Pope Leo XIV today received in the Vatican to the Conventual Brothers (Franciscans) and the order of the Holy Trinity and the captives (Trinitarios), who participate in his general chapter.
After welcoming them, Pope Leo XIV told them about a painting that is in the apse of the Basilica of San Juan de Letrán, in which the founders of both orders appear together, San Francisco and San Juan de Mata, in front of Innocent III.
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Leo XIV said that “God inspired these two saints not only a spiritual path of service, but also the desire to confront the successor of Peter about the gift received from the Spirit to make him available to the Church.”
In that image, San Francisco, as the Holy Father recalled, exposes to the Pope the need to follow Jesus “without reservations, without other purposes, without ambiguities or artifice.”
On the other hand, San Juan de Mata “expressed this truth with words that will later be revealed fundamental and that San Francisco will make his own.”
“A beautiful example will be to live ‘with nothing of its own’, with nothing ‘hidden in your pocket or in the heart of the heart,” he said below. He also reiterated the importance of the service and that the superior is perceived “as a minister, who becomes smaller to be the servant of all.”
Consolation to those who cannot live faith in freedom
Pope Leo XIV joined the Trinitarians in prayer, who from the foundation of his order continue to consolation to “those who cannot live faith in freedom.”
“I also ask God Trinidad that this is one of the fruits of his assembly: that they do not stop remembering in their prayer and in their daily effort to those persecuted because of their faith,” he added.
In addition, he stressed that attention to church members who suffer the most “will attract the gaze of vocations, of the faithful and men of good will to this reality.”
Write the future in the present
When addressing the Franciscans, the Pope recalled that “it is not our personal interest that must move, but that of Christ; it is his spirit to which we must listen first and foremost, to” write the future in the present ‘”.
“Listen to him in the voice of the brother, in the discernment of the community, in the attention to the signs of the times, in the calls of the teaching,” the Pontiff urged.
Finally, he asked to be each one, and in each of his fraternities, “a living reminder of the primacy of praise to God in Christian life.”
Communion and synodality style
Fr. Luigi Bucaello, re -elected General Minister of the Order of the Blessed Trinity and the captives pointed to Aci Prensa that having been welcomed by Pope Leo XIV “means being confirmed in this style of communion and synodality that is part of our tradition.”
He stressed that, from the beginning, “our founder has requested the approval of the Pope and the order has always had the sustenance and protection of the Pontiff throughout the centuries to live our mission.”
“Today we have also received from Pope León, that necessary mood to update the Trinitarian charism and to be especially close to those who suffer for reasons of their faith, of persecuted Christians and to carry out the light of the charisma to all those who suffer in this historical moment so dramatic and so difficult,” he added.
Almudena Martínez-Bordiú
Graduated in journalism and advertising from the CEU San Pablo University of Madrid. Specialized in religious information in Spain since 2015. It has been a senior correspondent for ACI Press and Ewtn News at the Vatican for two years and is currently a correspondent for Europe based on Spain.