Bulletins, Newsletters, and Flocknotes

3 August 18th Sunday of Ordinary Time Rome – Tor Vergata, 9.00 Holy Mass Jubilee of Youth

15 August Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, solemnity Pontifical Parish of San Tommaso da Villanova , Castel Gandolfo, 10.00 Holy Mass

7 September 23rd Sunday of Ordinary Time Saint Peter’s Square, 10.00 PAPAL CHAPEL Holy Mass and canonization of Blesseds: - Pier Giorgio Frassati - Carlo Acutis

14 September Ecumenical Commemoration of the new martyrs – witnesses of faith Basilica of Saint Paul Outside-the-Walls, 17.00

28 September 26th Sunday of Ordinary Time Saint Peter’s Square, 10.00 Holy Mass Jubilee of Catechists

Vatican City, 3 July 2025

✠ Diego Ravelli Titular Archbishop of Recanati Master of Pontifical Liturgical Celebrations

This morning, the Holy Father Leo XIV received in audience, in the Vatican Apostolic Palace, the President of the Republic of Poland, His Excellency Mr. Andrzej Duda, who subsequently met with His Eminence Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Secretary of State of His Holiness, accompanied by His Excellency Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, Secretary for Relations with States and International Organizations.

During the cordial talks held at the Secretariat of State, mutual appreciation for the sound bilateral relations was reaffirmed, and the socio-political situation in the country was discussed.

In the course of the conversation, international issues were considered, with special attention to the war in Ukraine.

From the Vatican, 3 July 2025

At 10.00 today, at the Holy See Press Office, Via della Conciliaione 54, a press conference was held to present the new formulary of the Missa “pro custodia creationis” , which will be added to the Missae “pro variis necessitatibus vel ad diversa” of the Roman Missal.

The speakers were: His Eminence Cardinal Michael Czerny, S.J., prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, and Archbishop Vittorio Francesco Viola, O.F.M. secretary of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments.

The following are their interventions:

 

Intervention of His Eminence Cardinal Michael Czerny, S.J.

In the Roman Missal, there are 49 Masses and Prayers for Various Needs and Occasions. Twenty are for the Church, 17 for civil needs, and 12 for various occasions. Among the formularies “for civil needs,” today we are happy to introduce a “Mass for the care of creation” ( Missa pro custodia creationis ), in response to requests suggested by  Laudato si’ .

Over the past decades, the Church has continually affirmed the “mutual responsibility between human beings and nature” (LS 67). Thirty-five years ago, Pope St John Paul II released his ground-breaking Message for the 1990 World Day of Peace, “Peace with God the Creator, Peace with All of Creation”. And ten years ago, Pope Francis published his even more revolutionary “ Laudato si’ : on care for our common home.”

Let us give thanks to God our Creator for this new formulary of prayers for the Mass; may it help us to learn how to care for His immense gift. Pope Leo XIV will use it next week for a Mass at the  Borgo Laudato si’,  Castel Gandolfo 1 . Following the liturgical norms, this formulary can be used to ask God for the ability to care for creation.

Creation is not an added theme but is always already present in the Catholic liturgy. As the Eucharist is celebrated, “the whole cosmos gives thanks to God... The Eucharist joins heaven and earth; it embraces and penetrates all creation” ( Laudato si’ , 236).

At every Mass, we bless God for the bread and wine we receive; they are both “fruit of the earth … fruit of the vine … and the work of human hands”. And every Sunday and Feast Day, our proclamation of faith begins: “We believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.” God’s gift of life, from the beginning, is completed or fulfilled by Christ’s life, passion, death and resurrection.

The  Missa pro custodia creationis  begins like this: “The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork” (Psalm 18:2). The Gospel speaks of “the lilies of the field and the birds of the air” (Matthew 6:24-34) or else recounts Jesus calming the storm at sea (Matthew 8:23-27).

With this Mass, the Church is offering liturgical, spiritual and communal support for the care we all need to exercise of nature, our common home. Such service is indeed a great act of faith, hope and charity.

This Mass is a reason for joy. It increases our gratitude, strengthens our faith, and invites us to respond with care and love in an ever-growing sense of wonder, reverence, and responsibility. It calls us to be faithful stewards of what God has entrusted to us – not only in daily choices and public policies, but also in our prayer, our worship, and our way of living in the world.

1 Video footage of the location is available for use here:

https://www.swisstransfer.com/d/66c727d5-b7b4-4e25-934c-68493132f658

 

Summary of Intervention of Archbishop Vittorio Francesco Viola, O.F.M.

