7 Signs Pope Leo XIV Is Truly a Son of Saint Augustine

  

Pope Leo XIV is the first Augustinian Pope in history — but what does that actually mean for his pontificate? In this video, we explore 7 concrete signs — drawn from his documents, speeches, and pastoral choices — that reveal how deeply Saint Augustine of Hippo has shaped Pope Leo XIV as a Pope. From his papal motto inspired by Augustine’s commentary on the Psalms, to his first Apostolic Exhortation focused on the poor, to his interpretation of today’s wars through the lens of The City of God — this is a pontificate with a distinctly Augustinian soul. We also look at one of his most significant recent gestures: his visit to Algeria, where he traveled to engage in interreligious dialogue, honor the memory of the Church in North Africa, and reconnect with the land of Augustine himself, who was bishop of Hippo (modern-day Annaba). This visit highlights the relevance of his Augustinian vision in today’s global and cultural context. Whether you know Augustine well or have never read a single line of his work, this video will change the way you see Pope Leo XIV — and the direction of his papacy.

Support for Trump among Catholics plummets

Trump Opens Another War Front: The Pope and the Vatican, Leo XIV Responds: «I Am Not Afraid of the Trump Administration»

Jorge Enrique Mújica

The Pope’s response did not adopt the same tone. During the flight to Algeria on April 13, the first leg of his third international Apostolic Journey, Leo XIV opted for a clear approach: avoiding personal confrontation and reaffirming the nature of his mission.

Support for Trump among Catholics plummets, according to a new poll conducted amid the war

Jorge Enrique Mújica

The Catholic vote, often decisive in American elections, is once again in motion—this time under the pressure of a conflict that has revived enduring questions about conscience, authority, and the cost of war

3 cardinals on a prime-time TV show in the U.S.: They discuss Trump, the Pope, just war, and the surge in conversions

Tim Daniels

Appearing on 60 Minutes, Cardinals Robert McElroy, Blase Cupich and Joseph Tobin offered a coordinated, if nuanced, critique of the current moment. Their intervention came against the backdrop of escalating U.S. military action under Donald Trump and the outspoken calls for peace issued by Pope Leo XIV

Easter Under Fire: A Fragile Truce Between Russia and Ukraine Collapses as Fighting Resumes

Joachin Meisner Hertz

The symbolism of the moment was difficult to ignore. Easter, the central feast of the Christian calendar, commemorates resurrection and renewal. Yet along the front lines of a war now entering its fourth year, it instead exposed the limits of religious gestures in the absence of political convergence

Which countries have the greatest religious diversity? Here is the map published in a major study

Jorge Enrique Mújica

This index, known as the Religious Diversity Index, does not measure the intensity of belief but the balance between groups. A score of zero would indicate total uniformity, while a perfect 10 would reflect an almost equal presence of all seven major categories used in the study: Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Jews, adherents of other religions and those with no religious affiliation

Although there are no diplomatic relations, the President of the National Assembly of Vietnam invites Pope Leo XIV to visit the country

ZENIT Staff

The President of the National Assembly in Hanoi presented the Pope with a letter from the President, who is now firmly at the helm of power in Vietnam. It was precisely internal disagreements over the local political balance of power that had slowed down the preparations for the visit, which is so eagerly awaited by the Catholic community. Cardinal Parolin is due to visit soon to establish full diplomatic relations. The possibility of 2027, when the Pope is already expected in Seoul for World Youth Day.

Nicaragua: A Holy Week with Many Restrictions, But More Faith from Local Catholics

Rafael Manuel Tovar

Catholics in Managua attended the Stations of the Cross in the inner gardens of the Metropolitan Cathedral under police surveillance. After the Stations of the Cross, Cardinal Leopoldo Brenes, who never refers to the government or religious restrictions, estimated that 25,000 people gathered in the Cathedral square.

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The current growth represents a recovery from recent lows rather than a return to historical highs

PHOTO GALLERY: Heralds of the Gospel Ordain 26 Priests and 31 Deacons Following the Vatican’s Lifting of Restrictions

ZENIT Staff

Yet the significance of the Caieiras ceremony cannot be understood without reference to the recent past. In 2019, the Vatican’s Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life imposed a series of disciplinary measures on the Heralds following an intervention whose details were never fully clarified publicly

This is what the letter says—the surprising and important letter that Leo XIV sent to the cardinals ahead of the Consistory in June 2026

ZENIT Staff

Letter from Pope Leo XIV to the cardinals ahead of the upcoming consistory in 2026

The quiet surge of alternative micro-colleges

Will Sister Mary Kay turn out the lights?*
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The quiet surge of alternative micro-colleges
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Church-state separation is a ‘lie,’ says Trump's Religious Liberty Commission chair
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Pope Leo XIV visits Algeria during his first papal trip to Africa

