In his first public general audience address, Pope Leo XIV has said he will maintain his predecessor’s focus on Jesus Christ as a source of hope during the ongoing Jubilee year, and prayed for the people of Gaza.
He focused during his address on the famous Parable of the Sower, while also drawing a parallel between it and one of Vincent van Gogh’s most famous paintings.
At the start of the 21 May general audience, after the Gospel was read aloud in various languages – almost exclusively by women, apart from the reader for the Arabic language – Pope Leo announced his decision to resume Pope Francis’s reflection on “Jesus Christ Our Hope” as his weekly catechesis topic during the 2025 Jubilee of Hope.
