(ZENIT News – OMPress / Vatican City, 10.10.2025) – On October 4, the feast of St. Francis of Assisi, Pope Leo XIV signed the Apostolic Exhortation «Dilexi Te» (“I Have Loved You”), which was published on Thursday, October 9. He completed the work that Pope Francis had begun in his final months of life, recalling that the question of the poor goes back to the essence of our faith. A 121-paragraph document, divided into five chapters, repeats what was already done in the Apostolic Exhortation «Lumen Fidei,» the draft of which had been initiated by Pope Benedict XVI and which Pope Francis concluded. A beautiful sign of the continuity that runs through the work of the Successors of Peter.
This is recalled in the first lines of the new Exhortation: «In continuity with the Encyclical Dilexit Nos, Pope Francis was preparing, in the last months of his life, an Apostolic Exhortation on the care of the Church for the poor and with the poor.» Pope Leo XIV made it his own «sharing the desire of my beloved predecessor that all Christians may perceive the strong connection that exists between the love of Christ and His call to draw close to the poor.»
The first chapter of the Exhortation «Dilexi Te» — «Some Indispensable Words» — is an Introduction that frames that approach and predilection for the poor, which must be an essential part of the life of a Christian and of the Church. Therefore, he reminds us that «we are not on the horizon of charity, but of Revelation; contact with those who have no power or greatness is a fundamental way of encountering the Lord of history.
In the poor, He continues to say something to us.» An essential figure in the history of the Church in this encounter is undoubtedly Saint Francis of Assisi, because «the impulse he provoked never ceases to mobilize the spirit of believers and many non-believers, and has changed history.» And it is because «the condition of the poor represents a cry that, in the history of humanity, constantly challenges our lives, our societies, political and economic systems, and especially the Church. In the wounded faces of the poor, we find imprinted the suffering of the innocent and, therefore, the suffering of Christ himself.» It is a fact that every day people die from causes linked to extreme poverty, and it is also a fact that reaching out to the poor requires a change of mentality, which does not put the accumulation of wealth and social success above all. Hence, «it’s not possible to forget the poor if we do not want to be excluded from the living current of the Church, whch springs from the Gospel and fertilizes every historical moment.»
Chapter two, «God Chooses the Poor,» recalls that Christ Himself, in order to share the limitations and fragilities of our human nature, «became poor, was born in the flesh like us, and we have known Him in the smallness of a child placed in a manger and in the extreme humiliation of the cross; there He shared our radical poverty, which is death.» A poor Messiah, whose poverty affected every aspect of His life; He worked «as a craftsman or carpenter, téktōn. This is a category of people who lived by manual labor. Moreover, since they did not own land, they were considered inferior to peasants.» At His Presentation in the Temple, Joseph and Mary offered a pair of turtledoves or pigeons, which was the offering of the poor. And Christ Himself recalled that He had nowhere to lay His head. His preaching made clear and undeniable the primacy of God, of which love of neighbor represents tangible proof, as reflected in the parable of the Last Judgment. «In the first Christian community, the program of charity did not derive from analysis or plans, but directly from the example of Jesus, from the very words of the Gospel,» the Pope notes in the Exhortation. The sharing of goods is thus found in the daily life and style of the first Christian community, in the early Church.
Pointed out in Chapter Three — «A Church for the Poor” –, is the continuity with the early Christian community, which has marked the history of the Church. By showing the poor as the richness of the Church, which Pope Sixtus did, when forced by the Roman authorities to hand over the treasures of the Church, as well as the numerous and constant references to the Church Fathers, shows that «charity is not an optional path, but the criterion of true worship.» Pope Leo XIV, in his return to the immense wealth of St. Augustine’s thought, work, and spirituality, recalls that «in a Church that recognizes the face of Christ in the poor and the instrument of charity in goods, Augustinian thought remains a sure light. Today, fidelity to Augustine’s teachings demands not only the study of his works, but also a willingness to live radically his call to conversion, which necessarily includes the service of charity.» An essential part of closeness to the poor has always been caring for the sick, with figures such as Saint John of God, Saint Camillus of Lellis and, above all, many consecrated women who «played an even more widespread role in the health care of the poor» and who made their homes become «oases of dignity where no one was excluded.» A reality that continues «in Catholic hospitals, health centers in outlying regions, health missions in jungles, shelters for drug addicts, and field hospitals in war zones. The Christian presence beside the sick reveals that salvation is not an abstract idea, but a concrete action. In the gesture of cleansing a wound, the Church proclaims that the Kingdom of God begins among the most vulnerable.» Monastic life itself «was from its beginning a testimony of solidarity,» because «the monks cultivated the land, produced food, prepared medicines, and offered them, with simplicity, to those most in need. Their silent work was the leaven of a new civilization, where the poor were not a problem to be solved, but brothers and sisters to be welcomed.»
