Pope convenes summit to proclaim the Gospel to families

The Pope's convocation in October 2026 to the bishops“ conferences aims to proceed, ”in a climate of mutual listening, to a synodal discernment on the steps to be taken to proclaim the Gospel to today's families, in the light of Amoris laetitia (AL) and taking into account what is being done in the local Churches.".

In its Message, Ten years after Amoris laetitia, the Pope is aware of “the anthropological-cultural changes” (AL 32), which have become more pronounced over the past thirty-five years”, and which “continue to affect families”, and that Pope Francis “wanted to commit the Church even more to the path of synodal discernment”. 

“The family is the foundation of society, a gift from God.”

And he specifies that it is not possible “to speak about the family without questioning families, listening to their joys and hopes, their sorrows and anxieties”. Consequently, the Successor of Peter wishes to continue to deepen the teachings of Amoris laetitia, and emphasizes that “the two Apostolic Exhortations Familiaris consortio - published by St. John Paul II in 1981 - and Amoris laetitia have stimulated the Church's doctrinal and pastoral commitment to the service of young people, spouses and families”.

In addition, the Pope briefly recalls the teachings of the Second Vatican Council - the family is ‘....‘the foundation of society’, a gift of God and ‘a school of the richest humanism’ - and emphasizes that “through the sacrament of marriage, Christian spouses constitute a kind of ‘domestic Church’, whose role is essential for the education and transmission of the faith”.

At Tor Vergata

The Pontiff also recalled the Jubilee of Youth last summer. There, “I had the opportunity to say to the young people gathered at Tor Vergata during the Jubilee of Hope, ‘I am very happy to have the opportunity to say to the young people gathered at Tor Vergata during the Jubilee of Hope, '....‘fragility [...], it is part of the wonder that we are’. We were not made ‘for a life where everything is firm and secure, but for an existence that is constantly regenerating itself in gift, in love’”.

“Evoking the beauty of the vocation to marriage.”

The Pope recalls, as mentioned at the beginning, that “to fulfill the mission of proclaiming the Gospel of the family to the younger generations, we must learn to evoke the beauty of the vocation to marriage precisely in the recognition of its fragility, in order to awaken «trust in grace (AL 36) and the Christian desire for holiness”. 

We must also support families, Leo XIV points out, “particularly those who suffer so many forms of poverty and violence present in contemporary society”.

In his Message, dated the Solemnity of St. Joseph today, the Pope gives “thanks to the Lord for the families who, despite difficulties and challenges, live «the spirituality of family love [...] made up of thousands of real and concrete gestures» (n. 315). 

He expresses his “gratitude to pastors, pastoral workers, associations of the faithful and ecclesial movements involved in family pastoral care”.

The Church's commitment to those whom the Lord calls to marriage and the family

And he forcefully states that “our era is marked by rapid transformations that, even more so today than ten years ago, require a special pastoral care to families, to whom the Lord entrusts the task of participating in the Church's mission of proclaiming and bearing witness to the Gospel”. 

In fact, he adds, the Pontiff, ^"there are places and circumstances in which the Church ‘can only become salt of the earth’ through the lay faithful and, in particular, through families. 

Therefore, the Church's commitment in this area must be renewed and deepened, so that those whom the Lord calls to marriage and the family may live their married love in Christ and young people may be attracted to the intensity of the married vocation in the Church.”.