In Illo Uno Unum: The Pope at the Core of Human Unity


 


Guglielmo Mangiapane/Reuters


Through the ministry of Peter, you have called me to carry that cross and to be blessed with that mission, and I know I can rely on each and every one of you to walk with me as we continue as a church, as a community of friends of Jesus, as believers, to announce the Good News, to announce the Gospel.

 

- Pope Leo XIV, from his first public homily as Pope (emphasis added)[1]

 

 

The Church, by reason of her role and competence, is not identified in any way with the political community nor bound to any political system. She is at once a sign and a safeguard of the transcendent character of the human person.

 

- Gaudium et Spes 76 (emphasis added)[2]

 

 

On the 8th of May, 2025, the college of cardinals of the Catholic Church elected Robert Francis Prevost as the 266th successor of St. Peter, taking the name Leo XIV. His election became a source of great joy for people from all tongues and nations. But we have to ask: what’s the significance of the office of the Pope, beyond all the pageantry of the conclave and the magnificence of the robes? Is he really that important? If he is, why?

 

Rod Dreher, in his book, The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation,[3] wrote that the underlying philosophy of both U.S. political parties – the republicans and the democrats – is enlightenment liberalism, or the idea that humans are naturally meant for an absolutely unshackled life, without constraints. In other words, the point of living is “to liberate the autonomous individual.”[4] For enlightenment liberalism, the perfect society is a society where I can do whatever I want, however I want, whenever I want. In other words, the purpose of other people or institutions, according to this idea, is to back off and let me do my thing.

 

          The problem with such an ideology and with a community that adopts it is that it cannot sustain a civilization. Think about it: a society ruled by individualism (“I am the ultimate arbiter of what I want to do and the government should protect my right to be so”) leads to relativism (“I decide what is the ultimate reality”) which leads to an anarchic fragmentation of society (“you have your own beliefs, I have mine”) which would then lead to tyranny as a solution for conflict (“since there is no common truth, the only way we can settle this debate is a recourse to power”). “A civilization in which no one felt an obligation to the past, to the future, to each other, or to anything higher than self-gratification is one that is dangerously fragile.”[5]

 

Dreher’s characterization of the ideological corruption in the United States due to liberalism is also similar to how I perceive the political, religious, and socio-cultural decline of my own country, The Philippines. I am writing this two days before the 2025 Philippine general elections, and many have already seen the heartbreaking downgrade of the state of the Filipino people. Liberalism is clearly shown in the fact that we do not have a single, agreed-upon definition of what it means to be a “good politician.” It is manifest in the people who prefer immediate personal self-bliss over long-term communal solutions, seen in rampant vote buying.[6] It is showcased in college students who study primarily or merely for individualistic, utilitarian purposes (“to get a good job”) instead of doing so for the sake of service to others. In short, we have no common unity. We have no community. And a society without a community is a society that is doomed to fail, because it is based on an extremely damaging lie that man is indeed an island.

 

But how do we combat this hyper- liberal, fragmentary, and egocentric disunity?

 

Catholicism proclaims that the Church is “a sign and instrument both of a very closely knit union with God and of the unity of the whole human race” (Lumen Gentium 1, emphasis added).[7] In other words, the goal of the Church is not just to unite you and me to God, but to unite you and me to each other. To be a part of the Church is to be like her Bridegroom and Lord, Christ Jesus, Who, according to Luke 2:34, became “a sign which shall be contradicted” (Douay-Rheims) or “that (which) is spoken against” (RSVCE). Contradicted by who? Against what? The Church is called to be a sign that will contradict our sinful disposition towards pride, against our tendency to raise our own egos and convictions above the moral law and the commandments of God. The Church is called to be a sign against egoism, relativism, and self-centeredness, which are at the heart of enlightenment liberalism. Catholicism is the herald of the fundamental Christian truth that the path to integral human development and to true sanctity is to be together under faith, hope, and love, and towards the only One that can fulfill the yearnings of our restless hearts: God Himself. The Church operates via her commitment to the salvific truth that no man is an island.

