VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- For the world's 1.4 billion Catholics and for millions of other people as well, the Catholic Church's 2025 was primarily about the death of Pope Francis and the election of Pope Leo XIV.

In fact, the Wikimedia Foundation announced Dec. 2 that "Deaths in 2025" -- an entry that includes Pope Francis -- was their second most-read entry during the year, and Pope Leo's biography was the fifth most-read article of the 7.1 million entries Wikipedia has in English.

"As people rushed online to learn about Leo, traffic to all Wikimedia projects peaked at around 800,000 hits per second -- more than 6x over normal traffic levels, and a new all-time record for us," said the foundation. 

"Plenty of people came to learn more about Francis' life too," they added. "His English Wikipedia article was the 11th most-read (page) of the year."

Pope Francis had begun the year celebrating the Jan. 1 Mass for the feast of Mary, Mother of God, with a weak voice and a puffy face that, looking back, already indicated his doctors were struggling to control his chronic lung conditions -- bronchiectasis and asthmatic bronchitis -- which were exacerbated anytime he had a cold.

He ended up being hospitalized Feb. 14 with a fever and respiratory tract infection, which later developed into double pneumonia.

While he was hospitalized, cardinals and other Vatican officials -- including U.S. Cardinal Robert F. Prevost, the future Pope Leo -- started taking turns leading thousands of people in praying the rosary for Pope Francis each night in St. Peter's Square. The nightly prayers continued until the pope was released from Rome's Gemelli hospital March 23.

Pope Francis had opened the Jubilee Year Dec. 24, 2024, just after his 88th birthday. But he ended up delegating cardinals to preside over many of the Jubilee Masses. 

On Easter, after giving his blessing "urbi et orbi" (to the city and the world) -- but barely able to raise his hands -- he took his final ride in the popemobile, spending about 15 minutes among the crowd.

Pope Francis died at 7:35 a.m. the next morning, April 21.

In addition to the mourning and the prayers, his death marked the beginning of meetings of the College of Cardinals to discuss the state of the church, its needs and the needs of the world and the qualities the next pope should have.

The conclave to elect the pope solemnly began May 7 with 133 cardinals entering the Sistine Chapel. Cardinal Prevost was elected the next day, on the fourth ballot, and took the name Pope Leo XIV.

"Peace be with you," were Pope Leo's first words to the crowd. The same words are often the first he says to any group he meets.

With a warm but measured demeanor, the first U.S.-born pope eased into his new ministry, highlighting the same themes his predecessors had: the primary Christian mission of sharing the Gospel, working for peace, promoting unity within the church and within the human family and bringing all of that together by serving the poor and denouncing injustice. 

He explained the threads of that inter-connected message in his first major document, "Dilexi Te" ("I Have Loved You"), an apostolic exhortation "to all Christians on love for the poor." 

"Love for the poor -- whatever the form their poverty may take -- is the evangelical hallmark of a Church faithful to the heart of God," the pope wrote. "I am convinced that the preferential choice for the poor is a source of extraordinary renewal both for the Church and for society, if we can only set ourselves free of our self-centeredness and open our ears to their cry."

That love, he said in the document and repeatedly elsewhere as well, extends to migrants and refugees.

"The Church has always recognized in migrants a living presence of the Lord who, on the day of judgment, will say to those on his right: 'I was a stranger, and you welcomed me,'" he wrote.

Pope Leo has been asked repeatedly about U.S. President Donald Trump's treatment of migrants and refugees and the administration's stated goal of mass deportations, and he repeatedly has affirmed church teaching that recognizes the right of a nation to control its borders while insisting that people seeking safety and a better life must be treated with dignity. 

Unlike Pope Francis, his predecessor, Pope Leo has had many of those conversations with reporters in Castel Gandolfo, home of a sprawling papal property with villas, a farm, gardens and a new center dedicated to educating people in ecology.

While Pope Francis visited only a couple of times and then turned the main papal residence at Castel Gandolfo into a museum, Pope Leo spent weeks there in the summer and returns most Monday evenings to spend 24 hours at the villa reading, relaxing, playing tennis and swimming in the indoor pool.

Being elected during a Holy Year, with special Jubilee celebrations planned most weekends, Pope Leo inherited a full calendar and made it his own, especially in late July with the Jubilee of Youth, which brought more than 1 million young people to Rome. 

He had a special and immediate connection with the crowd, in large part because he spoke directly to the young people in English and Spanish in addition to Italian, the Vatican's official working language. 

The young people roared with approval as he spoke to them in languages that most could understand without translation. He clearly tapped into their potential, their hopes and their dreams and brought them along with him to celebrate and pray.

