The Priority of the Gospel, Synodality According to Leo XIV, and the Types of Courage Needed Today in the Church

(ZENIT News / Vatican City, 05.28. 2026) – The Italian Episcopal Conference CEI) met with Pope Leo XIV, Primate of Italy, on the morning of Thursday, May 28, in the Synod Hall of Vatican City. The context was the Plenary Assembly of the Italian Episcopate. The Italian Episcopate is one of the largest in the world, given that the Pope is Bishop of Rome, and therefore also a member. For this reason, in the past, the decision regarding who should lead the Italian Episcopate has been left to him. Currently, its President is the Archbishop of Bologna, Cardinal Matteo Zuppi.

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Dearest Brothers in the Episcopate, good morning!

Thank you, Your Eminence, for your kind words. A warm greeting to all those elected to serve in the Episcopal Conference, especially the Vice-President, and to each of you. Through you, I wish to express my affection for all the Churches in Italy, for priests, deacons, consecrated persons, families, catechists, educators, young people, the elderly, priests, the sick, those who live their faith in the simplicity of daily life, and those who, perhaps unknowingly, carry in their hearts a thirst for God.

This is what we have the grace to observe in various ways, even in a time like ours, marked by complexity. I experienced it directly in my recent visits to Pompeii, Naples, and Cerra. Many signs speak to us of weariness, fragmentation, and loneliness. In our communities, we can sometimes perceive the fatigue of transmitting the faith, the difficulty of engaging the new generations. But the Gospel shakes us. Jesus, looking at the crowds, doesn’t see a problem to solve; He sees a harvest, He sees God’s field: «The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send laborers into His harvest» (Luke 10:2). A tireless Sower, God goes out into the world each day and generously scatters in hearts the desire for the infinite, for a full life, for a salvation that liberates. Yes, thanks be to God, the harvest is plentiful. Our first task is this: to make the Lord our own. Let us not lament only the barren ground nor dwell merely on statistics, but let us see, with the eyes of the Risen One, the harvest that God Himself prepares for us.

Dearest brothers, may the Holy Spirit grant us hearts burning with the impulse of Christ, and raise up many holy workers to labor with us.

With this perspective, then, the priority is the Gospel: Saint Francis of Assisi tells us this, eight hundred years after his ascension to Heaven; we are reminded of it in Saint Paul VI’s Evangelii Nuntiandi  and Pope Francis’ Evangelii Gaudium. For it is from the Gospel that faith is born, as a living encounter with Christ, dead and risen, present in His Church. Today, in the context in which we are called to act, confronted with other perspectives on life and with unprecedented anthropological challenges, returning the Gospel to the center is the gift that gives enthusiasm to our life as Bishops and the urgency that drives us.

We are called, therefore, to ask ourselves: what face of God do we allow to shine through in preaching, in catechesis, in the liturgy, in charity, in the life of our communities? How do we foster an encounter with Christ, and what does it mean today, for us and our Churches, to initiate others into the Christian life? These are questions that, as Pastors, we must always ask ourselves, never taking them for granted.

Here, then, is the renewed attention to Christian Initiation, which cannot be conceived only as preparation for the Sacraments. It is the «womb» in which a community gives birth to faith and introduces one into the Paschal life, into communion with the Lord, into ecclesial fraternity. It is a matter of rediscovering Baptism as a living and existential reality; and «it is not possible to fully understand Baptism except within Christian Initiation, that is, the journey through which the Lord, by means of the ministry of the Church and the gift of the Spirit, introduces us into the Paschal faith and inserts us into Trinitarian and ecclesial communion» (Final Document of the 16th Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, 24). This is a very important point emphasized by the most recent Synod of Bishops, because it situates the path opened by Baptism within a Church that believes, celebrates, accompanies, and gives birth. A Church that, while rejoicing in wonder at the young and adult catechumens, is then able to sustain their perseverance after the initial impulse.

