Ana Torres Fonseca
Pope Leo XIV held the general audience in a packed Saint Peter's Square as usual, but this week he began a new series of catecheses on the meaning of the liturgy.
POPE LEO XIV
Here, then, is the Christian Mystery: the Paschal event, that is, the passion, death, resurrection, and glorification of Christ, which is made sacramentally present to us precisely in the liturgy, so that every time we participate in the assembly gathered ‘in his name,’ we are immersed in this Mystery.
His catechesis on the Mass drew from the Vatican II document Sacrosanctum Concilium. known in English as the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy.
POPE LEO XIV
The participation of the faithful in the liturgical action builds them up, renews them, and sends them forth to reveal in daily life what has been celebrated, making of their very existence a ‘living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God.’
At this audience, the pope was not alone: he was joined by Patriarch Aram I, the head of the Armenian Apostolic Church of Cilicia.
This eastern Church is based in Lebanon, a country currently ravaged by war and violence. With this surely in mind, Pope Leo took the opportunity to make another appeal for peace in the Middle East.
