Pope Leo meets young people in Assisi: ‘Be peacemakers’

As Leone pointed out, relations between men and women “must not be like those between the great and the powerful of this world, who seek prominence and lord it over others”. St Francis, in fact, teaches us “not to dominate, but to serve; not to grasp, but to receive; not to hold on to, but to give back”, and this is what makes for “a free people, a place of respite and salvation”.

The Pope concluded that ‘around Jesus, men and women who would otherwise never have met or associated with one another become brothers and sisters. When this miracle of the Church continues to take place, it remains astonishing even today in our cities, which are full of invisible walls that separate us from one another. How much discrimination and inequality could come to an end at once, as soon as we recognise one another as brothers and sisters!’

Following his meeting with the young people, Leo XIV entered the Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli in procession and celebrated Mass in front of the Church of the Porziuncola, which is situated within the Basilica. He is the first Pope to have done so. The Porziuncola is regarded as one of the most significant Franciscan sites. It was within its walls, in fact, that St Francis realised his vocation and welcomed St Clare.

‘Dear young people,’ said the Pope during his homily, ‘today Europe and the whole world are looking to you for new saints: dare to believe in the word of the Gospel, become truly human through the freedom of Jesus Christ, and embrace Sister Poverty! The title of your gathering, ‘Go!’, is a mission, a sending forth onto paths for which we have no maps, because they open up as we listen to our hearts.”

Leone then urged young people not to stand still: ‘Go! Go forth! Better still: let’s go! Let’s go! To the margins, where the injustice and arrogance of a few deny the dignity and dreams of many – of far too many of God’s sons and daughters. Pope Francis, drawing inspiration from the ‘poor man of Assisi’, has warned us against the temptation to be Christians whilst maintaining a prudent distance from the Lord’s wounds. Jesus wants us to touch human misery, to touch the suffering flesh of others. He expects us to give up seeking those personal or communal shelters that allow us to keep our distance from the heart of human drama.”

The Pope went on to explain why the figure of St Francis remains so relevant and important to the faithful even eight centuries after his death: the reason why ‘he still draws us in lies in the magnificent humanity that led him to abandon the well-trodden paths, so that a new, more coherent one might be opened up’.

This, ‘even in a city that had been Christian for centuries, such as Assisi, seemed revolutionary. Chiara’s choice was even more striking: a young woman who wanted to be like Francis, who wanted to live, as a woman, as freely as those brothers! Such is the energy of Christianity, that of its beginnings and its many new beginnings.”

Leone concluded by saying that ‘one may not be understood, even by one’s own family, as happened to St Francis. Yet, to break free from the culture of power and tear down the walls that separate human beings is never a betrayal of one’s family, city or tradition, but rather a liberation from their ghosts, from enemies invented out of fear and ignorance, and from the violence with which one might seek to impose one’s own petty order upon a reality that surpasses us on all sides’ and he reiterated the importance of ‘rediscovering a world of brothers and sisters to cherish and serve, not to exploit and dominate. Not a world to be defended, but one to be embraced’.

It is precisely for this reason that the Pontiff urged young people to devote themselves ‘to the civilisation of love, the first signs of which you have encountered in so many examples of selfless giving, and which transfigures – in the image of Christ — countless peacemakers who, even today, are committed to serving life amidst the most tragic scenes of death. Pool the finest energies of your magnificent humanity — your studies, skills, work, friendships, love and prayer — bringing Francis’s vision to life in different ways’.