Rome (Italy). In the month of December 2025, in connection with his first apostolic journey, to Turkey and Lebanon, Pope Leo XIV entrusts to the Catholic Church, through the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network a special intention for peace:
Let us pray that Christians living in areas of war or conflict, especially in the Middle East, might be seeds of peace, reconciliation and hope.
In the unpublished prayer that he recites in the video, the Pope invokes help for Christians living amid war and violence and that we may be instruments of peace even where harmony seems impossible:
God of peace,
who through the blood of Your Son
has reconciled the world to Yourself,
today we pray for Christians
living amidst wars and violence.
Even surrounded by pain, may they
never cease to feel the gentle kindness of your presence
and the prayers of their brothers and sisters in faith.
For only through You, and strengthened by fraternal bonds,
can they become the seeds of reconciliation,
builders of hope in ways both small and great,
capable of forgiving and moving forward,
of bridging divides,
and of seeking justice with mercy.
Lord Jesus, who called blessed
those who work for peace,
make us Your instruments of peace
even where harmony seems impossible.
Holy Spirit,
source of hope in the darkest times,
sustain the faith of those who suffer and strengthen their hope.
Do not let us fall into indifference,
and make us builders of unity, like Jesus. Amen.
The press release accompanying the video cites Aid to the Church in Need’s 2025 Report on Religious Freedom according to which the number of conflicts in the Middle East and the socio-economic conditions there expose religious minorities, and Christians in particular, to a condition of extreme vulnerability. After two years of war, the population in Palestine is beyond exhaustion; homeless families have taken refuge in many churches. The severe economic crisis in Lebanon has driven thousands of people to emigrate, emptying parishes and schools. In Syria and Iraq, reconstruction struggles to make progress due to political instability, insecurity, and the lack of prospects for the young. And yet, in the midst of these difficulties, many small communities continue to safeguard the faith, serve the poor, and build bridges of co-existence with their neighbors who practice other religions.
The images that accompany the prayer read by the Pope tell us specifically about this. They show us examples of an unshakable faith even in the midst of the rubble. We see celebrations in Iraqi villages come back to life after the war, the extraordinary strength of the parish community of Gaza even as they are being bombed, the indispensable work of Caritas in Lebanon among the poor and refugees in neighboring countries, the spiritual oasis offered by Syrian monks. All of these are signs of the presence of that Holy Spirit who, as the prayer read the Pope says, is “the source of hope in the darkest times.”