"Aspire to great things, to holiness, wherever you are," he told them at Mass Aug. 3. "Do not settle for less. You will then see the light of the Gospel growing every day, in you and around you."

His ability to connect and his focus on mission, unity and peace were especially obvious Nov. 27-Dec. 2 as he made his first foreign trip as pope, visiting Turkey and Lebanon. 

The trip was planned around an ecumenical celebration of the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea and the Creed most Christians share. But he also encouraged the minority Catholic communities that make outsized contributions to both nations and spent hours demonstrating his respect for the majority Muslim communities.

"The more we can promote authentic unity and understanding, respect and human relationships of friendship and dialogue in the world, the greater possibility there is that we will put aside the arms of war, that we will leave aside the distrust, the hatred, the animosity that has so often been built up and that we will find ways to come together and be able to promote authentic peace and justice throughout the world," he told reporters flying back to Rome with him Dec. 2.
 

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Jesus entering the world as a little baby in need of everything is a sign of God's solidarity with every person in need, longing for love and a helping hand, Pope Leo XIV said at Christmas morning Mass.

"The Word has pitched his fragile tent among us. How, then, can we not think of the tents in Gaza, exposed for weeks to rain, wind and cold; and of those of so many other refugees and displaced persons on every continent; or of the makeshift shelters of thousands of homeless people in our own cities?" he asked in his homily at the Mass Dec. 25 in St. Peter's Basilica. 

In celebrating the morning liturgy publicly, Pope Leo restored a tradition that had lapsed for 30 years. St. John Paul II did not preside over the liturgy in 1995 because he had the flu, and the morning Mass never returned to the papal calendar.

Like his predecessors, Pope Leo went to the central balcony of St. Peter's Basilica at noon to give his solemn blessing "urbi et orbi" (to the city and world). And, returning to a tradition set aside by Pope Francis, who claimed he was bad at languages, Pope Leo wished people a merry Christmas in 10 languages: Italian, French, English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish, Arabic, Chinese and Latin.

"Merry Christmas! May the peace of Christ reign in your hearts and in your families," he said.

In his homily and in his Christmas message before the "urbi et orbi" blessing, Pope Leo insisted that the Christian mission of sharing the good news of salvation in Christ means being serious about what is going on in the world and working to alleviate suffering, promote dialogue and end wars and violence.

Taking on the fragile flesh of a baby, God wanted to identify with every human person, he said in the morning homily. 

"Fragile is the flesh of defenseless populations, tried by so many wars, ongoing or concluded, leaving behind rubble and open wounds," he said. "Fragile are the minds and lives of young people forced to take up arms, who on the front lines feel the senselessness of what is asked of them and the falsehoods that fill the pompous speeches of those who send them to their deaths."

"When the fragility of others penetrates our hearts, when their pain shatters our rigid certainties, then peace has already begun," the pope insisted.

The response of Christians to suffering and violence must be firm but tender, he said.

"We do not serve a domineering Word -- too many of those already resound everywhere," the pope said, but rather Christians profess and serve a Lord who "inspires goodness, knows its efficacy and does not claim a monopoly over it."

The peace proclaimed by Jesus, he said, will take root "when our monologues are interrupted and, enriched by listening, we fall to our knees before the humanity of the other." 

Pope Leo continued his reflection in his "urbi et orbi" message, telling the crowd gathered in the rain in St. Peter's Square that Jesus, "out of love" wanted "to be born of a woman and so share our humanity; out of love, he accepted poverty and rejection, identifying himself with those who are discarded and excluded."

As is customary, the pope used his message to call attention to urgent needs and suffering in places around the globe and to urge people to help relieve that suffering.

"Those who do not love are not saved; they are lost," he said. "And those who do not love their brother or sister whom they see, cannot love God whom they do not see," as the First Letter of John says.

"If all of us, at every level, would stop accusing others and instead acknowledge our own faults, asking God for forgiveness, and if we would truly enter into the suffering of others and stand in solidarity with the weak and the oppressed, then the world would change," Pope Leo said.

Looking around the world, the pope prayed for peace and justice in dozens of countries, including Ukraine, and, as he did the night before and during the Christmas morning Mass, Pope Leo also called attention to the plight of migrants and refugees, asking governments to accept and assist them.

"In becoming man," he said, "Jesus took upon himself our fragility, identifying with each one of us: with those who have nothing left and have lost everything, like the inhabitants of Gaza; with those who are prey to hunger and poverty, like the Yemeni people; with those who are fleeing their homeland to seek a future elsewhere, like the many refugees and migrants who cross the Mediterranean or traverse the American continent." 

"On this holy day, let us open our hearts to our brothers and sisters who are in need or in pain," Pope Leo said. "In doing so, we open our hearts to the Child Jesus, who welcomes us with open arms and reveals his divinity to us."