Archdiocese of Dubuque halts weekend Mass at 84 Iowa parishes As part of an ongoing reorganization due to a priest shortage and declining numbers of churchgoers, the Archdiocese of Dubuque, Iowa, announced the parishes that will no longer hold weekend Masses. Holy See’s diplomacy stands apart from all other states, witness tells Helsinki Commission “What is clear, is that no other state on earth is even attempting to do what the Holy See is trying to do,” Alexander John Paul Lutz, a Helsinki Commission policy fellow, testified. Border czar Tom Homan calls for Church leaders to ‘stay out of politics’ Homan, a Catholic, commented after President Trump denounced Pope Leo XIV. Traveling exhibit tells how serving others transforms Catholic Charities workers The People of Hope Museum offers personal stories of Catholic Charities workers, an immersive poverty‑simulation experience, and interactive data displays.

PHOTOS: Pope Leo XIV visits Algeria during his first papal trip to Africa The Holy Father is scheduled to visit four African countries throughout mid-April.

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covenantchurchsd 04.12.2026

 

We call this SoNoGo - South Park-North Park-Golden Hill & Our Mission: to see the baptized who live in SoNoGo worship in SoNoGo 

Covenant Presbyterian Church

What is the Evangelical Presbyterian Church?

Covenant Church at 30th & Howard  is a Christian church in the tradition of the Protestant Reformation and allied with the EPC [The Evangelical Presbyterian Church] We believe the Scriptures to be the infallible Word of God and our final authority in faith and practice, and we find the historic creeds of the early church (the Apostles’ Creed and Nicene Creed) to be vital expressions of the most important tenets of the global church universal. When the EPC started in 1981, we determined that we would not disagree on the basic essentials of the Christian faith, but on anything that was not essential—such as the issue of ordaining women as officers or practicing charismatic gifts—we would give each other liberty. Above all, we committed ourselves to loving each other and not engaging in quarrels and strife. The result is that when we get together in our regional and national meetings, we spend most of our time in worship and fellowship and almost none in arguing with each other.

When the Neophyte Corrects the Vicar of Christ

When the Neophyte Corrects the Vicar of Christ

 

On JD Vance, Theological Hubris, and the Gospel He Has Yet to Learn

 

There is a particular arrogance that takes root in the newly converted — the zeal of the autodidact who, having just discovered the tradition, mistakes enthusiasm for mastery. JD Vance, who received baptism into the Catholic Church in 2019 at the age of thirty-five, has now committed the singular error of instructing the Bishop of Rome to “be careful when he talks about matters of theology.”

 

We should sit with the full weight of that sentence.

 

The Vice President of the United States — seven years a Catholic, formerly an evangelical, before that a self-described atheist — stood before a Turning Point USA audience in Georgia and publicly admonished Pope Leo XIV about theological precision. “If you’re going to opine on matters of theology,” Vance informed the successor of Peter, “you’ve got to be careful, you’ve got to make sure it’s anchored in the truth.”

 

The audacity is breathtaking. The irony is almost comic.

 

While Vance was dispensing theological warnings from a stage in Georgia, Pope Leo XIV was standing at the archaeological site of Hippo in Algeria — the episcopal see where St. Augustine served as bishop until his death in 430 A.D. Vance, who claims Augustine as his patron saint and frequently invokes him in speeches, was lecturing on Augustinian just war theology to a political rally audience. The pope he was lecturing — who served as Prior General of the Order of St. Augustine for more than a decade and holds a doctorate in Canon Law from the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas — was planting an olive tree at the very ground where Augustine lived, prayed, wrote, and died. If God governs history with a sense of irony, this moment surely pleased Him.

 

The occasion for Vance’s correction was Pope Leo’s statement that “God is never on the side of those who wield the sword.” Vance responded by invoking the thousand-year tradition of Just War theory as if the pope were unaware of it. But Leo did not say war is never permissible. He said God is not simply enlisted as a combatant on any nation’s side. That is not a negation of Just War doctrine. That is its foundation. The Catechism at §2309 is unambiguous about the conditions that must all be simultaneously met for a war to be just. Archbishop Broglio stated plainly on Easter Sunday that the war against Iran does not meet those criteria. Cardinals Cupich, McElroy, and Tobin, along with Archbishop Coakley, have spoken with notable unanimity. Cardinal Tobin put it plainly: Pope Leo “will continue to speak clearly against war and other offenses against human dignity and to call for authentic dialogue, because the Church’s witness is grounded in the peace of Christ, not in partisan interests.” That is episcopal fidelity. What Vance offered was its precise opposite.

