Pope Leo XIV leads the traditional Sunday Angelus prayer from the window of his study overlooking St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City on August 23, 2026. EFE/EPA/VATICAN MEDIA
Vatican City, Aug 23 (EFE) – Pope Leo XIV urged Catholic faithful this Sunday “not to become closed off in their religious convictions and certainties” and to avoid the temptation of turning the Christian faith into “a mere habit,” during the Angelus prayer.
From the window of the Apostolic Palace, the pontiff affirmed that faith “is not given once and for all,” but rather requires continuous renewal to “deepen our understanding of its message and renew our life’s decisions,” overcoming the inertia of believing “that we already know everything.”
“Sometimes, with regard to the Christian faith, we settle for ‘what is said,’ for clichés, for what has been handed down to us, perhaps even with good intentions; but Jesus calls us to a personal response, to know him intimately, to allow ourselves to be transformed by friendship with him,” said Leo XIV.
In this sense, the Pope noted that this encounter may require “traveling uncharted paths and making decisions different from those we had imagined.”
An openness to change that, he concluded, must be applied “both to the personal path and to the path of the Church and to pastoral decisions, in which we sometimes think that it is enough to continue as we have always done.”
