Pope Leo XIV spent the final Sunday of his summer break with several dozen homeless people, alongside the church volunteers who support them.
The pontiff celebrated a special Mass for them at the St. Mary sanctuary in Albano, near the papal summer retreat in Castel Gandolfo, where he is vacationing, and invited them into the Vaticanâs lakeside estate for a lunch of lasagna and roast veal.
The Mass was attended by around 110 people cared for by the local Caritas church charity, as well as the volunteers who run the dioceseâs shelters, clinics and social service offices.
In his homily, Leo celebrated the âfire of charityâ that had brought them together.
âAnd I encourage you not to 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 have something to offer in terms of time, skills, and help,â he said.
In the church, he said, everyone is poor and precious, and all share the same dignity.
Leo, the former Robert Prevost, spent most of his adult life working with the poor people of Peru, first as an Augustinian missionary and then as bishop.
Former parishioners and church workers say he greatly reinforced the work of the local Caritas charity, opening soup kitchens and shelters for migrants and rallying funds to build oxygen plants during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Later on Sunday, Leo was to preside over a luncheon with the guests at the Borgo Laudato Si’, the Vaticanâs environmental educational centre in the gardens of the papal villa in Castel Gandolfo. The centre is named for Pope Francis’s 2015 landmark environmental encyclical, Laudato Si (Praised Be).
According to the Albano diocese, local caterers were providing a menu of lasagna, eggplant parmesan and roast veal. For dessert, the menu called for fruit salad and sweets named for the pope, âDolce Leoneâ.
