BREAKING Pope Leo XIV's 1st Apostolic Exhortation Co-Written with Pope Francis - 5 Keys to Understand "Dilexi te" - "I have loved you" - Official Magisterial Teaching
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Pope Leo XIV, like Pope Francis, who completed the work of Benedict XVI on the encyclical Lumen Fidei, took up the text of his immediate predecessor for his first major Magisterial document. Dilexi te builds on the teaching of Pope Francis’ final encyclical – Dilexit nos, on the Sacred Heart of Jesus – highlighting the “close connection” between the love of God and love for the poor. “In the poor”, writes Pope Leo, God “continues to speak to us” (5).
Cardinal Michael Czerny, head of the Vatican Dicastery for Integral Human Development, said at an Oct. 9 presentation of the document, explained that the document is now part of papal magisterium.
Dilexi te (“I have loved you”, from Rev 3:9) unfolds in 121 numbered paragraphs spread throughout five chapters, and flows directly from the Gospel of the Son of God, Who in the very act of entering into our world through the Incarnation became poor for our sakes.
At the same time, it reproposes the Church’s social teaching, especially that of the past 150 years, as “a veritable treasury of significant teachings” concerning the poor.
Pope Leo XIV’s first Apostolic Exhortation sees the love of Christ incarnated in love for the poor, in caring for the sick, opposing slavery, defending women who experience exclusion and violence, making education available to all, accompanying migrants, charitable giving, working for equality and more.At the same time, it reproposes the Church’s social teaching, especially that of the past 150 years, as “a veritable treasury of significant teachings” concerning the poor.
Dilexi te (“I have loved you”, from Rev 3:9) unfolds in 121 numbered paragraphs spread throughout five chapters, and flows directly from the Gospel of the Son of God, Who in the very act of entering into our world through the Incarnation became poor for our sakes. At the same time, it reproposes the Church’s social teaching, especially that of the past 150 years, as “a veritable treasury of significant teachings” concerning the poor.
5 KEYS to UNDERSTAND DILEXI TE:
1.The face of the poor as an epiphany of the Kingdom of God (8-12)
In the healing of wounds, whether physical, social or spiritual, the Church proclaims that the Kingdom of God embraces the vulnerable. In every act of care such as visiting the sick (Mt 25:36), the Christian community experiences salvation as a concrete relationship with those who bear the marks of the Cross in their flesh.
Poverty, a huge social problem, is also a theological theme: through the poor, God speaks to the Church (“Dilexi te,I have loved you” [1]), faith becomes real in mercy and service that break down barriers, and God’s people experience the beatitude of “the poor in spirit.”[2]
2.From structures of sin to the conversion of social structures (90-98)
Recent Church teaching understands that poverty results from structures of sin. Selfishness and indifference solidify in economic and cultural systems. The “economy that kills”[3]measures human value in terms of productivity, consumption and profit. This “dominant mentality” makes it acceptable to discard the weak and unproductive, and thus deserves the label “social sin”.
Beyond donations and other assistance, the Church's response denounces the false impartiality of the market, proposes models of development, promotes justice, aims for the conversion of structures. This fosters a form of communal or social repentance that restores dignity to the invisible and helps them to develop more fully.
3.Poverty as active subjectivity and principle of evangelisation (99-102)
St John Paul II urged the poor to become protagonists of ecclesial and social transformation. Popular movements (80-81)with their “moral energy,”[4]demonstrate that justice arises from including the excluded. Besides suffering privation, the poor can be “bearers of hope” and “builders of a common destiny.”[5]Let the Church assist them,be evangelised by them, recognise the Spirit at work in them, and together proclaim the Gospel.
4.Education, Eucharist and Service: promoting integral development (68-72, 108-114)
Promoting integral human development, according to the Social Teaching of the Church, intertwines education, Eucharist and service.
•Education is the first act of justice, because it frees people from spiritual poverty and prepares them for social responsibility.
•The Eucharist brings diverse people together, nourishes the community and missions it to charity and solidarity.
•Service is social love in concrete form: care for the poor and for our common home.
Thus, the Church offers mercy to the world, promoting a civilisation in which every person is recognised as the image of God.
5.Charity generates peace and universal fraternity (108-114)
In Dilexi te,Pope Leo joins Pope Francis in declaring: there will beno peace as long as the poor and the planet are neglected and abused.