 

The deeper problem is not merely that Vance is wrong about just war. It is the ecclesiological framework he is importing from American Christian nationalism into a tradition that explicitly rejects it. Vance told Fox News that “in some cases it would be best for the Vatican to stick to matters of morality, to stick to matters of what’s going on in the Catholic Church, and let the president of the United States stick to dictating public policy.” Let that formulation stand naked for a moment. The pope — who holds a universal pastoral office precisely because the Gospel speaks to every dimension of human life — is being instructed to confine himself to the sacristy, while the president is assigned the role of “dictating” the political world. This is not a Catholic understanding of faith and public life. Catholic Social Teaching from Rerum Novarum onward has always insisted that the Gospel is not a private spiritual comfort but a public moral claim. When Vance tells the pope to stay in his lane, he is not defending Catholic doctrine. He is betraying it.

 

JD Vance’s forthcoming book on his Catholic faith is titled Communion. Its cover features a United Methodist church. I do not say this merely to mock. Symbolism matters in Catholic theology, and the symbolism here is telling. A book about Catholic unity, bearing Protestant ecclesial architecture on its cover, written by a man who publicly contradicts the pope on Just War doctrine — this is not communion. This is confusion dressed in piety. Archbishop Coakley said it plainly: “The Pope is not Trump’s rival, nor is the Pope a politician. He is the Vicar of Christ who speaks from the truth of the Gospel and for the care of souls.” Communion, in Catholic theology, is not a feeling of spiritual warmth. It is a participation in the Body of Christ that carries radical obligations — to the poor, the stranger, the enemy, to peace. It is a table the powerful do not preside over. They are guests at it, like everyone else.

 

A seven-year Catholic who tells the pope to watch his theology, while defending an administration that posted an AI image of the president as Jesus Christ and refused to apologize, is not in communion with the tradition he claims to be writing about. He is in communion with power. And that, as Augustine himself understood deeply, is a very different thing.

 

by Arthur Holquin, retired Pastor of Mission Basilica San Juan Capistrano 

Pope Leo XIV denounces the ‘delusion of omnipotence’

Pope Leo XIV denounces the ‘delusion of omnipotence’ he says fuels the US-Israeli war in Iran
The Associated Press: In his strongest words yet, Pope Leo XIV on Saturday denounced the “delusion of omnipotence” that is fueling the U.S.-Israel war in Iran and demanded political leaders stop and negotiate peace.

 

80 years later, scholarship is breaking silence on women’s suffering and strength at Treblinka – including their role in its uprising
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The dangers of institutional neglect*
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How do people cope during war?*
The New York Times: We explore how the rituals of religion persist — even as war alters the world.

 

Driscoll invited to speak at Trump’s rededication of America to God
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Religious institutions and spiritual innovators need each other

Religious institutions and spiritual innovators need each other

By Danielle Goldstone

Building local spiritual ecosystems can provide stability in a shifting religious landscape and help communities flourish, a nonprofit network leader writes.

What can ancient Egyptian papyri teach us about the Christian faith?

Q&A with Geoffrey Smith

A collection of papyri, including the earliest known Gospel fragment, is coming to North America for the first time, along with letters, magic spells and other remnants of Christian life in antiquity.

A new documentary focuses on a Civil Rights era journalist and the truth he helped share

By Ellen Ann Fentress

Bill Minor’s reporting was important to the movement for civil rights in Mississippi and the nation. His vocation was informed and sustained by his faith, a documentarian writes.

‘Joyful, Anyway’

By Kate Bowler

In this excerpt from her book, bestselling author and Duke Divinity School professor Kate Bowler reflects on the ways that joy is possible even when happiness is elusive.

Spring brings rebirth, renewal and a gift of pink tulips

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A writer reflects on the past and the future as he plants flowers and vegetables in his garden.

At an Indigenous center, the lessons are a way of life

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The Eloheh Indigenous Center for Earth Justice hosts retreats, sells seeds and cultivates a farm, all in the name of reorienting relationships through Indigenous traditions and thought.

Viktor Orbán’s election loss

The United Kingdom has proposed new language and income requirements for permanent residency applicants. Some Christian Hong Kongers believe it will make it impossible for them to stay in the country.

By positioning himself as the pope’s superior and sharing an image of himself as Jesus, Donald Trump has shown that he ranks himself above the church, writes Bonnie Kristian.

A new book about Elon Musk offers a look into the self-proclaimed techno-king shaping our society.

An excerpt from Vaneetha Rendall Risner’s new book tackles how to separate the truth from lies when walking through divorce.

On The Bulletin: failed Iran talks, Viktor Orbán’s election loss, US draft registrations for young men, and the science of revenge.

Join Russell Moore and Karen Swallow Prior on April 15 at 1:30 p.m. Central Daylight Time for a discussion of Karen’s latest CT article on infertility, childlessness, and Christian identity. Today is the last day for members to register for the event. Not a member? Get 25% off your first year and event access.

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