Pope Leo XIV has asked the faithful who filled St. Peter’s Square this Sunday to learn to forgive “beyond every limit, without measure.” From the window of the Apostolic Palace, the Pontiff dedicated the Angelus of the XXIV Sunday in Ordinary Time to the Gospel of Saint Matthew (18, 21-35), in which Peter asks Jesus how many times he must forgive his brother and receives the famous reply: “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven.”
That figure, the Pope explained, invites us to go beyond any calculation and to live forgiveness with a generosity that neither measures nor sets conditions. Drawing on the parable of the servant whose lord cancels an impossible debt and who then refuses to forgive his companion, Leo XIV recalled that “gift and forgiveness are the foundation of our existence”: everything we receive comes from God’s free love, and that same gratuity must become the rule that orders human coexistence.
The Pontiff warned bluntly of what happens when forgiveness is lacking. “Forgiveness is indispensable; without it one cannot live in peace,” he stated. Where it disappears, “conflicts, accusations, resentments and vengeances” arise that “destroy relationships, divide families and unleash wars.” Faced with that spiral, he concluded, “only forgiveness liberates and restores light.”
Memory of 9/11 and a call to peace
After the Marian prayer, the first American Pope in history recalled the 25th anniversary of the attacks of September 11, 2001 in his native country. “I renew my prayers for those who lost their lives and for those who continue to bear the wounds of that tragic day,” he said.
Leo XIV wanted the memory of that day to serve as a spiritual spur: the remembrance of the attack “impels us to renew our commitment to peace,” which he entrusted to the Virgin Mary. “At a time when conflict and violence afflict so many of our brothers and sisters, I invite everyone to pray that the Lord may grant his gift of peace upon the world,” he added before the pilgrims.
Today’s catechesis continues last Sunday’s, in which the Pope spoke of fraternal correction and of the “debt of mutual love” based on the Letter to the Romans, in a sequence of reflections on the life of the Christian community that follows the thread of the readings for these Sundays in September.