Faith is transmitted and grows where there are vibrant and welcoming communities, capable of hearing and listening; communities where the Word of God does not remain on the margins, but illuminates decisions; where the Eucharist is truly the source and summit; where the poor are not external recipients of a service, but brothers and sisters through whom the Lord speaks to us; where young people are faces, voices of stories with whom to dialogue; where families are not left alone and wounds are not hidden, but are brought before the Lord with humility; where faith becomes an effective commitment in society, in politics, in culture.

Precisely for this reason, we Bishops are called to profound listening: to listen to the Word of God, to listen to the People of God, and therefore to listen to the signs of the times, to listen also to what challenges our pastoral practices. Where listening is genuine, the community does not close in on itself, but becomes a place of discernment and mission and, with that end, knows how to renew itself.

This is the meaning of the Synodal Path that you have completed and that, as you have emphasized, must now become a permanent style. Vatican Council II reminded us that God was pleased to sanctify and save men not separately and without any bond between them, but by constituting them as a people who would recognize Him in truth and serve Him in holiness (cf. Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium, 9). A synodal Church is one in which each person, according to their own vocation, can offer the gift received from the Spirit for the common upbuilding. Participation, therefore, is not an option: it is a requirement of communion and mission and, for this reason, must become method, responsibility, and verification, involving the various charisms and ministries and respecting the proper role of the Bishop. The Synthesis Document of the Synodal Path of the Churches in Italy underscores the value of participatory bodies as places where the discernment of the communities can take shape. However, it is not enough for these instruments to exist; it is necessary to verify that they truly function.

In this process, the various structures of the Italian Episcopal Conference (CEI) are called to continue their service of communion, coordination, discernment, and support for the Churches in Italy. Precisely because it has this role, the organization of the Episcopal Conference must be shaped by the demands of the mission and the changed historical conditions. It is not a matter of imitating external organizational models, nor of reducing everything to administrative efficiency, but rather of asking what form helps pastors and local Churches today to better proclaim the Gospel, to walk together, and to make possible, effective, orderly, and fruitful participation. When one lives in the Spirit, this examination does not weaken communion but, rather, purifies it.

Dear brothers, the Lord does not ask us to measure the fruitfulness of the Church by criteria of numbers, visibility, or influence. «When we look with the eyes of God, we discover that He has chosen the path of smallness to descend in our midst. […] This logic of smallness is the true strength of the Church. It does not reside in her resources and structures, nor do the aims of her mission derive from numerical consensus, economic power, or social relevance. The Church, on the contrary, lives by the light of the Lamb and, gathered in His presence, is propelled through the ways of the world by the power of the Holy Spirit» (Address at the Prayer Meeting in Istanbul, November 28, 2025).

Let us have the courage for what is essential! The courage of communities less concerned with preserving everything and more free to proclaim Christ. The courage of a catechesis that is a path of initiation and ongoing formation in the Christian life. The courage of welcoming and missionary parishes, where families rediscover each other and are renewed with the lifeblood of the Gospel. The courage of vibrant participatory bodies. The courage to listen to young people without taming their questions. The courage to allow ourselves to be evangelized by the poor. The courage of a national structure increasingly at the service of the missionary communion of the Churches of Italy. A people is born of mothers and fathers in faith, of communities that know how to say, with their lives even before their words: «We have found the Messiah» (John 1:41). Italy needs this witness.

I entrust your path to the Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church. She received the gift, guarded the Word, walked with the disciples, and waited for the Spirit in the Upper Room. She helped them to be «rooted and built up in him, firm in the faith» (Colossians 2:7), to guard what is essential, to give birth in faith, to walk with the People of God, and to recognize the voice of the Lord who still calls, comforts, and sends out.

I accompany you with my blessing. Thank you!

Translation of the Italian original into Spanish by ZENIT’s Editorial Director and, into English, by Virginia M. Forrester.