Saint Joseph Catholic Church

Vatican News reported that Archbishop Peña Parra spoke of a need “to find a balance between two opposing risks: on the one hand, a return to a hierarchical and top-down approach that stifles the role of the faithful; on the other, a chaotic system that threatens the unity and mission of the Church.”

As the Sostituto (officially, the Substitute for General Affairs of the Secretariat of State), Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra coordinates the internal affairs of the Roman Curia and reports to Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Secretary of State.

“You have come to entrust your lives to the same mercy to which, through your religious profession, you once committed yourselves to bear witness, because living out your vows means abandoning yourselves like children into the arms of the Father,” Pope Leo preached.

God is “the fullness and meaning of our lives,” the Pope continued. “For you—for us—the Lord is everything ... The Lord, to whom you have given everything, has rewarded you with such beauty and richness, and I would like to urge you to treasure and cultivate what you have received.”

“It is with great joy that I write to you, following a practice begun by Pope Francis more than ten years ago, associating the entire Episcopal College at important moments of Papal Magisterium,” Pope Leo wrote. “May ‘Dilexi te’ help the Church to serve the poor and help bring the poor to Christ.”

“For us Christians,” the problem of the poor leads to the very heart of our faith,” writes Pope Leo XIV in his apostolic exhortation Dilexi Te, released on October 9. In this, the first major teaching document of his pontificate, Pope Leo insists that care for the poor is an essential and obligatory aspect of the life of faith.