Homily of the Papa Leo XIV Mass in the Plaza de San Pedro for the Jubilee of Families

This is the homily pronounced by Pope Leo XIV this Sunday at Mass for the Jubilee of Families, Children, Grandparents and the Elders:

The gospel that we have just proclaimed shows us Jesus that, at the last supper, pray for us (cf. Jn 17,20). The verb of God made man, already close to the end of his earthly life, thinks of us, his brothers, and becomes a blessing, supplication and praise to the Father, with the strength of the Holy Spirit.

We also, upon entering with astonishment and confidence within the prayer of Jesus, see each other wrapped, for his love, in a great project that covers all humanity. Christ asks, in effect, that we all be “one thing” (cf. v. 21). This is the greatest good that can be desired, because this universal union makes among the creatures the eternal communion of love that is God himself: the father who gives life, the son who receives it and the spirit that shares it.

The Lord wants, to unite, we do not add to an indistinct mass as an anonymous block, but that we are one: “like you, father, you are in me and I in you, that they are also one in us” (v. 21). The unity for which Jesus prays is, therefore, a communion founded in the same love with which God loves, where life and salvation come from.

And as such, it is first and foremost a gift that Jesus brings. It is, from his human heart, that the Son of God addresses the Father saying: “I in them and you in me, so that they are perfectly one and the world knows that you have sent me, and that I loved them how you loved me” (v. 23).

We listen with shock these words: Jesus is revealing us that God loves us how he loves himself. The father does not love us less than his only begotten son, that is, infinitely.

God does not love less, because he loves first, loves before anyone! This is witnessed by Christ when he says to the Father: “You already loved me before the creation of the world” (v. 24). And it is like this: in his mercy, God always wants to welcome all men in his hug; And it is his life, that is given to us through Christ, that makes us one, that unites us among us.

Hearing this gospel today, during the jubilee of families and children, grandparents and the elderly, fills us with joy. Dear friends, we have received life before we have wished it. As Pope Francis taught: “All men are children, but none of us chose to be born” (Ángelus, January 1, 2025). And not just that. We are just born, we need others to live; We would not have achieved it. We owe someone else, who saved us, took over us, our body and also our spirit.

We all live thanks to a relationship, that is, a free and liberating bond of humanity and mutual care. It is true that sometimes this humanity is betrayed. For example, when freedom is invoked not to give life, but to remove it; Not to protect, but to hurt.

However, even in the face of the evil that divides and kills, Jesus continues to pray for us for us, and his prayer acts as a balm over our wounds, becoming an announcement of forgiveness and reconciliation for all. That Prayer of the Lord gives full meaning to the light moments of our mutual love as parents, grandparents, sons and daughters. And this is what we want to announce to the world: we are here to be “one” as the Lord wants us to be “one”, in our families and in the places where we live, work and study: different, but one; Many, but one, always one, in any circumstance and age of life.

Brothers, if we love each other, about the foundation of Christ, which is “the alpha and the omega”, “the beginning and the end” (cf. ap 22,13), we will be a sign of peace for all, in society and in the world. Do not forget it: the future of peoples is born from the bosom of families.

In recent decades we have received a sign that fills with joy and, at the same time, it involved reflecting: I mean the fact that some husbands were proclaimed, not by separate, not together, but together, as a couple of husbands. I think of Luis and Celia Martin, the parents of Santa Teresa of the Child Jesus; And I also remember the blessed Luis and María Beltrame Quattrocchi, whose family life passed in Rome, the last century. And let’s not forget the Polish family Ulma, parents and children united in love and martyrdom. He said it is a sign that gives to think.

Yes, by proposing ourselves as exemplary witnesses to holy marriages, the Church tells us that today’s world needs the conjugal alliance to know and welcome the love of God, and to overcome, with its strength that unites and reconciles, the forces that destroy relations and societies.

Therefore, with your heart full of gratitude and hope, I am telling you: marriage is not an ideal, but the model of true love between men and women: total, faithful and fruitful love (cf. S. Pablo VI, Letter Enc. Humanoe Vitae, 9). This love, by making them “one flesh”, enables them to give life, in the image of God.

Therefore, I encourage them to be for their children examples of coherence, behaving as they want them to behave, educate them in freedom through obedience, always looking for their own good and the means to increase it.

And you, children, are grateful to your parents: say “thank you” for the gift of life and for everything that is given with it every day is the first way of honoring the father and the mother (cf. ex 20,12). Finally, to you, dear grandparents and the elderly, I recommend that you wake up, with wisdom and tenderness, for those who love, with the humility and patience that are learned over the years.

In the family, faith is transmitted together with life, from generation to generation: it is shared as the bread of the table and the affections of the heart. This makes it a privileged place to find Jesus, who loves us and always wants our good.

And I would like to add one last thing. The prayer of the Son of God, who infuses us on the road, also reminds us that one day we will all be unum (cf. S. Augustine, Sermo Super Ps. 127): One thing in the only Savior, hugged by the eternal love of God. Not only us, but also fathers and mothers; grandparents and grandmothers; The brothers, sisters and children who have already preceded us in the light of their eternal Easter, and that today we feel present, here, with us, at this time of party.