Christian peace isreconciling and reconciled justice. The poor, Mother Teresa said, “do not need our pity but our respectful love.”[6]Treating them with dignity is the first act of peace. Only a society with the discarded at its centre can be truly peaceful, and only a world of such societies can be at peace._______________
1.The face of the poor as an epiphany of the Kingdom of God (8-12)
In the healing of wounds, whether physical, social or spiritual, the Church proclaims that the Kingdom of God embraces the vulnerable. In every act of care such as visiting the sick (Mt 25:36), the Christian community experiences salvation as a concrete relationship with those who bear the marks of the Cross in their flesh.
Poverty, a huge social problem, is also a theological theme: through the poor, God speaks to the Church (“Dilexi te,I have loved you” [1]), faith becomes real in mercy and service that break down barriers, and God’s people experience the beatitude of “the poor in spirit.”[2]
2.From structures of sin to the conversion of social structures (90-98)
Recent Church teaching understands that poverty results from structures of sin. Selfishness and indifference solidify in economic and cultural systems. The “economy that kills”[3]measures human value in terms of productivity, consumption and profit. This “dominant mentality” makes it acceptable to discard the weak and unproductive, and thus deserves the label “social sin”.
Beyond donations and other assistance, the Church's response denounces the false impartiality of the market, proposes models of development, promotes justice, aims for the conversion of structures. This fosters a form of communal or social repentance that restores dignity to the invisible and helps them to develop more fully.
3.Poverty as active subjectivity and principle of evangelisation (99-102)
St John Paul II urged the poor to become protagonists of ecclesial and social transformation. Popular movements (80-81)with their “moral energy,”[4]demonstrate that justice arises from including the excluded. Besides suffering privation, the poor can be “bearers of hope” and “builders of a common destiny.”[5]Let the Church assist them,be evangelised by them, recognise the Spirit at work in them, and together proclaim the Gospel.
4.Education, Eucharist and Service: promoting integral development (68-72, 108-114)
Promoting integral human development, according to the Social Teaching of the Church, intertwines education, Eucharist and service.
•Education is the first act of justice, because it frees people from spiritual poverty and prepares them for social responsibility.
•The Eucharist brings diverse people together, nourishes the community and missions it to charity and solidarity.
•Service is social love in concrete form: care for the poor and for our common home.
Thus, the Church offers mercy to the world, promoting a civilisation in which every person is recognised as the image of God.
5.Charity generates peace and universal fraternity (108-114)
In Dilexi te,Pope Leo joins Pope Francis in declaring: there will beno peace as long as the poor and the planet are neglected and abused.
Christian peace isreconciling and reconciled justice. The poor, Mother Teresa said, “do not need our pity but our respectful love.”[6]Treating them with dignity is the first act of peace. Only a society with the discarded at its centre can be truly peaceful, and only a world of such societies can be at peace._______________
FULL TEXT at LINK Dilexi te
[1]Addressed to Philadelphia, a poor and powerless Christian community, unimportant but faithful, treated instead with violence and contempt: “You have but little power… and they will realize that I have loved you” (Revelation 3:8-9).
[2]Matthew 5:3.
[3]Evangelii Gaudium, 92-93.
[4]PopeFrancis,Adress to the Participants in the World Meeting of Popular Movements, 28 October 2014.
[5]PopeFrancis,Adress to the Participants in the World Meeting of Popular Movements, 28 October 2014.
[6]Dilexi te,77.
Sources: VaticanNews and https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/it/bollettino/pubblico/2025/10/09/0729/01298.html
[1]Addressed to Philadelphia, a poor and powerless Christian community, unimportant but faithful, treated instead with violence and contempt: “You have but little power… and they will realize that I have loved you” (Revelation 3:8-9).
[2]Matthew 5:3.
[3]Evangelii Gaudium, 92-93.
[4]PopeFrancis,Adress to the Participants in the World Meeting of Popular Movements, 28 October 2014.
[5]PopeFrancis,Adress to the Participants in the World Meeting of Popular Movements, 28 October 2014.
[6]Dilexi te,77.
Sources: VaticanNews and https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/it/bollettino/pubblico/2025/10/09/0729/01298.html
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