Leo XIV’s Inaugural Focus: Poor, Peace, Planet

By Tony Magliano – In his inaugural Mass homily, Pope Leo said that the role of the successor of Peter is“preserving the rich heritage of the Christian faith and, at the same time, looking to the future, in order to confront the questions, concerns and challenges of today’s world”.

Reflecting on some of those concerns and challenges, Pope Leo said, “We still see too much discord … and an economic paradigm that exploits the Earth’s resources and marginalises the poorest.”

Yes, we tragically still see far too much discord all around our world. From broken marriages to broken families, from untreated drug abuse to drug gangs, from warehousing many of our elderly in poorly run nursing homes to euthanizing them, from the serious lack of prenatal care to the barbaric brutality of aborting unborn babies, from state sanctioned death penalty murders to prisons that often fail to rehabilitate inmates, from nuclear weapons to space weapons, from the failure to provide quality medicine and health-care for every person to pharmaceutical companies raking in astronomical profits, there tragically exists a world that displays as Pope Leo underscores “much discord.”

And then, there is, as our new pontiff stated, “an economic paradigm that exploits the Earth’s resources.”

Deforestation, overuse and mismanagement of water resources, increasing use of dangerous climate-changing fossil fuels, haphazard mining for minerals and precious metals, over extraction of sand mining, and unsustainable fishing practices are important examples of profit-centred economic paradigms that exploit the Earth and its limited resources.

And then, there is, as Pope Leo stated, an economic paradigm that exploits and “marginalises the poorest”

Throughout the world, example after example, reveals an economic model which is designed to help the rich get richer while keeping an increasingly poor working class trapped, struggling to make ends meet.

In 1891, Pope Leo XIV’s immediate namesake, Pope Leo XIII, saw the exploitation of destitute workers and wrote his landmark encyclical letter Rerum Novarum(“On Capital and Labor”) which insisted on workers’ rights to fair wages, reasonable working hours, the right to form labour unions, decent working conditions, and the necessity for governments to protect workers and promote social justice.

In choosing his papal name, it appears that Pope Leo XIV is planning to continue and further develop the just and compassionate steps laid out by the last Pope Leo who launched modern Catholic Social Teaching.

Also, in his inaugural homily, our Holy Father calls our attention to the fact that “we still see too much discord, too many wounds caused by hatred, violence, prejudice, the fear of difference.”

Dozens of wars fueled by the weapons industry, societies awash with guns, nuclear weapons, the militarising of Space, and countless angry interpersonal arguments are some of the ways hatred, violence, prejudice, and the fear of difference is wounding humanity.

As the elixir to these and all ills, Pope Leo’s inaugural homily offers this most hopeful, inspiring call: “Look to Christ! Come closer to him! Welcome his word that enlightens and consoles! Listen to his offer of love and become his one family. In the one Christ, we are one. This is the path to follow together, among ourselves, but also with our sister Christian churches, with those who follow other religious paths, with those who are searching for God, with all women and men of goodwill, in order to build a new world where peace reigns!”

Tony Magliano is an internationally syndicated Catholic social justice and peace columnist. He is available to speak at diocesan or parish gatherings. Tony can be reached at .