Pope Leo XIV on Palm Sunday sharply condemned war and the use of religion to justify violence, saying during Mass in St. Peter’s Square that God “does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war.”
At the start of Holy Week, the pope tied the Church’s contemplation of Christ’s Passion to the suffering of people caught in today’s conflicts, especially Christians in the Middle East.
In his Palm S...
The strongest version of this narrative is a principled moral stance against war, rooted in Christian theology and universal humanitarian values. Pope Leo XIV’s homily leverages the symbolic power of Holy Week to amplify a message of peace, framing Christ’s suffering as a mirror to contemporary conflicts. By explicitly rejecting the weaponization of religion, he challenges both political and theological justifications for violence, grounding his appeal in scripture and tradition. The focus on Mi...