Pope Leo welcomed over 100 Caritas-assisted individuals and volunteers to lunch at Castel Gandolfo on Sunday, greeting them with “Enjoy your meal!” He emphasized the beauty of “being together, all around the table, sharing the gifts the Lord has given us.”
The meal was served under gazebos in the Borgo Laudato Si’ within the Pontifical Villas. “Such a beautiful place,” the Pope remarked, “reminds us of nature’s beauty, of creation, but also makes us think that the most beautiful creature is the one made in God’s image and likeness – all of us. Being gathered for this lunch is living together with God in communion.” The Pope sat at a table among his guests, dining alongside Rosabal Leon, who arrived from Peru five months ago with her husband and two children, and Gabriella Oliverio, an 85-year-old woman living alone in Rome’s Torre Spaccata district.
Earlier, celebrating Mass at the Sanctuary of Santa Maria della Rotonda in Albano Laziale, Pope Leo delivered a powerful homily. He called on the faithful to “no longer live for ourselves, but to bring fire into the world. Not the fire of weapons, nor the fire of words that incinerate others. No. But the fire of love, which lowers itself and serves, opposing indifference with care and arrogance with meekness; the fire of goodness, which doesn’t cost like armaments, but gratuitously renews the world.” He acknowledged this path might bring “incomprehension, scorn, even persecution,” but stressed “there is no greater peace than having its flame within you.”
The Pope described the Church not as a power, but as a place of welcome. “We find ourselves in an ancient Sanctuary whose walls embrace us,” he said, noting the circular shape of the Rotonda, like St. Peter’s Square, makes one “feel welcomed into the bosom of God.” While externally the Church can seem “angular,” he explained, its divine reality manifests when “we cross its threshold and find welcome.” Within, he stated, “our poverty, our vulnerability, and especially the failures for which we might be despised and judged – are finally welcomed in the sweet strength of God, a love without edges, an unconditional love.”
Concluding, Pope Leo warned against confusing peace with comfort or goodness with tranquillity. “For his peace, God’s shalom, to come among us,” Jesus must tell us: ‘I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing!'” He acknowledged this message might cause division, even among family and friends, who may urge caution to “stay calm” and say others “don’t deserve to be loved.” “Jesus, instead,” the Pope affirmed, “immersed himself in our humanity with courage.”