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Since her apparitions to Saint Juan Diego in 1531, devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe has been a source of comfort, hope, and faith for millions.

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VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Leo XIV prayed for Mary's maternal intercession so that she would help nations avoid lies and hatred and instruct leaders to protect the dignity of all human life.

He also prayed that families find strength, young people find meaning and people of faith seek greater communion because "within the church, Mother, your children cannot be divided."

In his homily at Mass for the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe in St. Peter's Basilica Dec. 12, Pope Leo also asked Mary to support him in his ministry as the successor of St. Peter and "grant that, trusting in your protection, we may advance ever more united, with Jesus and among ourselves, toward the eternal dwelling place that He has prepared for us and where you await us."

While it was his first Mass marking the Marian feast day at the Vatican as pope, as Cardinal Robert F. Prevost, he had already served as the main celebrant at the altar during the Dec. 12 Mass in 2024 and 2023 when he was prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops and president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. Pope Francis had presided over both of those Masses, but due to bouts of illness, he remained seated during the celebrations and gave the homily.

Pope Leo, who spent more than two decades as a missionary in Peru, gave the homily in Spanish and recalled how the Marian apparitions in 1531 in Tepeyac, Mexico, awakened "in the inhabitants of America the joy of knowing that they are loved by God." 

Devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe is deeply rooted in Latin America. According to tradition, Mary appeared to St. Juan Diego, an Indigenous Mexican, and left her pregnant image imprinted on his cloak. It was said she assured him in his native language not to be afraid because, "Am I not here, who am your Mother?" offering protection, health and safety in the folds of her mantle.

"It is the voice that echoes the promise of divine fidelity, the presence that sustains when life becomes unbearable," especially "amidst unceasing conflicts, injustices and pains that seek relief," Pope Leo said.

Her motherhood "makes us discover ourselves as children," and "as children, we will turn to her to ask" what must be done, especially "how to grow in faith when our strength fails and shadows grow," the pope said. Referring to her son, Jesus, she will "tenderly reply: 'Do whatever he tells you.'"

Pope Leo then prayed for Mary's intercession, asking that she "teach nations that want to be your children not to divide the world into irreconcilable factions, not to allow hatred to mark their history or lies to write their memory."

"Show them that authority must be exercised as service and not as domination," he said. "Instruct their leaders in their duty to safeguard the dignity of every person during all stages of their life," and may these people create places "where every person can feel welcome."

He prayed that Mary would accompany young people so they could find strength in Christ "to choose what is good and the courage to remain firm in the faith, even when the world pushes them in another direction." 

"Show them that your Son walks beside them. May nothing afflict their hearts so that they may fearlessly welcome God's plans," he said, praying that she also help keep young people safe "from the threats of crime, addiction and the danger of a meaningless life."

"Seek out, Mother, those who have strayed from the holy church," he said. "May your gaze reach them where ours cannot, break down the walls that separate us, and bring them back home with the power of your love."

Pope Leo then implored Mary to touch the hearts of those "who sow discord toward your Son's desire that 'they may all be one' and restore them to the charity that makes communion possible, for within the church, Mother, your children cannot be divided."

"Strengthen families," he prayed. "Following your example, may parents educate their children with tenderness and firmness, so that every home may be a school of faith."

He prayed that those who teach be inspired to share the truth "with the gentleness, precision and clarity that comes from the Gospel," and he prayed that the clergy and consecrated men and women find support and encouragement to be faithful, prayerful and revitalized.

"Holy Virgin, may we, like you, keep the Gospel in our hearts," he said, and help Christians understand "we are not the owners of this message, but, like St. Juan Diego, we are its simple servants."

Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller, who served as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith from 2012 to 2017, said in a new interview that “since the 18th century, Islam has been regarded—by the philosophy of deism and of ‘natural religion’—as an ally in the struggle against Christianity.”

“Even today, it is instrumentalized by the so-called fighters against ‘Islamophobia,’ who hope that this religion will eventually secularize itself and ultimately tolerate—against its own truth—the atheistic woke anthropology,” Cardinal Müller added.

Stating that “there is no way around recognizing the Second Vatican Council as the 21st ecumenical council of the Catholic Church,” Cardinal Müller added:

The foolish talk of a “sede vacante” of the Chair of Peter, calls for a revision of the Council, and the claim that the Lefebvrists are the last bastion of true Catholicity must finally come to an end. Even if they are right to place their finger on the wounds inflicted on the Body of Christ by self-appointed reformers in the style of Modernism, there is never a justification for distancing oneself from the Catholic Church—even though the Church is a mixture of saints and sinners, as St Augustine emphasised against the strict and self-righteous Donatist sect.

Cardinal Stephen Chow, SJ, of Hong Kong preached that “I think AI is not from the devil. AI comes from God.”

The prelate made his remarks during the opening Mass of a December 10-12 gathering organized by the Office of Social Communications of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences. Cardinal Chow added, “I pray that this meeting will help us, liberate us, and inspire us to work with AI to achieve the blessings God intends for us.”

Addressing the bishops and other participants in the gathering, Paolo Ruffini, the prefect of the Dicastery for Communication, offered a more cautious approach. He “cautioned against deepfakes, unverifiable sources, algorithmic filtering, and the opaque logic by which digital platforms shape information flows,” Vatican News reported.

Citing the right to freedom of speech, a federal appeals court has sided with Florida Preborn and four sidewalk counselors in their lawsuit against a buffer-zone ordinance enacted by the city of Clearwater.

In its decision, the court noted that the “buffer zone applied to most pedestrians, forbidding entrance to a 38-foot stretch of public sidewalk (28 feet of which cross the clinic’s driveway) during business hours.”

The prefect of the Dicastery for Culture and Education said that “Chapel of Liberation,” a new exhibit in his dicastery’s contemporary art museum, is not about liberation theology.

In a December 10 speech introducing two exhibits by Brazilian artist Jonathas De Andrade, Cardinal José Tolentino de Mendonça said that the artist shows “strength of prophetic aspiration,” as well as “the opportunity and complexity of the Church-World dialogue, religion and secularization, mystical dimension, and political commitment.”

“Jonathan de Andrade’s aim in ‘The Chapel of Liberation’ is not to validate a particular aesthetic or create a monument to a specific theological movement—namely, liberation theology, because monumentalizing is freezing time in an image—but rather to make us reflect on the social responsibility of Christians today, which will have different expressions than those of yesterday,” the cardinal added.