 

But just like any group of people, whether big or small, we need a leader that will preserve this unity, a head that will safeguard our oneness. Who could it be? The Lord, out of His gratuitous grace and love, has never left us without answers. He himself instituted the office of the papacy to be at the heart – the core – of human unity under God.

 

In St. Luke’s account of  the Last Supper, Christ clarifies to his disciples that true leadership is an exercise of servanthood: “let the greatest among you become as the youngest, and the leader as one who serves” (Lk 22:26). In this very context, Christ individually addresses Peter in a very telling manner. He says to Peter that Satan “demanded to have you (plural in the Greek, meaning “you all”),  that he might sift you (also plural) like wheat” (v. 31). In other words, Christ seems to be prophesying that all the disciples will be isolated from one another due to Satan’s attack. But Christ’s follow-up to this prophecy is very interesting: “but I have prayed for you (now in the Greek singular, meaning “only you, Peter”) that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren” (v. 32).  To put it simply, Christ saw that demonic forces will try to rip apart the community of friends that He established, but that He singled out Peter to be the one to preserve them in unity, precisely in the context where Our Lord was talking about servant-leadership. The Lord’s desire for unity is further established by St. John’s own account of the Last Supper, where He records Christ as praying to the Father that all believers “may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you” (Jn 17:21). St. Peter, the servant-leader, is vital to the preservation of that same oneness.

 

Another Scriptural example of the Petrine office’s essential mission to unite all believers is found, in a subtle manner, in John 21. In this chapter of the Johannine Gospel, we find Peter wanting to go fishing (v. 3) and some of the other disciples following him to catch fish, saying “we will go with you.” After a whole night of fishing during which they caught nothing, they encounter the Risen Christ on the shore Who told them where to throw their nets, through which they were able to catch a quantity of fish so large that “they were not able to haul (the net) in” the boat (v. 6). Later on in the same chapter we learn the exact number of fish they were able to catch: “a hundred and fifty-three of them” (v. 11).

 

Here’s the interesting part. Christ commanded Peter to “bring some of the fish that you have just caught” (v. 10), from the same net of fish that all five of the disciples at the boat weren’t able to drag inside the boat when they were still in the water. But from this command, Peter alone was able to “haul the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred and fifty-three of them; and although there were so many, the net was not torn” (v. 10). This is significant. Remember that earlier in His ministry, Christ already used the fish as a symbolism for man, in the context of characterizing the mission of the apostles: “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men” (Mt 4:19). What else does this story tell us? Joe Heshmeyer, in his book Pope Peter: Defending the Church’s Most Distinctive Doctrine in a Time of Crisis,[8] explains:

 

At the outset, it is Peter who says, “I am going fishing,” to which the other disciples reply, “We will go with you” (John 21:2-3). Peter is called to be a fisher of men; the others are called to be fishers of men with Peter. When Christ sends them to bring in the catch, Peter acts alone, but on behalf of the whole. He is capable, at Christ’s urging, of doing what the other apostles were incapable of doing: bringing the catch home to the eternal shores without tearing the net. If we are the fish, and the kingdom is the net, Peter is given a unique role in leading that net toward the shore, to ensure that it doesn’t tear. The Greek word used here for “torn” is from schisma, where we get our word schism. Peter’s role is to bring the Church to the eternal shore without letting it rupture through schism.[9]

 

In a world disposed to all types of schism – spiritual, ecclesiological, cultural, political, and even domestic – it is Peter’s role as Pope to preserve the spiritual “net” of the Church and of the human person in order to maintain and fight for the unity of all mankind, especially the people of God, and to bring all of us safely into the shore of heaven, our eternal home.