With the Encyclical Letter  Laudato si'  (24 May 2015), Pope Francis drew everyone’s attention - believers and non-believers alike -  to the care of our common home , a theme taken up by the Apostolic Exhortation to all people of good will titled  Laudate Deum  (4 October 2023)  on the climate crisis .

Creation in liturgy

The Easter mystery is made real throughout our sacred Liturgy. Every moment of the liturgical year celebrates the mystery of creation’s redemption, renewal and final fulfilment in the Easter of the Lord.

Truly, in the annual commemoration of Easter and every Sunday, in every Eucharistic celebration (as in the presentation of the gifts), in the  Rogations , in the  Four Tempora  as well as in the individual sacraments, the Liturgy dwells upon God's creative action within the horizon of salvation history.

To the richness that the Liturgy already enfolds regarding the mystery of creation, we now add the  Missa pro custodia creationis  which, with the approval of Pope Leo, is henceforth included in the  Missale Romanum, editio typica tertia  (2008). It will appear among the  Missæ et Orationes pro variis necessitatibus vel ad diversa , Section 2  Pro circumstantiis publicis.  Its use is regulated by Chapter VII of the  Institutio Generalis Missalis Romani  and its own rubrics ( Missale Romanum ,  editio typica tertia , p. 1074).

A formulary for a Mass for the care of creation

The title of the new form is inspired by the proper biblical hermeneutics to which Pope Francis has called us. In No. 67 of  Laudato si ' we read: '“Tilling” refers to cultivating, ploughing or working, while “keeping” means caring, protecting, overseeing and preserving. This implies a relationship of mutual responsibility between human beings and nature'.

Verse 2 of Ps 18(19), chosen as the  Entrance Antiphon  ( The heavens tell of the glory of God, / the work of his hands announces the firmament ), opens the celebration by expressing wonder at how creation reflects the glory of God: without this wonderment "our attitude," writes Pope Francis, "will be that of masters, consumers, ruthless exploiters” of natural resources ( LS  11).

The  Collect  prayer devoutly synthesises the theology of creation inspired by Holy Scripture: Christ is the first-born of all creation; the Father has called all things into existence; humanity is called to safeguard his work.

The  Offertory Prayer  takes up and amplifies the words of the presentation of the gifts in a manner that encapsulates the theological concepts that inspire our liturgical contemplation of creation. In very brief summary: the entire history of salvation, of which creation is the foundation and beginning, culminates in the Lord's Passover; the liturgy makes the paschal mystery present in a sacramental manner, renders it real and reveals its efficacy; in continuity with the logic of the Incarnation, what God has created and the work of human hands (bread, wine, oil, water...) reach their full meaning in the celebratory action; their nobility demands our contemplative gaze on created things, which changes our relationship with them. Verse 3 of Ps 97, the  Communion Antiphon  ( All the ends of the earth have seen / the salvation of our God ), accompanies the assembly nurtured at the Eucharistic banquet and contemplating the work of salvation that unites humans to all creatures,

With the  Prayer after Communion  we invoke the fruits of the mystery that has been celebrated. This prayer is inspired by  Laudato si’  n. 66 where Pope Francis reminds us that there are ‘three fundamental and closely intertwined relationships: with God, with our neighbour and with the earth itself. According to the Bible, these three vital relationships have been broken, both outwardly and within us. This rupture is sin'.

Communion  with God, with one's neighbour ,  with the earth  is nourished by the Eucharist, the "sacrament of unity", and it reaches towards its ultimate fulfilment, towards that fullness of communion in which all things will be new. Harmony with all creatures, which we contemplate in Francis of Assisi, can only arise, as it did for the Poverello, from an experience of reconciliation that makes communion with God and with our sisters and brothers possible.

The  biblical readings  chosen for the  Missa pro custodia creationis  offer several points for reflection.

The Book of Wisdom invites us to recognise the beauty of the Creator in that of creatures. This passage is echoed by the Responsorial Psalm that unites the assembly with creation that sings the glory of God.

The hymn from the letter of St Paul the Apostle to the Colossians offers a Christological reading of creation. The Responsorial Psalm is a song of blessing for God's creative work.

Two Gospel passages are proposed (Mt 6: 24-34:  Look at the birds of the air ... Seek, first of all, the kingdom of God and his righteousness ; Mt 8: 23-27:  He arose and threatened the winds and the sea and there was a great calm ).

