On Friday, Pope Leo XIV welcomed more than 100 ambassadors to an audience inside the Vatican’s Clementine Hall as he affirmed that the family is built on the “stable union between a man and a woman” — and that preborn children, the sick, and the elderly have dignity as God’s creations. The audience was private, but the Vatican released the pope’s prepared text.
“It is the responsibility of government leaders to work to build harmonious and peaceful civil societies. This can be achieved above all by investing in the family, founded upon the stable union between a man and a woman, ‘a small but genuine society, and prior to all civil society,'” he said, citing Rerum Novarum. “In addition, no one is exempted from striving to ensure respect for the dignity of every person, especially the most frail and vulnerable, from the unborn to the elderly, from the sick to the unemployed, citizens and immigrants alike.”
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He continued, “My own story is that of a citizen, the descendant of immigrants, who in turn chose to emigrate. All of us, in the course of our lives, can find ourselves healthy or sick, employed or unemployed, living in our native land or in a foreign country, yet our dignity always remains unchanged: it is the dignity of a creature willed and loved by God.”
Pope Leo was said to be the co-founder of campus pro-life organization “Villanovans for Life,” considered the oldest pro-life club in the United States, in the 1970s. He was also reported to have participated in a March for Life in the past.
Speaking to the Vatican diplomatic corps is one of the requirements after being elected as pope. It allows Pope Leo, the first American-born pope, to greet world government representatives before his Papal inauguration on Sunday, during which Mass will mark the formal commencement of the Pontificate.
