Meeting with the General Chapter of the Legionaries of Christ, Pope Leo XIV says the role of authority in religious life is to focus the community on Christ, not as a means to dominate members.
By Devin Watkins
Pope Leo XIV met on Thursday with participants in the General Chapter of the Legionaries of Christ, a religious congregation founded in Mexico in 1941.
In his address, the Pope said General Chapters offer religious orders an opportunity to listen to the Holy Spirit and engage in communal discernment so as to guide the community into the future.
The Legionaries have received a charism within the Church, despite historical expressions and scandals that have led to pain and crises, he noted.
Pope Leo encouraged the congregation’s members to continue to recall their history and seek renewal constantly in order to remain faithful to the Gospel, saying their charism offers a “valuable contribution” to the Church and the spiritual family of Regnum Christi, a lay movement.
“A charism is a gift of the Holy Spirit,” he said. “Every institute and each of its members are called to embody it personally and in community, in a continuous process of deepening their own identity that places them and defines them within the Church and within society.”
Yet, he added, each charism contains various forms and styles of life, which should be welcomed and discerned in order to live out fidelity to God’s call.
“Remember, then, that you are not owners of the charism, but its custodians and servants,” he said. “You are called to give your life so that this gift may continue to be fruitful in the Church and in the world.”
Pope Leo XIV invited the Legionaries of Christ’s leaders to recall that authority in religious life must serve the common life and focus a congregation’s members on Christ, while “avoiding every form of control that does not respect people’s dignity and freedom.”
“Authority, in religious life, is not understood as domination, but as spiritual and fraternal service to those who share the same vocation,” he said. “Its exercise must be expressed in the ‘art of accompaniment’.”
Leaders of religious orders must seek a form of governance characterized by “mutual listening, co-responsibility, transparency, fraternal closeness, and communal discernment,” he said.
Healthy forms of governance, added the Pope, foster subsidiarity and responsible participation of all members.
Missionary unity is not uniformity and elimination of differences, he said, but rather harmonizes diversity and divergences so that all may benefit.
“This process requires humility to listen, interior freedom to speak sincerely, and openness to accept shared discernment,” he said. “It is a demand inherent in every vocation that is lived in community.”
In conclusion, Pope Leo XIV exhorted the Legionaries of Christ to avoid particular or regional interests but instead to guide their congregation in interior freedom.
“May this Chapter open you to a time of hope. The Lord continues to call and send; to heal and to purify,” he said. “Therefore, your task is to discern how to respond with fidelity to the present that God places in your hands.”
