Above: Pope Leo XIV greets pilgrims at the start of his weekly general audience in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican March 11, 2026. (CNS photo/Lola Gomez)
Addressing pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square for his weekly General Audience, Pope Leo XIV continued his catechesis on the Second Vatican Council’s Lumen gentium, focusing this week on the Church as the People of God. The Holy Father reflected on the biblical roots of God’s chosen people and the fulfillment of that identity in Christ.
The pope began by recalling God’s covenant with Abraham as the moment God formed a people for Himself. Their identity, he said, came not from cultural unity but from God’s initiative: “The identity of this people is given by God’s action and by faith in Him.” God’s chosen people, he added, were always meant to serve as a light for all nations.
Turning to the New Covenant, Pope Leo XIV explained that this divine gathering of a people finds its fulfillment in Jesus Christ. “It is Christ who, in giving His Body and His Blood, unites this people in Himself and in a definitive way,” he said. Through the grace of Christ, he continued, the Church becomes a people drawn “from all the peoples of the earth,” held together not by ethnicity or language but by shared faith.
Because Christ is the head, the pope emphasized, the Church is a “messianic people.” Christians belong to this people not by merit but by grace. “What really matters in the Church,” he taught, “is to be grafted onto Christ, to be children of God by grace.” This identity, he said, forms the foundation of the Church’s mission and its internal life: a community animated by the law of love.
The Holy Father also highlighted the Church’s essential openness and universality. “In the Church there is, and there must be, a place for everyone,” he affirmed, reminding the faithful that all people are called to belong to God’s family and that every Christian is sent to share the Gospel where they live and work. The Church’s catholicity, he added, both welcomes the richness of diverse cultures and offers them the transforming newness of the Gospel.
Drawing on a memorable image from a 20th‑century theologian, Pope Leo XIV described the Church as the “unique Ark of Salvation” that must embrace the full spectrum of human diversity—“the garment of Joseph, with its many colours.”
As the world continues to grapple with violence and division, the pope said the Church is called to be a living sign of unity. He pointed to the global makeup of the Church as a witness to the peace God desires: “It is a great sign of hope… to know that the Church is a people in which women and men of different nationalities, languages and cultures live together in faith.”
Pope Leo XIV concluded by inviting the faithful to rediscover the joy and responsibility of belonging to the People of God—formed by the Father, united in Christ, and sent into the world as bearers of light and hope.
Read the pope’s complete message.