Bishop Laurenson prays Pope Leo will be ‘a guide to heaven’

Bishop Laurenson presided at a Mass of celebration and thanksgiving for the new Pontiff, celebrated at the Cathedral of the Blessed Virgin Mary on May 16. 

The bishop’s homily reflected on the promises of God, particularly on the provision of shepherds, from the Old Testament to Jesus the Good Shepherd, and Jesus’ promise for those who would continue to shepherd in his place.

Bishop Laurenson called for prayerful support for the new Pope as he guides people to the Lord. The bishop prayed “that Leo will be for us a shepherd after the Lord, a guide to heaven, a way of peace”.

The Lord promised that those who would shepherd in his place would do so not by their own strength and not by their own skills, but by the strength and the skills that are the Lord’s, Bishop Laurenson said.

“To prove it, he established Peter, the blowhard, the one who rushes in where angels fear to tread, the one who said he would never, never leave the Lord, then denies him three times. Peter the apostate, a man who completely denied the Lord. That’s the man the Lord chose, to prove that Christ’s shepherds would shepherd on God’s terms and not on human terms,” Bishop Laurenson said. 

The bishop also reflected on the phrase attributed to St Augustine that was mentioned by Pope Leo on the balcony of St Peter’s Basilica – “with you I am a Christian, for you, I am a bishop”.

Before the Lord, Pope Leo is “first a disciple, he is a baptised member of the Body of Christ, and the task the Lord has placed before him, a cross as it is, an enormous task which is only achievable if he clings to the God who made him, the God who loves him and the God who saves him”, Bishop Laurenson said. 

“That is also true for us in our own vocations, in our own walk of life, so in that sense Pope Leo is not that different from you and me. In another sense, the Lord has laid this burden on him, he picks up a mantle that only the Lord can give the grace to carry.

“It’s important for us always to keep him in prayer, as we did Francis, Benedict, John Paul II and I (and for those of you with ‘longer memories’ Paul and John).”

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Thanksgiving Mass for Pope Leo XIV (Full text of homily by Bishop Richard Laurenson)