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Dilexi Te: On Love for the Poor, with Fr. Cristian Mendoza Ovando

Church Life Today

When Pope Leo XIV issued his first apostolic exhortation, he chose a title drawn from the Book of Revelation: Dilexi te — "I have loved you." Those words, addressed to a community with little power and little standing, become in this document Christ's word to the poor of every age. The poor are not a problem to be managed. They are, the Pope insists, the place where Christ continues to speak. But who exactly are the poor? That question turns out to be less obvious than it sounds. Poverty, as ...