 

This mission of preserving the unity of all believers is evident during the times when the Church is challenged within by divisions caused by heretical beliefs and schismatic tendencies among her own people, even clergymen. During the Third Council of Constantinople (AD 680-681), Pope St. Agatho’s letter to the council fathers reasserts his predecessor, Pope Martin I’s position against monothelitism (the heresy that teaches that Christ only has one will) and also that fact that the church of Rome will never fall away from the faith because Christ said so, and thereby making sure that Rome – the See of St. Peter – will remain a reliable and infallible teacher for all churches when it comes to divine truth for all:

 

(T)he apostolic Church of Christ, has both in prosperity and in adversity always held and defended with energy; which, it will be proved, by the grace of Almighty God, has never erred from the path of the apostolic Tradition, not has she been depraved by yielding to heretical innovations… and remains undefiled unto the end, according to the divine promise of the Lord and Savior himself, which he uttered in the holy Gospels to the prince of his disciples: saying, Peter, Peter, behold, Satan has desired to have you, that he might sift you as wheat; but I have prayed for you, that [your] faith fail not. And when you are converted, strengthen your brethren.[10]

 

          The council fathers accepted this claim of indefectibility and leadership, calling Pope Agatho “the bishop of the first see of the Universal Church” and saying that they “acknowledge this letter was divinely written as by the chief of the apostles” through which they “have cast out the heretical sect of many errors”.[11]

 

          Almost 300 years before Pope Agatho, Pope St. Boniface I (418-422) wrote in a letter to Bishop Rufus of Thessalonica that “it has never been licit to deliberate again on that which has once been decided by the Apostolic See (of Rome).”[12] In other words, to use the words of the Code of Canon Law: “The First See is judged by no one.”[13] This has the obvious implication: if there are quarrels and disagreements within the Church, Rome, through the successor of St. Peter, has the prerogative to settle the matter so as to maintain peace and, thus, unity.

 

          Thus, as Scripture and history testify, the Pope is important because human beings ought to live as one within the Church just as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are one in their Trinitarian life. The Pope is the crusader against diabolical division, prideful isolation, and selfish self-exaltation. We have to be one family under Christ, and the Pope is the guardian of this family on earth.

 

          I think it safe to say that no one is more conscious of the unitive goal of the papacy other than the new pope himself, Pope Leo XIV. His motto manifests this consciousness: In Illo Uno Unum, or, in English, In the One (that is, Christ) We are One. Unity is such a fundamental aspiration of man. Politicians promise it and musicians sing about it (e.g. John Lennon’s Imagine and Bob Marley’s One Love). But Leo XIV knows, as expressed by his motto, that true unity will only be achieved in and with the One Lord, Jesus Christ “through whom are all things and through whom we exist” (1 Cor 8:6).

 

“There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us all, who is above all and through all and in all” (Eph 4:4-6). To maintain this oneness, Scripture exhorts us to “obey (our church) leaders and submit to them; for they are keeping watch over (our) souls, as men who will have to give account. Let (us) do this joyfully, and not sadly, for that would be of no advantage to you” (Heb 13:17). And of all the leaders who have the responsibility of “keeping watch over our souls,” the Pope’s role is the most grave. This is why, in the 2nd century, St. Irenaeus speaks of the diocese of Rome in this way: it “is a matter of necessity that every Church should agree with this Church, on account of its preeminent authority.”[14] Contrary to the individualism of the modern world, the way to go is to mortify our wills and submit ourselves to Rome, embodied by its bishop, the Pope, who himself will show us authentic unity, which is unity in Jesus.

 

This is why Pope Leo XIV’s words in his first public homily as supreme pontiff are very timely:

These are contexts where it is not easy to preach the Gospel and bear witness to its truth, where believers are mocked, opposed, despised or at best tolerated and pitied. Yet, precisely for this reason, they are the places where our missionary outreach is desperately needed. A lack of faith is often tragically accompanied by the loss of meaning in life, the neglect of mercy, appalling violations of human dignity, the crisis of the family and so many other wounds that afflict our society.

