OPINION — On January 1, 2026, in his deliberate first message for the 59th World Day of Peace, Pope Leo XIV will replicate on peace, justice, and world concord.
On December 18, 2025, Pope Leo printed his first main peace message themed “Peace be with you,” in preparation for his and the Catholic Church’s annual January 1st exhortation on World Peace. Pope Leo’s December message urged the trustworthy to not give up to the concept that worry and darkness are regular, however to see peace as not solely attainable however crucial. “After we deal with peace as a distant best, we stop to be scandalized when it’s denied, and even when conflict is waged in its title… and to justify violence and armed wrestle within the title of faith.” Pope Leo known as on believers of all religions to protect towards the temptation to weaponize phrases and faith to commit violence in its title. He ended with two searing eyewitness accounts of European horrors: the Bosnian conflict and the home terrorism that tormented Italy within the Seventies and Eighties.
The World Day of Peace is an annual Catholic observance celebrated every January 1. Established in 1968 by Pope Paul VI, it is a chance for every pope to jot down a peace message and to replicate on peace, justice, and world concord. The messages provide ethical steering to the Church and the world on find out how to pursue peace in a up to date context.
For his first message for the 59th World of Peace, Pope Leo selected the theme “Peace be with you” as a name not solely to want peace, however to make it a lived actuality. Certainly, peace isn’t just the absence of conflict, however rooted in justice, belief, dialogue, forgiveness, and shared humanity.
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Searching for peace in a world in disarray
The annual Preventive Priorities Survey, produced by the Council on International Relations (CFR) and the greater than 600 American international coverage consultants who contributed to the survey, was simply printed and considered 5 conflict-related eventualities as extremely more likely to emerge or escalate and to have excessive influence on U.S. pursuits in 2026.
The consultants have been most involved about conflict-related dangers within the Center East and japanese Europe, together with the potential for elevated clashes between Israeli safety forces and Palestinians within the West Financial institution, renewed preventing within the Gaza Strip, and intensified assaults within the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Additionally, the opportunity of direct U.S. army strikes in Venezuela and of a rise in political violence and standard unrest in the US are equally worrying eventualities.
Renewed armed battle between Iran and Israel, synthetic intelligence-enabled cyberattacks on U.S. infrastructure and a cross-strait disaster between China and Taiwan are regarding. And North Korea was elevated to a Tier 1 concern for 2026 – a top-priority world risk as a consequence of its nuclear weapons, ballistic missile packages and potential to destabilize Northeast Asia.
“The world continues to develop extra violent and disorderly. Final yr’s unprecedented stage of tension amongst consultants in regards to the rising danger of battle stays undiminished, in response to the director of the CFR survey.
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Pope Leo, the primary American pope, has a chance to place phrases into motion, within the pursuit of peace. Since his election in Could 2025, “peace be with you all” has been the muse for his peace mission. In October 2025, at an interreligious assembly in Rome, Pope Leo declared: “Peace is holy, not conflict”, urging spiritual leaders to behave as “moms” who encourage folks to deal with one another as household. And in December 2025 throughout a visit to Lebanon he met with Muslim and Druze leaders, stating that genuine unity and friendship are the one methods to “put apart the arms of conflict.”
Pope Leo may and may convene a gathering of interreligious leaders to draft a method to deliver peace to a troubled world. This, clearly, can be a monumental activity, seemingly past the attain of any particular person, nation, alliance, and faith. However a frontrunner that has the respect of friends and the general public may very well be the catalyst for such a “peace motion.”
Pope Leo has my vote.
This column by Cipher Temporary Knowledgeable Ambassador Joseph DeTrani was first printed in The Washington Instances
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