Address of Pope Leo to the “Centesimus Annus” Pro Pontifice Foundation
celebrating the centenary of Pope Leo XIII encyclical Rerum Novarum (of new things)
Saturday, 17 May 2025
Theme: “Overcoming Polarizations and Rebuilding Global Governance: The Ethical Foundation”
“Doctrine” can be a synonymous for “science,” “discipline” and “knowledge.”
“We must rediscover, emphasize and cultivate our duty to educate others in critical thinking”
“I urge you to make the voice of the poor be heard”
Dear brothers and sisters,
I thank the President and the members of the Centesimus Annus Pro Pontifice Foundation,
and I greet all of you who are taking part in this annual International Conference and General Assembly.
The theme of this year’s conference – “Overcoming Polarizations and Rebuilding Global Governance: The Ethical Foundations” – speaks to us of the deepest purpose of the Church’s social doctrine as a contribution to peace and dialogue in the service of building bridges of universal fraternity.
Especially in this Easter season, we realize that the Risen Lord always goes before us, even in times when injustice and death seem to prevail.
Let us help one another, as I said on the evening of my election, “to build bridges through dialogue and encounter, joining together as one people, always at peace.”
This is not something that happens by chance, but it is rather an active and continuous interplay of grace and freedom, which our meeting today seeks to respect and support.
Pope Leo XIII, living in an age of momentous and disruptive change, sought to promote peace by encouraging social dialogue between capital and labor, between technology and human intelligence, and between different political cultures and nations.
Pope Francis spoke of a “poly-crisis” to describe the dramatic nature of our time, marked by wars, climate change, growing inequalities, forced and contested migration, stigmatized poverty, disruptive technological innovations, job insecurity and precarious labor rights
(Message to the participants in the General Assembly of the Pontifical Academy for Life,
On such important issues, the Church’s social doctrine is called to provide insights that facilitate dialogue between science and conscience, thus making an essential contribution to better understanding, hope and peace.
This doctrine helps us to see that the way we approach them, guided by criteria of discernment, sound ethical principles and openness to God’s grace is more important than our problems their eventual solution.
You have the opportunity to show that the Church’s social doctrine, with its specific anthropological approach, seeks to encourage genuine engagement with social issues.
It does not claim to possess a monopoly on truth, either in its analysis of problems or its proposal of concrete solutions.
Where social issues are concerned, knowing how best to approach them is more important than providing immediate answers to why things happen or how to deal with them.
It is about learning how to face problems, because they are always different, because each generation is new, with new challenges, dreams and questions.
This is a fundamental aspect of our attempts to build a “culture of encounter” through dialogue and social friendship.
For many of our contemporaries, the words “dialogue” and “doctrine” may seem incompatible.
Perhaps when we hear the word “doctrine,” we tend to think of a set of ideas belonging to a religion.
The word ‘doctrine’ itself makes us feel less inclined to reflect, to call things into question or to seek new alternatives.
In the case of the Church’s social doctrine, we need to make clear that the word “doctrine” has another, more positive meaning, without which dialogue itself would be meaningless.
“Doctrine” can be a synonym for “science,” “discipline” and “knowledge.”
Understood in this way, doctrine appears as the product of research, and is therefore the product of hypotheses, discussions, advances and setbacks, all aimed at providing a reliable, organized and systematic body of knowledge on a given subject.
Consequently, a doctrine is not the same as an opinion, but it is rather a shared, collective and even multidisciplinary search for truth.
“Indoctrination” is immoral.
It stifles critical judgement and undermines the sacred freedom of respect for conscience, even when it is wrong.
It resists new notions and rejects movement, change or the evolution of ideas in the face of new problems.
On the other hand “doctrine,”, (as a serious, calm and rigorous discourse), aims primarily to teach us how to approach problems and, even more importantly, aims to teach us how to approach people.
It also helps us to make prudent judgements when faced with challenges.
Seriousness, rigor and serenity are what we must learn from every doctrine, including the social doctrine of the Church.
In the context of the ongoing digital revolution, we must rediscover, emphasize and cultivate our duty to educate others in critical thinking, countering the temptations to the contrary, that can also be found in ecclesial circles.
There is so little dialogue around us; it is often replaced by shouting, not infrequently in the form of fake news and irrational arguments put together by a few loud voices.
Deeper reflection and study are essential, as well as a commitment to meeting and listening to the poor, who are a treasure for the Church and for humanity.
The views of the poor, though often ignored, are essential if we are to see the world through God’s eyes.
Those who are born and raised far from the centers of power must not simply be educated in the social doctrine of the Church’s but should also be recognized as its continuators and actualizers: witnesses of social commitment, popular movements, and various Catholic workers’ organizations are expressions of the existential peripheries where hope resists and always sprouts.
I urge you to let the voice of the poor be heard.
Dear friends, as the Second Vatican Council states, “In every age, the Church must be able to answer the recurring questions that people ask about the meaning of this present life and the life to come, and how the one is related to the other” ” (Gaudium et Spes, 4 – promulgated y Pope Paul VI on December 7, 1965).
I invite you, then, to participate actively and creatively in this process of discernment, and thus to contribute, together with the whole People of God, to the development of the Church’s social doctrine in this time of significant social change, listening to all and entering into dialogue with all.
In our time, there is a widespread thirst for justice, a desire for authentic fatherhood and motherhood,
a deep longing for spirituality, especially among young people and the marginalized, who do not always find effective means to express their needs.
There is a growing demand for the Church’s social doctrine, to which we must respond.
I thank you all for your commitment and for your prayers for my ministry, and I cordially bless you and your families, and all that you do. Thank you very much!
