Pope Leo XIV has been in the Petrine office for less than a month, but that hasn’t stopped tons of people from expressing their hopes for how the American-born pontiff can improve the Church and the world.
For instance, there’s excitement about his intention to tackle the challenges posed by artificial intelligence, or AI. Others have noted that Pope Leo’s American roots may allow him to effectively interact with U.S. government officials and positively influence American society. And still others are eager to see if his reverent style of celebrating Mass leads to a liturgical revival.
These are all good things to hope for. But there’s another area that I am especially hopeful that Pope Leo XIV can help revitalize, in society but also among Catholics: the centrality of community.
Pope Leo is a religious, and not just a member of any order. He is an Augustinian friar. And for the Augustinians, community and friendship are essential.
This is in large part due to the theological views of their spiritual patron, St. Augustine. The fifth century bishop emphasized that the Triune God — Father, Son and Holy Spirit — was a communion of love, and that human community should mirror this divine unity in love. The very first chapter of the Rule of St. Augustine, which Augustine himself wrote for a group of women religious in the 400s, stresses that all community members “should live together harmoniously, having one mind and one heart intent on God.”
When the Augustinian order was formed in 1256 A.D., they put their patron’s theology of community at the heart of their life. Friendship for the Augustinians is not seen as optional but as an essential means to becoming holy. Through community life, one is drawn out of oneself, and encounters Christ in others.
Pope Leo XIV knows this. When he became a cardinal in 2023, he described friendship as “without a doubt, one of the most wonderful gifts that God has given us.” And when he visited the Augustinian order’s headquarters on May 13, he said “the communal life we share as brothers has shaped my heart to serve the Church with humility and love.”
Why is this a big deal?
Because America, and much of the world, is experiencing a crisis of community. We suffer from individualism, which in turn leaves us isolated, anxious and often depressed. Twenty percent of single men report having no close friends, according to 2021 data from the Survey Center on American Life. Seventy-nine percent of Gen Z members say they are lonely, according to a 2020 report published by the data platform Statista. And nearly 60 percent of Americans say they only know some of their neighbors, according to 2018 data published by the Pew Research Center.
Furthermore, it sometimes seems like even Christians disregard the importance of community. This happens when we reduce our religion to a relationship solely between “God and me;” others are relevant insofar as they aid that private relationship but aren’t really important in their own right. But communal life is essential — the Christian community is the body of Christ, and it represents a meaningful place of his presence among us today. How can we be friends with Christ if we downplay human friendship?
Pope Leo XIV understands that. And his deep Augustinian sense of community and friendship is already evident. A well-timed homily or even apostolic letter on the importance of Christian communal living could spark a revolution in the Church — prompting bishops, theologians and ordinary Catholics to reconsider the importance of community in our lives and to take steps to put it into practice — be we lay or religious.
Expectations are already sky high for Pope Leo XIV. But I’m confident that he’ll help more of us experience the fruitfulness of Christian community — in part, because he’s already experienced it so richly himself.
Liedl lives in South Bend, Indiana, and is senior editor for the National Catholic Register.
