Pope Leo condemns economies that marginalize the poor while the wealthy live in a bubble of luxury

VATICAN CITY AP Pope Leo XIV criticized how the wealthy live in a bubble of comfort and luxury while poor people suffer on the margins confirming in his first teaching document that he is in perfect lockstep with his predecessor Pope Francis on matters of social and economic injustice The Vatican on Thursday published the document entitled I have loved you which Francis had begun to write in his final months but never finished Leo who was elected in May credited Francis with the text cited him repeatedly but explained he had made the document his own and signed it The -page document traces the history of Christianity s constant concern for poor people from Biblical citations and the teaching of church fathers to the preaching of latest popes about caring for expatriates prisoners and casualties of human trafficking Leo credits especially women s religious orders with carrying out God s mandate to care for the sick feed the poor and welcome the stranger and also praised lay-led popular movements advocating for land housing and work for the society s majority disadvantaged The conclusion Leo draws is that the Catholic Church s preferential option for the poor has existed from the start is non-negotiable and is the very essence of what it means to be Christian He calls for a renewed commitment to fixing the structural causes of poverty while providing unquestioning charity to those who need it When the church kneels beside a leper a malnourished child or an anonymous dying person she fulfills her deepest vocation to love the Lord where he is majority disfigured Leo writes Citing Francis a critique of the wealthy Leo cites Francis frequently including in specific of the Argentine pope s most-quoted talking points about the global business activity that kills and criticism of trickle down economics Francis made those points from the very start of his pontificate in saying he requested a church that is poor and for the poor God has a special place in his heart for those who are discriminated against and oppressed and he asks us his church to make a decisive and radical choice in favor of the weakest Leo writes Echoing Francis Leo rails against the illusion of happiness derived from accumulating wealth Thus in a world where the poor are increasingly numerous we paradoxically see the advancement of a wealthy elite living in a bubble of comfort and luxury almost in another world compared to ordinary people Francis frequent criticism of capitalism angered countless conservative and wealthy Catholics especially in the United States who accused the Argentine Jesuit of being a Marxist In a latest interview Leo reported such misdirected criticism cannot be leveled against him The fact that I am American means among other things people can t say like they did about Francis he doesn t understand the United States he just doesn t see what s going on Leo communicated Crux a Catholic site As a product Leo s embrace of Francis teaching on poverty and the church s obligation to care for the weakest is a crucial reaffirmation especially in Leo s first teaching document Francis spirit in text and launch Vatican bureaucrats insisted that the text was fully Leo s and declined to say how much Francis had written before he died It s Francis and it s Leo declared Cardinal Michael Czerny who runs the Vatican s expansion and movers office and was a top Francis aide Petitioned if the same conservatives who labeled Francis a Marxist or Communist will now accuse Leo of the same Czerny noted that both are merely following the Gospel Such labels say much more about the person who is using the label Czerny announced The issue is not Pope Francis or Pope Leo s The matter is the person using such labels to reject the church s teaching Francis spirit was very much infused in the document and in its official presentation on Thursday In addition to Czerny the news conference featured a rare appearance by Cardinal Konrad Krajewski the Polish prelate whom Francis entrusted with carrying out his personal acts of charity over the discipline of his pontificate Under Krajewski s quiet eye the Vatican installed showers for homeless people off St Peter s Square provided COVID- vaccines for movers and people without access to Italy s vitality system sent ambulances with medicine to Ukraine and hosted weekly luncheons for the hungry Krajewski explained the document was proof that such gestures of charity toward the needy come straight from the Bible recalling that Jesus didn t work - in an office but rather went out and looked for people who needed him Krajewski regaled reporters with anecdotes of his behind-the-scenes dealings with Francis who would jokingly reprimand him if his bank account had too much money in it because it meant he hadn t spent enough on poor people Signed on the feast of St Francis Leo signed the text on Oct the feast of St Francis of Assisi the th-century mendicant friar who renounced his wealth to live poor among the poor The date was not coincidental The late Pope Francis named himself after the saint and one of the pontiff s the bulk central documents Fratelli Tutti Brothers All was itself published on the Oct feast day in Leo too seems inspired by the saint s example As a young priest the former Robert Prevost left the comforts of home to work as a missionary in Peru as a member of the Augustinian religious order one of the other ancient mendicant orders that considers group the sharing of communal property and provision to others as central tenets of its spirituality The fact that specific dismiss or ridicule charitable works as if they were an obsession on the part of a minimal and not the burning heart of the church s mission convinces me of the need to go back and reread the Gospel lest we hazard replacing it with the wisdom of this world Leo writes