In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Peace be with you!
 

Dear brothers in the episcopate,
Dear Ministers,
Distinguished Military Authorities,
Reverend Chaplains and Officials of the Military Ordinariate;
Dear brothers and sisters,

I warmly welcome you all! In particular, in greeting the Military Ordinaries from other countries apart from Italy, I encourage you to continue and deepen your dialogue and collaboration with the various Ordinariates throughout the world.

Inter Arma Caritas: “To bring Christ into the veins of humanity, renewing and sharing the apostolic mission, to look to tomorrow with serenity, making courageous choices” (cf. Address to the Italian Episcopal Conference, 17 June 2025). These are the words that are guiding the path of the Centenary of the Military Ordinariate for Italy, an event that preserves memory, relevance and prophecy.

We live in a society that risks losing its sense of memory. Our age has an extraordinary capacity to transmit information, but an increasingly weak capacity to internalize it. Memory is often “externalized” and available, but not always internalized and activated. For the Church, however, it is a living conscience: not an accumulation of data, but a constant call to responsibility; not nostalgia, but a root that generates prophecy. For Christians, memory has a unique character: it is a celebration of God entering history, because the Christian faith is based on a historical fact and salvation is not an idea, but the living person of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Centenary of the Military Ordinariate for Italy also fits into this logic, as the embodied memory of a concrete history, made up of men and women in uniform who, journeying in the Church, supported and accompanied by their pastors, in the bright days of peace and the dramatic days of war, with sacrifice, courage and dedication, contributed to the growth of this society, sometimes at the cost of their lives.

In this context, the teaching of Pope Saint Paul VI, when he stated that history is not a reality to be endured, but a place of grace in which to build a civilization of love, resonates today. The Centenary you are celebrating is intended to echo this very message, in the light of the Lord’s commandment: “Love one another as I have loved you” (Jn 15:12). Your service is an act of love – towards the country, towards the territories, and above all towards the people – which translates into tangible closeness, especially in places and circumstances where there are the greatest fragilities.

In you, dear Military Chaplains, may Saint Augustine's exhortation to live your ministry as amoris officium, a service of love, therefore echo. Commenting on the dialogue between the Risen Jesus and Peter, Augustine writes: “If you love me, think not of feeding yourself, but feed my sheep as mine, and not as your own; seek my glory in them, and not your own; my dominion, and not yours. … In feeding His sheep, let us be seeking the things which are His, not the things which are our own” (In Joannis Evangelium, 123, 5). Many Military Chaplains have embodied these words and have made pastoral charity visible to the point of heroic virtue, sometimes even martyrdom.

The action of the Military Chaplain is often carried out in silence, in places of peace and in those of conflict, in military bases and in operational contexts, in chapels and in field tents. It is there that the care of the Lord’s flock is manifested through the witness of life, the proclamation of the Gospel, the celebration of the Eucharist and in the Sacraments, patient listening and spiritual accompaniment. In this sense, educational contexts, academies, schools, training institutes, and places where consciences are shaped take on particular importance. In a society marked by human mobility and cultural plurality, the chaplain also serves dialogue between peoples, cultures, and religions, bearing witness to a Church that is an instrument of unity. His spiritual action thus contributes to the promotion of the common good and social peace, the fruit – as Pope Francis recalled – of patient craftsmanship, which requires formation, justice and charity (cf. Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii gaudium, 217-221).

The Second Vatican Council, in the Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et spes, affirms that: “Insofar as men are sinful, the threat of war hangs over them, and hang over them it will until the return of Christ. But insofar as men vanquish sin by a union of love, they will vanquish violence as well” (no. 78). This is the context in which the mission of the Christian soldier is situated. Defending the weak, protecting peaceful coexistence, intervening in disasters, operating in international missions to preserve peace and restore order. All this cannot be reduced to a mere profession: it is a vocation, a response to a call that challenges the conscience. The soldier’s identity is forged by generosity, a spirit of service, high aspirations and deep feelings. But these values require a foundation, a gift of Grace capable of fostering charity to the point of total self-sacrifice. It is therefore necessary to inspire the codes, norms and missions of military life with the lifeblood of the Gospel so that, in the service of security and peace, the common good of peoples is always the first priority.

Forty years ago, with the Apostolic Constitution Spirituali militum curae, Saint John Paul II established Military Ordinariates as particular Churches, endowed with their own theological and organizational identity. Addressing the participants in the first Synod of Military Ordinariates (6 May 1999), he emphasized the specificity of this Church, which accompanies military personnel, their families and all those connected with the service of the Armed Forces and the Police. And, during the Jubilee of 2000, the same Holy Father said to the military: “You are called to defend the weak, to protect the honest, to foster the peaceful coexistence of peoples. The role of the sentinel, who scans the horizon to avert danger and promote justice and peace everywhere, befits each of you” (Homily at the Mass for the Jubilee of the Armed Forces and the Police, 19 November 2000, 2).

The Church, in the wake of the teaching of the Second Vatican Council and the Apostolic Exhortations Evangelii nuntiandi and Evangelii gaudium, proclaims the Gospel of peace, ready to collaborate with everyone to safeguard this universal good (cf. Francis, Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii gaudium, 239). In it, the Military Ordinariate for Italy, through spiritual care, seeks to be an effective laboratory of God’s action in favour of humanity, a space of formation for the transition from amor sui to amor Dei, the foundation of that Civitas Dei in which the fundamental law is charity (cf. Saint Augustine, De civitate Dei, 14, 28), and where peace is not only the absence of conflict, but the fullness of justice, truth and love. From this perspective, I encourage you to continue to implement the projects you have in mind: the Pastoral Centre, the formation activities for chaplains and chaplain trainees and, in particular, the Centre for Advanced Studies in Spiritual Assistance, aimed at promoting interdisciplinary reflection on the challenges of today’s world, on the inculturation of the faith, and on the relationship between the Gospel, culture, science and new technologies.

Dear friends, thank you for what you do! I invoke upon all of you, your families and your service, the intercession of Mary, Queen of Peace, and of your patron Saints, and I bless you from my heart. Thank you.

____________________________________

Holy See Press Office Bulletin, 7 March 2026