Pope Leo XIV presided over Holy Mass this Sunday, September 21, in the Vatican parish of Santa Ana, where he delivered a homily centered on Christ’s radical teaching on the impossibility of serving two masters: God and money.
A Parish “on the Border” of the Vatican
The Pontiff highlighted the unique character of this parish, located at the entrance to Vatican City, through which workers, guests, and pilgrims pass. Leo XIV asked that those who pass through this place always find “doors and hearts open to prayer, listening, and charity”.
Warning Against the Idolatry of Wealth
Commenting on the Gospel of the day (Lk 16:13), the Pope recalled that wealth can take the place of God in man’s heart: “The temptation is to think that without God we can live well, while without wealth we would be lost. But whoever serves wealth becomes its slave”.
He quoted the prophet Amos to denounce those who seek to dominate the poor “by buying the needy for money” (Am 8:6), and Psalm 113 to emphasize that God bends over human weakness and lifts the poor from their misery.
Call to Conversion and the Common Good
Leo XIV insisted that the Word of God does not divide humanity into rival classes, but invites all to an “interior revolution” that translates into open hands for giving and open minds for building a better society. He recalled Saint Paul, exhorting to pray for rulers so that they do not fall into the temptation of using wealth “as a weapon that destroys peoples or as a monopoly that humiliates workers”.
Message in the Face of War and Indifference
The Pope concluded by denouncing that “entire peoples are today crushed by violence and even more by a brazen indifference that abandons them to misery”. He encouraged the parishioners to persevere in hope, trusting that, nourished by the Eucharist, they become “witnesses of charity and peace” in a world wounded by war and greed.