Today, too, there are many settings in which Jesus, although appreciated as a man, is reduced to a kind of charismatic leader or superman. This is true not only among non-believers but also among many baptized Christians, who thus end up living, at this level, in a state of practical atheism.

This is the world that has been entrusted to us, a world in which, as Pope Francis taught us so many times, we are called to bear witness to our joyful faith in Christ the Saviour. Therefore, it is essential that we too repeat, with Peter: "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Mt 16:16).[15] (emphasis added)

            We, the laity, are not called to remain idle while the pope does his job alone. Pope Leo XIV has encouraged us to go on a “missionary outreach” in order to achieve, as one people, the deepest aspirations of the human heart, by “bearing witness to our joyful faith in Christ the Saviour.” Let us go to the streets, then, and gather all men in the Love of Christ our King and with the Pope as the Prime Minister of His Kingdom!

          How could we do this concretely? Let me answer by telling a story.

          In the year 449 AD, emperor Theodosius II convened a gathering of bishops in Ephesus that, by all appearances, looked like an ecumenical council. This same council was presided by the high-ranking Patriarch Alexandria, Dioscorus. However, there was a major issue at this council: it was teaching a Christological heresy.

          How can a heresy, this time being endorsed by a council of bishops, be stopped? In attendance at the council is a deacon from Rome named Hilary, the legate sent by Pope St. Leo the Great to represent Rome. As the council was in its closing stages, Hilary exclaimed: “contradicitur,” meaning “I object.” Heschmeyer quotes the historian Alain Bescançon, who describes the event this way: “All the immortal power of the Church was concentrated in that simple, legal word spoken by the Roman deacon: contradicitur.”[16] That one statement changed the course of that council, and that same council was never considered by any of the apostolic Churches (whether Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, or the Assyrian Church of the East) as ecumenical afterwards. How can a mere deacon reverse all the decisions made by the bishops, who possess a higher authority than him? It’s simple, really: “Because Hilary was the pope’s legate… and he was invoking the pope’s own authority to object to the unsavory proceedings.”[17]

          What are the “unsavory proceedings” going on in society today? The growing irreligiosity of the young, the lack of reverence for human life by the promotion of things like abortion or euthanasia, the misuse of sexuality, the inhumane treatment of refugees, the corruption of the government, the giving of too much power to lawmakers, the destruction of the family, and many more. We Catholics are called to be modern “papal legates” and represent His Holiness, Leo XIV –  just as deacon Hilary represented his own Pope Leo, Leo the Great –  by proclaiming to the world, contradicitur, I object! We say “no” to everything that violates the rights of both man and God and say “yes” to Truth, Goodness, and Beauty. WIth Leo XIV, we shout to the rooftops: IN THE ONE CHRIST WE ARE ONE!

 

 

 

 

 

 


[2] Second Vatican Council. “Gaudium et Spes: PASTORAL CONSTITUTION on the CHURCH in the MODERN WORLD.” www.vatican.va, 7 Dec. 1965, www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19651207_gaudium-et-spes_en.html. Accessed 12 Mar. 2024.

 

[3] Dreher, R. (2017). The Benedict option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation. Penguin.

 

[4] Ibid., p. 90

 

[5] Ibid.

 

[7] Second Vatican Council. “Lumen Gentiums: DOGMATIC CONSTITUTION on the CHURCH.” www.vatican.va, 21 Nov. 1964, https://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html


[8] Heschmeyer, J. (2020). Pope Peter: Defending the Church’s Most Distinctive Doctrine in a Time of Crisis. Catholic Answers Press.

 

[9] Ibid., p. 115


[10] Answering Orthodoxy: A Catholic response to Attacks from the East. (2022). Catholic Answers Press. pp. 91-92

 

[11] Ibid., p. 93

 

[12] Ibid., p. 118

 

[14] St. Irenaeus, Against Heresies III, c. 3

 

[15] From the  Full text of first public homily of Pope Leo XIV

 

[16] Pope Peter, pp. 205-206

 

[17] Ibid., p. 206


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