Octavia Thuss and her son Henry Thuss from La Cañada, California, were among the 26,000 people in St. Peter's Square for the pope's blessing. They also had been in the square late the night before, watching the pope's Christmas Mass on a screen in the rain.

Since it was Pope Leo's first Christmas as pope, "It was historic," she said. "It was a really beautiful service."

Spending the Christmas holiday in Rome during the final days of the Jubilee Year added to the experience, since they were among some of the last pilgrims to pass through the Holy Doors at the city's major basilicas.

"It's kind of a no brainer," Henry said, adding that he felt being at the Vatican during Christmas in a Jubilee Year was akin to Muslims making a pilgrimage to Mecca.

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Contributing to this story was Josephine Peterson.
 

Pope Leo's Christmas message: Jesus brings peace by healing sin

Pope Leo XIV celebrated Christmas morning Mass in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican Dec. 25 before giving his blessing "urbi et orbi" (to the city and the world).

Pope Leo XIV celebrated the Mass of Christmas night in St. Peter’s Basilica at 10:00 PM on Christmas Eve and preached that Christ’s nativity is the light that illumines human darkness (booklet, video).

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- If people refuse to make room for others -- like the poor, children and the stranger -- then they also refuse to make room for God, Pope Leo XIV said as he celebrated the birth of Jesus.

"Where there is room for the human person, there is room for God," the pope said in his homily Dec. 24 as he celebrated the nighttime liturgy in St. Peter's Basilica.

"While a distorted economy leads us to treat human beings as mere merchandise, God becomes like us, revealing the infinite dignity of every person," he said. "While humanity seeks to become 'god' in order to dominate others, God chooses to become man in order to free us from every form of slavery."

The Christmas hymn, "Noel," was sung during the procession, and the Mass began with the Christmas proclamation, or "kalenda," of Jesus' birth. The pope lifted a cloth to reveal a statue of baby Jesus, which he then kissed and blessed with incense.

As the bells of St. Peter's Basilica rang loudly, announcing the birth of Christ, several children representing different cultures placed white flowers around the crib of baby Jesus.

Before the Mass, Pope Leo appeared outside the basilica to greet some 5,000 people gathered in the square under the cold, pouring rain. The basilica was near capacity, and large screens set up in the square allowed the overflow crowd to follow the liturgy.

"Good evening and welcome!" the pope said to the crowd outside.

"The basilica of St. Peter's is very large, but unfortunately, it is not large enough to receive all of you. I admire and respect and thank you for your courage and your wanting to be here this evening," he said in English.

"Jesus Christ, who was born for us, brings us peace, brings us God's love," he said before heading back to the basilica for the Mass. More than 6,000 people were in the basilica, and guards were reportedly letting additional people in from the rain during the service. 

In his homily, the pope reflected on how, for millennia, people looked to the heavens for guidance and a truth that was missing below on earth.

With the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem, the One who redeems humanity is born, the pope said. "To find the Savior, one must not gaze upward, but look below."

"The omnipotence of God shines forth in the powerlessness of a newborn," he said. "The divine light radiating from this Child helps us to recognize humanity in every new life."

"To heal our blindness, the Lord chooses to reveal himself in each human being," Pope Leo said. "As long as the night of error obscures this providential truth, then 'there is no room for others either, for children, for the poor, for the stranger,'" he said, quoting from Pope Benedict XVI's homily on Christmas Eve in 2012.

His predecessor's words "remain a timely reminder that on earth, there is no room for God if there is no room for the human person. To refuse one is to refuse the other," he said.

"The wisdom of Christmas," he said, is that God gives the world a new life -- his own, offered for all -- in the Child Jesus. "He does not give us a clever solution to every problem, but a love story that draws us in."

"Will this love be enough to change our history?" he asked. "The answer will come as soon as we wake up from a deadly night into the light of new life and, like the shepherds, contemplate the Child Jesus." 

God sends a child to be "a word of hope," he said, recalling how exactly one year ago, Pope Francis began the Holy Year dedicated to hope on Christmas Eve. The year will run through Jan. 6, 2026.

"Now, as the Jubilee draws to a close, Christmas becomes for us a time of gratitude" for the gift received and mission to bear witness to it before the world, he said.

"Let us therefore announce the joy of Christmas, which is a feast of faith, charity and hope," he said, and become "messengers of peace. With these virtues in our hearts, unafraid of the night, we can go forth to meet the dawn of a new day."

After the Mass, Pope Leo carried the figurine of the baby Jesus to the Nativity scene at the back of the basilica. Flanked by children on either side, the pope went to the crèche, and the Jesus figurine was placed in the manger. The pope blessed the crowd as he left the basilica.