Synodality is ‘antidote’ to polarisation says Pope Leo XIV

Ruth Gledhill

15 September 2025, The Tablet

Riccardo De Luca – Update Images, Alamy

Synodality can address ‘some of the greatest challenges that we have in the world today’ the Pope says in interview.

Speaking to Elise Ann Allen of Crux, for her new biography of Leo published this Thursday, and with extracts published on Crux today, he defined his predecessor’s synodal process as an attitude of openness and understanding, meaning each Church member has a voice and a role to play.

“It’s an attitude which I think can teach a lot to the world today,” he said.

Talking about his identity, he says he is American and loves America, referring to the US where he was born and brought up in Chicago. But he also has Peruvian nationality and says half his ministry so far was spent in Peru, so “the Latin American perspective” is valuable to him. Asked who he would cheer for if the US was up against Peru in the World Cup, he said, “Probably Peru and just because of affective bonds. I’m also a big fan of Italy…People know I’m a White Sox fan, but as pope, I’m a fan of all the teams. Even at home, I grew up a White Sox fan, but my mother was a Cubs fan, so you couldn’t be one of those fans that shut out the other side. We learned, even in sports, to have an open, dialogical, friendly and not angry competitive stance on things like that, because we might not have gotten dinner had we been.”

He tells Allen that he feels he is on a learning curve, feels challenged but not overwhelmed, and while he has always stayed on top of current events, the role of pope was “totally new” to him. “The totally new aspect to this job is being thrown onto the level of world leader. It’s very public, people know the phone conversations or meetings I’ve had with the heads of state of a number of different governments, countries around the world, in a time when the voice of the church has a significant role to play. I am learning a lot about how the Holy See has had a role in the diplomatic world for many years…Those things are all new to me in any sense of hands-on.”

He condemns the “useless killing” of people on both sides of the Russia-Ukraine conflict in particular but others also. “I think people have to somehow be wakened up to say, there’s another way to do this.” But he also talks of the importance of the Vatican maintaining a neutral position.

“We have to continue to remind ourselves of the potential that humanity has to overcome the violence and the hatred that is just dividing us more and more. We live in times when polarisation seems to be one of the words of the day, but it’s not helping anybody. Or if it’s helping anyone, it’s very few when everyone else is suffering.”

It is important to work out why the world has become so polarised, he continues. “The crisis of 2020 and the pandemic certainly had an effect on all of this, but I think it began further back…Perhaps in some places the loss of a higher sense of what human life is about would have something to do with that, which has affected people on many levels. The value of human life, of the family, and the value of society. If we lose the sense of those values, what matters anymore?”

And he criticises the widening gap between rich and poor. “For example, CEOs that 60 years ago might have been making four to six times more than what the workers are receiving, the last figure I saw, it’s 600 times more than what average workers are receiving.” He referred to the news recently that Elon Musk is going to be the first trillionaire in the world. “What does that mean and what’s that about? If that is the only thing that has value anymore, then we’re in big trouble.”

Pope Leo XIV gave a two-part interview to Crux Senior Correspondent Elise Ann Allen whichg is in her new biography of the pope, León XIV: ciudadano del mundo, misionero del siglo XXI, or “Leo XIV: Citizen of the World, Missionary of the XXI Century.” The book is published in Spanish by Penguin Peru and will be available for purchase in stores and online 18 September. English and Portuguese editions will be available in early 2026. Austen Ivereigh’s take on the interview will be published in this week’s print edition of The Tablet and will be available online from Thursday.