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Below is the text of Pope Leo’s weekly Wednesday audience, delivered on Jan. 7, 2026.

Brothers and sisters, good morning and welcome!

After the Jubilee Year, during which we focused on the mysteries of the life of Jesus, we
will begin a new cycle of catechesis which will be dedicated to Vatican Council II and a
rereading of its Documents. It is a valuable opportunity to rediscover the beauty and the
importance of this ecclesial event. Saint John Paul II, at the end of the Jubilee 2000,
stated: “I feel more than ever in duty bound to point to the Council as the great grace
bestowed on the Church in the twentieth century” (Apostolic Letter Novo millennio ineunte,
57).

Together with the anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, in 2025 we remembered the sixtieth
anniversary of Vatican Council II. Although the time that separates us from this event is not
so long, it is equally true that the generation of bishops, theologians and believers of Vatican
II is no longer with us. Therefore, while we hear the call not to let its prophecy fade, and to
continue to seek ways and means to implement its insights, it will be important to get to know
it again closely, and to do so not through “hearsay” or interpretations that have been given,
but by rereading its documents and reflecting on their content. Indeed, it is the Magisterium
that still constitutes the guiding star of the Church’s journey today. As Benedict XVI
taught, “as the years have passed, the Conciliar Documents have lost none of their
timeliness; indeed, their teachings are proving particularly relevant to the new situation of
the Church and the current globalized society” (First Message at the end of the Eucharistic
Concelebration with the Members of the College of Cardinals, 20 April 2005).
When Pope Saint John XXIII opened the Council on 11 October 1962, he spoke of it as the
dawn of a day of light for the whole Church. The work of the numerous Fathers convened
from the Churches of all continents did indeed pave the way for a new ecclesial season.
After a rich biblical, theological and liturgical reflection spanning the twentieth century,
Vatican Council II rediscovered the face of God as the Father who, in Christ, calls us to be
his children; it looked at the Church in the light of Christ, light of nations, as a mystery of
communion and sacrament of unity between God and his people; it initiated important
liturgical reform, placing at its centre the mystery of salvation and the active and conscious
participation of the entire People of God. At the same time, it helped us to open up to the
world and to embrace the changes and challenges of the modern age in dialogue and co-
responsibility, as a Church that wishes to open her arms to humanity, to echo the hopes and
anxieties of peoples, and to collaborate in building a more just and fraternal society.
Thanks to Vatican Council II, the Church “has something to say, a message to give, a
communication to make” (Saint Paul VI, Encyclical Letter Ecclesiam suam, 65), striving to
seek the truth by way of ecumenism, interreligious dialogue and dialogue with people of good
will.

This spirit, this inner disposition, must characterize our spiritual life and the pastoral action
of the Church, because we have yet to achieve ecclesial reform more fully in a ministerial
sense and, in the face of today’s challenges, we are called to continue to be vigilant
interpreters of the signs of the times, joyful proclaimers of the Gospel, courageous
witnesses of justice and peace. At the beginning of the Council, Monsignor Albino Luciani, the
future Pope John Paul I, as Bishop of Vittorio Veneto, wrote prophetically, “As always, there
is a need to achieve not so much organizations or methods or structures, but a deeper and
more widespread holiness. … It may be that the excellent and abundant fruits of a Council
will be seen after centuries and will mature by laboriously overcoming conflicts and adverse
situations”.[1] Rediscovering the Council, then, as Pope Francis remarked, helps us to “restore
primacy to God, to what is essential: to a Church madly in love with its Lord and with all the
men and women whom he loves” (Homily on the sixtieth anniversary of the beginning of
Vatican Council II, 11 October 2022).

Brothers and sisters, Saint Paul VI’s words to the Council Fathers at the end of its work
remain a guiding principle for us today. He affirmed that the time had come to leave the
Council assembly and go out towards humanity to bring it the good news of the Gospel, in the
awareness that they had experienced a time of grace in which the past, present and future
were condensed: “The past: for here, gathered in this spot, we have the Church of Christ
with her tradition, her history, her councils, her doctors, her saints; the present, for we are
taking leave of one another to go out towards the world of today with its miseries, its
sufferings, its sins, but also with its prodigious accomplishments, its values, its virtues; and
lastly the future is here in the urgent appeal of the peoples of the world for more justice, in
their will for peace, in their conscious or unconscious thirst for a higher life, that life
precisely which the Church of Christ can and wishes to give them” (Saint Paul VI, Message to
the Council Fathers, 8 December 1965).

This is also true for us. As we approach the documents of Vatican Council II and rediscover
their prophetic and contemporary relevance, we welcome the rich tradition of the life of the
Church and, at the same time, we question ourselves about the present and renew our joy in
running towards the world to bring it the Gospel of the kingdom of God, a kingdom of love,
justice and peace.

[1] A. Luciani – John Paul I, Note sul Concilio, in Opera omnia, vol. II, Vittorio Veneto 1959-
1962. Discorsi, scritti, articoli, Padua 1988, 451-453.Brothers and sisters, good morning and
welcome!