Ashley Noronha joined John Morales on Morning Air to discuss the Holy Father’s Wednesday General Audience on Ash Wednesday, February 18. Continuing his catechetical series on the documents of the Second Vatican Council, Pope Leo XIV turned his attention to Lumen Gentium, the 1964 Dogmatic Constitution on the Church.
The Pope began with the document’s opening vision of the Church not primarily as an institution, but as a mystery. He clarified that mystery in the Christian sense does not mean something irrational or unknowable. Rather, as Saint Paul taught, it refers to God’s saving plan, once hidden and now revealed in Christ. This divine plan is nothing less than the restoration of unity, the gathering of all creation through the reconciling love of Jesus, accomplished in His Passion and Death.
Quoting Saint Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians, the Holy Father recalled: “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have become near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, he who made both one and broke down the dividing wall of enmity, through his flesh…” (Ephesians 2:13–14). In Christ, division gives way to communion. What sin scattered, the Cross begins to restore.
Pope Leo also reflected on the very word Church, which comes from the Greek ecclesia, meaning an assembly called together. The Church, then, is not a private association or an exclusive circle. It is the visible expression of God’s desire to gather His people into one. The Church exists because God calls, and she remains alive because He continues to call.
He pointed to the opening line of Lumen Gentium: “Since the Church is in Christ like a sacrament or as a sign and instrument both of a very closely knit union with God and of the unity of the whole human race, it desires now to unfold more fully to the faithful of the Church and to the whole world its own inner nature and universal mission” (Lumen Gentium, 1). In this teaching, the Church is presented as both sign and instrument. She signifies communion with God, and she serves as a means by which that communion is extended to the world.
The Holy Father reminded the faithful that this mission requires cooperation. When we live in fidelity to Christ, He uses us as instruments of reconciliation and peace.
Concluding his catechesis, Pope Leo offered a call to gratitude and hope. In a world marked by fragmentation and conflict, the Church journeys through history as a pilgrim people, entrusted with a sanctifying mission. He invited the faithful to give thanks for the gift of belonging to the Church and to renew their commitment to be signs of unity and reconciliation. With that encouragement, he wished everyone a fruitful and grace-filled Lent.