CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy (AP) — Pope Leo XIV spent the last Sunday of his summer vacation with several dozen refugees, homeless and poor people and the church volunteers who help them, celebrating a special Mass for them and inviting them into the Vatican’s lakeside estate for a lunch of lasagna and roast veal.
Leo celebrated Mass in the St. Mary sanctuary of Albano, near the papal summer retreat in Castel Gandolfo, where he is vacationing. The Mass was attended by around 110 people cared for by the local Caritas church charity, and the volunteers who run the diocese’s shelters, clinics and social service offices.
In his homily, Leo celebrated the “fire of charity” that had brought them together.
“And 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,” 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 Sunday, Leo presided over a luncheon with the guests, who included Rosabal Leon, a Peruvian refugee who has been in Italy for a few months, along with her husband and two children. Leo's other companion was an 85-year-old Roman, Gabriella Oliveiro, who lives on her own, organizers said.
The luncheon was held at the Borgo Laudato Si', the Vatican’s environmental educational center in the gardens of the papal villa in Castel Gandolfo. The center is named for Pope Francis' 2015 landmark environmental encyclical, Laudato Si (Praised Be).
Local caterers provided a menu of lasagna, eggplant parmesan and roast veal. For dessert, the menu called for fruit salad and sweets named for the pope, “Dolce Leone.”
Greeting the pope and his guests, who were seated along two long tables under a veranda, Albano Bishop Vincenzo Viva said their coming together to break bread followed the teaching of Christ.
Today's church, he said, should be “by the side of the most vulnerable, the weakest, the young and those who are wounded by the circumstances of life and history.”
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Rosa reported from Albano, Italy, and Winfield from Rome.
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Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
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