Cindy Wooden, Catholic News Service

Pope Leo XIV said a proposal to create an AI-version of him so people could have a virtual audience with the pope pretty much horrified him.

Because "true knowledge of God is realized in a life transformed by love," the Catholic Church needs theologians whose pursuit of understanding is framed by care for the real concerns of modern men and women, Pope Leo XIV said.

In situations where "hatred seemed to have permeated every aspect of life," modern Christian martyrs showed that love is stronger than death, Pope Leo XIV said at an ecumenical prayer service.

"Maybe some of you are still saying: Why was I chosen? At least I ask myself that," Pope Leo XIV said Sept. 11 during a meeting with bishops in Rome for the Vatican's annual formation courses for new bishops.

"When our dialogue is lived out in actions, a powerful message resounds: that peace, not conflict, is our most cherished dream, and that building this peace is a task we undertake together," Pope Leo XIV said in a message to an interreligious meeting in Bangladesh.

The future Christians hope for and must build "is not one of walls and barbed wire, but one of mutual acceptance," Pope Leo XIV told young adult Catholics from more than a dozen Mediterranean countries.

As Israeli military operations in Gaza continued, Pope Leo XIV met with Israeli President Isaac Herzog at the Vatican.

Two months after celebrating a new Mass "for the care of creation," Pope Leo XIV will return to Castel Gandolfo to formally inaugurate Borgo Laudato Si', a place of education, ecology and spirituality in the papal summer estate.

"I plead for all hostages to be freed, a permanent ceasefire to be reached, the safe entry of humanitarian aid to be facilitated and humanitarian law to be fully respected," the pope said at the end of his weekly general audience Aug. 27.

Marking Ukraine's Independence Day, Pope Leo XIV pledged his prayers for the Ukrainian people in a message to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and encouraged Catholics to respond to Ukrainian religious leaders' request for prayers for peace Aug. 24.

Pope Leo prayed that God would console the Ukrainian people, "strengthen the injured and grant eternal rest to the departed." Ukraine declared its independence from the Soviet Union on Aug. 24, 1991.

A plan for Pope Leo XIV to visit Lebanon as well as Turkey in late November and early December is being studied, a Vatican official said.

The theologians were asked to read, organize and summarize the reports to assist members of the synod council in preparing the working document for the synod session Oct. 2-27.

The reason why the 2024 edition of the Vatican yearbook has re-inserted "Patriarch of the West" as one of the historical titles of the pope appears to be a response to concerns expressed by Orthodox leaders and theologians.

The lawyer for the former Vatican employee accused of trying to sell St. Peter's Basilica an allegedly stolen 17th-century manuscript about plans for the massive canopy over the basilica's main altar said the illustrated manuscript is different from one listed in the archives and later reported missing.

Sitting in the Vatican Gardens with the dome of St. Peter's Basilica as a backdrop, Pope Francis told cardinals and diplomats, including the ambassadors of Israel and Palestine, "Every day I pray that this war will finally end."

Archbishop Paul R. Gallagher, the Vatican foreign minister, told the ambassador and his guests, "In conflicts, the Holy See must adhere to the principle of neutrality, which does not mean being morally indifferent."

Pope Francis reportedly told a young gay man to "keep going" with his vocational search after he told the pope he felt called to the priesthood but was turned away by an Italian seminary because he told them he was gay.

In the third week of November, three executions by lethal injection took place in the U.S. in just two days and a fourth execution was called off after failed attempts happened close to the expiration of the prisoner's death warrant.