Pope Leo urges unity and remembrance on Holocaust Remembrance Day, calling for an end to antisemitism and a renewed respect for human dignity.
Newsroom (28/01/2026 Gaudium Press ) In a solemn appeal during his weekly General Audience at the Vatican, Pope Leo XIV called upon humanity to ensure that “the horror of genocide may never again be inflicted upon any people.” His remarks, made one day after International Holocaust Remembrance Day (27 January), underscored the Church’s enduring commitment to combating antisemitism and all forms of persecution based on ethnicity, nationality, or faith.
“On this annual occasion of painful remembrance,” the Pope said, “I ask the Almighty for the gift of a world no longer marked by antisemitism, nor by prejudice, oppression, and persecution against any human being.” His words resonated deeply across a world still wrestling with division, extremism, and historical wounds that have yet to fully heal.
“A Gift of a World Without Antisemitism”
The Pope recalled that the Holocaust “brought death to millions of Jews and to many other people,” framing remembrance not merely as a moral duty but as a call to action. He urged the international community to remain vigilant against the resurgence of hate ideologies, warning that “society must be founded on mutual respect and the common good.”
In a related message shared on his @Pontifex social media account, Pope Leo reaffirmed the Church’s “unwavering position” enshrined in the Second Vatican Council’s Declaration Nostra Aetate—a 1965 document that transformed Catholic–Jewish relations and condemned every form of antisemitism.
“The Church,” he reiterated, “rejects any discrimination or harassment based on ethnicity, language, nationality, or religion.”
The Word of God as a Living Guide
Turning from remembrance to reflection, Pope Leo continued his catechesis on Divine Revelation, under the theme Dei Verbum, the Dogmatic Constitution of the Second Vatican Council. He emphasized the profound interconnection between Sacred Scripture and Tradition, calling them “two streams flowing from the same divine wellspring.”
“The ‘deposit’ of the Word of God remains in the hands of the Church,” the Pope explained, urging clergy and laypeople alike “to preserve it in its integrity as a lodestar for our journey through history.” Scripture, he said, is not a relic of the past but “a living and organic reality that develops and grows in Tradition,” animated by the Holy Spirit to respond to the needs of every age.
Citing the Gospel accounts of Christ’s promise to send the Holy Spirit and his command to “make disciples of all nations,” Pope Leo illustrated how divine truth continues to unfold through the life of the Church. Quoting Dei Verbum, he reminded the faithful that Scripture and Tradition “merge into a unity and tend toward the same end.”
Faith Handed Down Through the Generations
Reflecting on the life of the Church, Pope Leo described Tradition as a “living transmission” that evolves through “contemplation, study by believers, and the preaching of the successors of the Apostles.” This continuity, he said, allows the Church to “hand on to all generations all that She herself is, all that She believes.”
The Pope invoked St. John Henry Newman, the 19th-century theologian and Doctor of the Church, to illustrate the dynamism of faith: “Christianity, both as a communal experience and as a doctrine, is a living reality that develops thanks to an inner vital force.”
In this vein, Pope Leo cautioned against treating revelation as a static deposit of doctrines and urged the Church to embody its meaning in daily witness. “The Word of God,” he said, “is written principally in the Church’s heart rather than in documents and records.”
One Sacred Deposit of Faith
Concluding his address, Pope Leo returned to the teaching of Dei Verbum, which affirms that “Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture form one sacred deposit of the word of God.” This deposit, he said, is entrusted to the Church, whose teaching authority acts “in the name of Jesus Christ.”
“The term ‘deposit,’” Pope Leo explained, “implies that the custodian must preserve the faith’s content and transmit it intact.” He called on believers to embrace this shared responsibility with fidelity and courage, allowing the Word to illuminate every era’s challenges.
As the General Audience ended, the Pope’s two messages—the remembrance of humanity’s darkest chapter and the meditation on the living Word—merged into one unified call: that faith, memory, and compassion together form the moral foundation of a world that must never again permit hatred to triumph.
- Raju Hasmukh with files from Vatican News
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