Pope Leo XIV after U.S. bombings in Iran: ‘Humanity cries out and pleads for peace’

Vatican City, Jun 22, 2025 / 08:22 am (CNA).

Reacting to what he called the “alarming news” of U.S. airstrikes on nuclear facilities in Iran, Pope Leo XIV on Sunday pleaded with the international community “to stop the tragedy of war before it becomes an irreparable abyss.”

“Today more than ever, humanity cries out and pleads for peace,” the pope said, in remarks following his Angelus reflection June 22, adding that the cry “must not be drowned out by the roar of weapons or by rhetoric that incites conflict.”

U.S. President Donald Trump announced on Saturday night that the U.S. had “obliterated” Iran’s main nuclear sites massive bunker busting bombs. Iran responded by launching a volley of missiles at Israel. Scores of civilians were wounded in a missile strike in Tel Aviv, Reuters reported.

Speaking to pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square from a window in the Apostolic Palace, Leo framed the attacks, which have escalated the conflict between Israel and Iran, within the broader context of regional conflicts.

“In this dramatic scenario, which includes Israel and Palestine, the daily suffering of the population — especially in Gaza and other territories — risks being forgotten, even as the urgency for proper humanitarian support becomes ever more pressing,” he said.

“There are no distant conflicts when human dignity is at stake,” he said. “War does not solve problems — on the contrary, it amplifies them and inflicts deep wounds on the history of nations that take generations to heal.”

The pope also evoked the most heartbreaking human toll of violence. “No armed victory can make up for a mother’s grief, a child’s fear, or a stolen future.”

Finally, he renewed his call for diplomacy and commitment to peace: “Let diplomacy silence the weapons; let nations shape their future through works of peace, not through violence and bloody conflict.”

In his catechesis prior to the Angelus on Sunday, the feast of Corpus Christi, Pope Leo XIV focused on the deep meaning of the Eucharist and the value of sharing.

Reflecting on the day’s Gospel, which recounts the miracle of the loaves and fishes (cf. Lk 9:11–17), he said that “God’s gifts, even the smallest, grow whenever they are shared.”

Pope Leo XVI noted that the supreme act of sharing was “God’s sharing with us.”

“He, the Creator, who gave us life, in order to save us asked one of his creatures to be his mother, to give him a fragile, limited, mortal body like ours, entrusting himself to her as a child,” the pope said. “In this way, he shared our poverty to the utmost limits, choosing to use the little we could offer him in order to redeem us.”

God’s generosity is especially manifested in the gift of the Eucharist, the Holy Father said.

“Indeed, what happens between us and God through the Eucharist is precisely that the Lord welcomes, sanctifies and blesses the bread and wine that we place on the altar, together with the offering of our lives, and he transforms them into the Body and Blood of Christ, the sacrifice of love for the salvation of the world,” Leo said.

“God unites himself to us by joyfully accepting what we bring, and he invites us to unite ourselves to him by likewise joyfully receiving and sharing his gift of love,” he added. “In this way, says Saint Augustine, ‘just as one loaf is made from single grains collected together … so in the same way the body of Christ is made one by the harmony of charity.’”

The pope was scheduled to celebrate Mass for the feast of Corpus Christi at 5 p.m. Sunday, followed by a eucharistic procession through the streets of Rome.