In addition to this material assistance, «the monasteries played a fundamental role in the cultural and spiritual formation of the most humble.» Another example of the continuity of this «Church for the poor» were the Mendicant Orders, which «represented an evangelical revolution, in which the simple and poor lifestyle became a prophetic sign for the mission, reviving the experience of the first Christian community.» They did not propose social reforms expressly, «but rather a personal and communal conversion to the logic of the Kingdom. Poverty, for them, was not a consequence of a lack of goods, but a free choice: to make themselves small in order to welcome the little ones.» Along with this always very present for the Church was that to teach the poor was an act of justice and faith, with the Scholastics, the La Salle Brothers, the Brothers of the Christian Schools, the Marists, or with Saint John Bosco when he began the Salesian work. Here too, the Female Congregations were also protagonists of this pedagogical revolution. «The religious women taught literacy, evangelized, dealt with practical issues of daily life, elevated the spirit through the cultivation of the arts and, above all, formed consciences.» Their mission has been «to form the heart, teach how to think, promote dignity. Combining a life of piety and dedication to their neighbour, they fought abandonment with the tenderness of those who educate in the name of Christ.» In addition to all this work of being close to the poor, there was also the constant accompaniment of migrants, a work that continues today, in initiatives such as refugee reception centers, missions at the borders and the efforts of Caritas Internationalis and other institutions. Christian holiness has flourished «in the most forgotten and wounded places of humanity,» as in the case of Saint Teresa of Calcutta, with her charity lived «to the extreme in favour of the most destitute, discarded by society,» or Saint Dulce of the Poor, known as «the good Angel of Bahia,» who embodied the same evangelical spirit with the Brazilian characteristics, or Saint Benedict Menni, Saint Charles de Foucauld, Saint Katharine Drexel . . .
A story that continues,» the fourth chapter, certifies this union with Christ and with the first Christian community, which also highlights the Christian Social Doctrine, with the Social Encyclicals of the Popes, the documents of Vatican II and also the positions adopted by the national and regional Episcopal Conferences in this regard: «It was the very heart of the Church that was moved by so many poor people who suffered unemployment, underemployment, unjust wages and were forced to live in miserable conditions.» In this sense, Pope Leo XIV recalls in this Exhortation that «charity is a force that changes reality, an authentic historical power of change,» which can put an end to the structures of sin that cause poverty and external inequalities. Because «it is the responsibility of all the members of the People of God to make heard, in different ways, a voice that awakens, that denounces and that exposes itself, even at the cost of appearing «stupid.» The structures of injustice must be recognized and destroyed through the force of good, through a change of mentality, but also with the help of science and technology, through the development of effective policies in the transformation of society. «Furthermore, the poor have been made subjects of evangelization, not only as recipients of charity: «grown up in extreme precariousness, learning to survive in the most difficult conditions, trusting in God with the certainty that no one else takes them seriously, helping one another in the darkest moments, the poor have learned many things that they keep in the secret of their hearts. Those among us who have not experienced similar situations, a life lived on the edge, surely have much to learn from that source of wisdom, which is the experience of the poor. Only by comparing our complaints with their sufferings and trials can we accept a rebuke that invites us to simplify our lives.»
Chapter five is the logical conclusion to the reflection on the Church’s journey. «A permanent challenge,» because «love for the poor is an essential element of God’s history with us and, from the heart of the Church, bursts forth as a continual call in the hearts of believers, both in communities and in each individual faithful.» It’s to listen to the question behind the parable of the Good Samaritan. «Who do you identify with?» This question is stark, direct, and decisive. «Which of them do you resemble?» A challenge that also implies keeping in mind that the worst discrimination the poor suffer is the lack of spiritual attention, since «the preferential option for the poor must translate primarily into privileged and priority religious attention.» All of this without ceasing to practice almsgiving: «We must nourish love and the deepest convictions, and that is done with gestures. To remain in the world of ideas and discussions, without personal, assiduous, and sincere gestures, would be the loss of our most cherished dreams. For this very reason, as Christians, we do not renounce almsgiving.»
“Christian love,» the Exhortation concludes, «overcomes every barrier, brings distant people closer, unites strangers, makes enemies familiar, crosses humanly insurmountable chasms, penetrates the most hidden corners of society. By its nature, Christian love is prophetic, it works miracles, it has no limits: it strives for the impossible. Love is above all a way of conceiving life, a way of living it.»