In effect, the readings may be seen as presenting a "challenge" and an opportunity to commit to practicing the corrected hermeneutics of biblical texts that  LS  67 emphasised. Without such correction, one risks supporting positions that are inconsistent with the truth of Revelation and holding, for example, the attitude that  LS  69 defines as "distorted anthropocentrism".

In conclusion, the  Missa pro custodia creationis  takes up some of the main positions contained in  LS  and expresses them in the form of a prayer within the theological framework that the encyclical revives. The texts of this formulary are a good antidote against a certain reading of  LS  that risks reducing the depth of its content to a "false or superficial ecology" ( LS  59) far removed from that "integral ecology" amply described and promoted in the encyclical (cf. LS chap. IV).

Appointment of bishop of Santa Rosa de Copán, Honduras

Appointment of members of the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue

Appointment of consultors of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity

 

Appointment of bishop of Santa Rosa de Copán, Honduras

The Holy Father has appointed Bishop Héctor David García Osorio of Yoro, Honduras, as bishop of Santa Rosa de Copán, Honduras.

Curriculum vitae

Bishop Héctor David García Osorio was born in Concepción de María, diocese of Choluteca, on 23 September 1966. He studied philosophy and theology at the Seminario Mayor Nuestra Señora de Suyapa in Tegucigalpa, and was awarded a licentiate in spiritual theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University of Rome.

He was ordained a priest for the diocese of Choluteca on 8 November 1997.

He has held the following offices: parish vicar of San Pablo in Choluteca; diocesan coordinator of delegates for the celebration of the Word of God; diocesan vicar for pastoral care; chancellor of the diocesan Curia; vicar general of the diocese; rector of the Seminario Menor Pablo VI in Choluteca; parish priest of San Jerónimo in Goascorán; formator and vice rector of the Seminario Mayor Nuestra Señora de Suyapa in Tegucigalpa; assistant secretary of the Episcopal Conference of Honduras.

On 3 July 2014 he was appointed bishop of Yoro, Honduras, receiving episcopal ordination the following 20 September. He is currently president of the Secretariado Episcopal de América Central (S.E.D.A.C.).

 

Appointment of members of the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue

The Holy Father has appointed the following as members of the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue: Their Eminences Cardinals Pierbattista Pizzaballa, O.F.M., Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Israel; Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi, S.V.D., archbishop of Tōkyō, Japan; Dominique Joseph Mathieu, O.F.M. Conv., archbishop of Teheran-Ispahan of the Latins, Iran; and Frank Leo, archbishop of Toronto, Canada; Archbishop Bernard Longley of Birmingham, United Kingdom; Archbishop Mitchell Thomas Rozanski of Saint Louis, United States of America; Archbishop Yagop Mourad of Homs of the Syrians, Syria; Archbishop Vira Arpondratana of Bangkok, Thailand; Bishop Joseph Chau Ngoc Tri of Lang Són et Cao Bang, Vietnam; Bishop Sithembele Sipuka of Umtata, South Africa; Bishop Teodoro Mendes Tavares, C.S.Sp., of Ponta de Pedras, Brazil; Bishop José Luis Mumbiela Sierra of Holy Trinity in Almaty, Kazakhstan; Bishop Ollo Modeste Kambou of Gaoua, Burkina Faso; Bishop Brendan Leahy of Limerick, Ireland; Bishop Paolo Martinelli, O.F.M. Cap., vicar apostolic of Southern Arabia, United Arab Emirates; Bishop Derio Olivero of Pinerolo, Italy; Bishop Christophorus Tri Harsono of Purwokerto, Indonesia; Bishop Bertram Johannes Meier of Augsburg, Germany; Bishop Wilybard Lagho of Malindi, Kenya; Bishop Yousaf Sohan of Multan, Pakistan; and Bishop Echchampulle Arachchige Jude Nishantha Silva of Badulla, Sri Lanka.

 

Appointment of consultors of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity

The Holy Father has appointed the following as consultors of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity: the Reverend Father Russell McDougall, C.S.C., executive director of the Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops; and the distinguished Professor Christian Stoll, executive director of the Johann-Adam-Möhler-Instituts für Ökumenik presso la Theologische Fakultät Paderborn , Germany.

This morning, the Holy Father Leo XIV received in audience:

- His Eminence Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith;

- His Excellency Andrzej Duda, President of the Republic of Poland, and entourage;

- Archbishop Ryan Jimenez P., of Agaña, Guam;

- His Excellency Mr. Anthony Chung-Yi Ho, ambassador of China (Taiwan), on the occasion of the presentation of his credential letters;

- Dr. Carmelo Barbagallo, President of the Supervisory and Financial Information Authority.