Pope in Lampedusa: Faced with enormous suffering, we must radically respond
By Deborah Castellano Lubov
Pope Leo XIV traveled to the southern Italian island of Lampedusa on July 4, 2026, marking his pastoral visit with a series of deeply symbolic gestures centered on the plight of migrants and refugees.
Upon landing at 8:54 AM on the Mediterranean island, which was the destination of Pope Francis' first journey outside Rome after his election in 2013, Pope Leo likewise brought his closeness and solidarity to the island's residents and to the many migrants who have passed through Lampedusa, as well as to those who never completed the journey.
The Holy Father first visited the local cemetery, which includes a section for "Muslims and Catholics, for young and old, black and white, all of them lost at sea as they searched for freedom."
He then stopped at the "Gateway to Europe," a sculpture symbolizing hope for those arriving by sea, before meeting a migrant family at Favarolo Pier, which was renamed in honor of Pope Francis for the occasion.
The Pope next celebrated Mass at Lampedusa's sports field.
READ POPE LEO XIV'S FULL HOMILY DURING HIS PASTORAL VISIT TO LAMPEDUSA
Left half-dead
In his homily, Pope Leo reflected that today Lampedusa and its neighboring island of Linosa lie along a path as dangerous as the one that led from Jerusalem to Jericho in the Gospel parable of the Good Samaritan.
"Here," he said, "you have seen not just one, but thousands of human beings fallen into the hands of robbers who have taken everything from them, beat them brutally and walked away, leaving them half-dead."
He lamented that the sea has claimed the lives of many others—"those who did not manage to reach their hoped-for destination"—whose presence, he insisted, "challenges us no less than that of those who have landed in need of attention and aid."
"Indeed, before any intellectual consideration or ideological conviction," Pope Leo XIV continued, "the encounter with those who lie before us, stripped of everything, calls us to be close to them."
Nothing happens automatically
Turning to the people of Lampedusa, the Pope expressed his gratitude for their solidarity.
"I have come to thank you, brothers and sisters of Lampedusa, for the solidarity that so many of you have shown, for the 'miracle of compassion' once again taking place."
"Thank you, brothers and sisters," he continued, "because there is nothing to be taken for granted in your reaching out to others; nothing happens automatically."
The Pope said that those who allow themselves to be drawn into this dynamic of compassion and mercy begin to live differently, become citizens in a new way, and work differently. In this way, he said, "the civilization of love" envisioned by his predecessors—Saint John XXIII, Saint Paul VI, and Saint John Paul II—can truly emerge.
"Together with a great number of prophets and martyrs of the last century," he said, "they understood that only mercy can respond to the depths of the human heart and the horrors of war by opening the way to a new beginning."
A concrete civilization of love
"Now, standing on the shoulders of these giants," the Pope continued, "we have entered a millennium in which we must give spiritual, cultural, legal, political and economic expression to the civilization of love."
Thus, Pope Leo made a heartfelt appeal.
"May the enormity of the suffering we witness," he said, "help us grasp the radical nature of this call."
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