from August 2019 until August 2021.

In December 2024, Msgr. Jason Gray, executive director of the Archbishop Fulton John Sheen Foundation, told OSV News that “Sheen is clean. … Not one accusation has been raised that impugned Sheen.”

Msgr. Gray said the foundation has examined “all of the pleadings” relevant to claims against the Rochester Diocese, and “there hasn’t been anything that was brought up there” implicating Archbishop Sheen.

Msgr. Gray also told OSV News that “the desire to see Sheen beatified is increasing, and there is a growing devotion to him,” as evidenced by a surge in visits to his tomb, requests for both relics and for his more than 50 books, and reports of favors and graces received through Archbishop Sheen’s intercession.

Archbishop Sheen is remembered as one of the most influential and innovative evangelists in American history. Once dubbed “God’s microphone,” Archbishop Sheen announced God’s truth in a non-confrontational, yet no less life-giving, manner to untold millions through radio, print and television.

Born in El Paso, Illinois, on May 8, 1895, Archbishop Sheen resolved to serve the Church as a priest from an early age. He was assigned to academic ministry following his ordination to the priesthood on Sept. 20, 1919, for the Diocese of Peoria.

After studies in Europe, a promising future as a professor awaited Archbishop Sheen. First, though, his bishop called him back to a parish in Peoria to test his obedience. And he zealously took on the task. In less than a year, though, Archbishop Sheen landed a professorship at The Catholic University of America in Washington. For a quarter century, he was known there for his engaging and stimulating lectures. During that time, he published more than half of his over 60 books, informed by a lively and heroic faith.

During the 1930s and 1940s, then-Msgr. Sheen became a household name as host of “The Catholic Hour,” broadcast nationally from NBC radio in New York. The priest emerged as a national voice, a prophetic truth-teller who spoke out on a host of issues, particularly the threats of communism.

Having to give up his professorship after appointment as director of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith in 1950, Msgr. Sheen moved to New York City. The next year, he was appointed an auxiliary bishop of New York, ordained in Rome on June 11, 1951. Bishop Sheen began his work on behalf of the global missions with great energy, and his innovative efforts enabled him to evangelize at the same time. He donated all media earnings to the missions.

Beginning in 1952, Bishop Sheen proposed eternal truths each Tuesday evening to tens of millions via his “Life Is Worth Living” TV program, armed only with his charisma and intellect – and his famous cape and chalkboard. After his first year on the air, Bishop Sheen won an Emmy award for best television personality. Upon acceptance, he famously thanked his writers: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Bishop Sheen was a charitable and attentive pastor who treated prince and leper alike. His intelligence, wit and sense of humor made him an effective evangelist. And with clear teaching and common sense, Bishop Sheen helped people make sense of life’s problems. He was never afraid to proclaim Christ and brought many converts to Catholicism.

Throughout his 60-year priesthood, Bishop Sheen sought to conform himself more closely to Christ by observing a daily Eucharistic Holy Hour, what he called “the hour that makes my day.” He also was intensely devoted to the Mother of God.

Bishop Sheen battled various temptations and difficulties throughout his life — including a decade of behind-the-scenes hostility from Cardinal Francis Spellman of New York, which caused Bishop Sheen great pain. But in the face of his troubles, Bishop Sheen persevered in virtue. He understood his sufferings in light of God’s providence: “Christianity begins not with sunshine, but with defeat. During those days when my life was backed up against the cross, I began to know and to love it more.”

Despite his best efforts as bishop in Rochester, New York (1966-69) — what many considered to be an exile — Bishop Sheen’s brief tenure was met with great resistance, resulting in a good deal of self-described failure. After retirement, Bishop Sheen was appointed titular archbishop of Newport, Wales, by Pope St. Paul VI. Archbishop Sheen delivered retreats aimed at renewal of the priesthood throughout the country and maintained a voice in the public square through regular media appearances.

The temptations and sufferings Archbishop Sheen faced purified him and intensified his union with Christ. He maintained “God has been easy with me.” Toward the end of his life, writing in his autobiography, Archbishop Sheen apologized for his failures, wondering “Was I inspiring anyone to imitate Christ in the daily carrying of His Cross?”

After nearly two years in and out of the hospital following open-heart surgery, Archbishop Sheen died Dec. 9, 1979, in New York City, in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament. He was declared venerable in 2012.

Bishop Tylka said that Archbishop Sheen, particularly in his work for the missions, “helped us recognize that the Church is meant for all people” and that “as members of the Church, we are called to serve everyone, especially those most in need and those longing to hear and experience the Gospel, wherever they may be in the world.”

“Archbishop Sheen will be a special blessing for the Church in the United States, where he was a powerful evangelist on radio, television, and in personal appearances,” he said.

Bishop Tylka expressed thanks for “the collaboration, assistance, generosity, and prayers from the Holy See, my brother Bishops, clergy and lay people from around the world in moving this cause forward.”

(OSV News) – The Vatican press office confirmed that Pope Leo XIV has no plans to visit the U.S. this year.

“The pope will not be going to the United States in 2026,” Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said in response to journalists’ questions Feb 8.

Vice President J.D. Vance extended an invitation on behalf of President Donald Trump during a May 19 meeting with Pope Leo, not long after his papal election, the Reuters news agency reported.

According to a handout video shared by the Vatican, the pope was heard saying that he would visit “at some point.”

While many had hoped that Pope Leo would visit his homeland, the trip seemed unlikely to happen in the immediate future, given the growing divide between the Trump administration and the pope over his criticism of U.S. policies targeting migrants.

Speaking with journalists outside Castel Gandolfo Sept. 30, the pope said Catholic politicians should be judged by their overall policy positions, not just a single issue.

“Someone who says I’m against abortion but is in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life,” the pope said. “And someone who says I’m against abortion, but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States, I don’t know if that’s pro-life.”

At another press scrum Nov. 18, the pope expressed his support for the pastoral message released by the U.S. bishops’ conference on the enforcement of immigration policies in the country.

“When people are living good lives — and many of them (in the United States) for 10, 15, 20 years — to treat them in a way that is extremely disrespectful, to say the least,” is not acceptable, the pope said Nov. 18.

The pope said that while every country “has a right to determine who and how and when people enter,” it was also important “to look for ways of treating people humanely, treating people with the dignity that they have” when enforcing immigration policies.

Despite the pope’s criticism, Trump said he was unaware of the pope’s comments and was open to meeting with him.

“Sure, I will. Why not?” the president said in an interview with Politico published Dec. 9.

The Holy See typically announces papal visits months or even just weeks in advance, and it has not issued any announcement about the pope’s 2026 travel destinations.

However, bishops in Angola, Algeria and Spain have confirmed that Pope Leo will visit their countries this year.

Pope Leo has also expressed his desire to visit Latin America during a press conference aboard the papal flight to Rome Dec. 2.

“Obviously, I would love to visit Latin America; Argentina and Uruguay are waiting for the pope’s visit. Peru, I think they will receive me, too! And then, if I go to Peru, (I could visit) many neighboring countries as well. But the plan is not yet defined,” the pope said.