Pope Leo: Faith is ‘required to become culture,’ reaching people in their living environment

In his Oct. 28 General Audience Pope Leo XIV reflected on the Vatican II document Gaudium et Spes’ section on culture and its relationship to the Christian faith, saying the relationship's “primary foundation” is found in the Incarnation. 

“If the divine Word became flesh and came to dwell among us, then faith too is an incarnate reality, interwoven with the culture in which it is immersed,” Pope Leo said. “It is also required to become culture, that is, to reach the person in their living environment, made up of human words, traditions, religious meaning, art and poetry, thought and science. As Saint John Paul II loved to repeat, ‘a faith that does not become culture is a faith not fully accepted, not entirely thought out, not faithfully lived’.”

The Pontiff also noted that the culture can inspire people to consider questions about the meaning of life, thus preparing them to be receptive to the Gospel. He emphasized that living out the faith is not exclusive to a specific culture, but something to be shared throughout the world. 

“Faith can be embodied in all cultures, because it does not identify itself with any of them in a specific one,” Pope Leo said. “It dwells within them, shaping them from within according to the ‘form’ of Jesus Christ; that is, through charity, service and the filial recognition of God’s fatherhood. In this way, the Church draws from the various cultures all that is good, beautiful and true, in order to embody and transmit the message of the Gospel.”

He then quoted from Gaudium et Spes, which highlights that the Church, which is sent to all peoples in every place and time, “is not bound exclusively and indissolubly to any race or nation, any particular way of life or any customary way of life recent or ancient.”

Pope Leo also highlighted that historically, schools have played a crucial role in developing culture and that Gaudium et Spes emphasizes the importance of widespread educational access. 

“The Catholic Church has always been concerned with accompanying the preaching of the Gospel with the establishment of schools of every kind, aimed at advancing the human, cultural and spiritual formation of men and women across the five continents,” he said. “Medieval universities, as we know, were born from the heart of the Church, making a decisive contribution to the development of Western civilization.” 

He said culture is a good in itself that benefits the human person and the Church, and thus Gaudium et Spes urges the international community to ensure access to basic cultural goods, through overcoming illiteracy and lack of education. 

“All those who are capable of accessing higher education – the Council boldly states – must be placed in a position to do so in practice. Furthermore, ‘it will belong to all to acknowledge and favour the proper and necessary participation of women in the cultural life,’” he added, citing the document’s paragraph 60.

He also encouraged Christians to strive to pursue formation not only in faith but in other sciences as well, noting that Gaudium et Spes urges theologians in particular to collaborate with professionals of other disciplines.

“Theological inquiry should pursue a profound understanding of revealed truth; at the same time it should not neglect close contact with its own time,” the document states, “that it may be able to help these men skilled in various disciplines to attain to a better understanding of the faith.”

Concluding, Pope Leo emphasized that Gaudium et Spes encourages the faithful “to live the faith in a spirit of opposition or hostility towards the world, culture and its human expressions,” but rather to live closely with the people of their time and work to understand their way of thought and judgement seen through their culture. 

“Achieving a mature and responsible synthesis between faith and culture is, in fact, a necessary condition for persevering in the Christian vocation,” Pope Leo said, “as well as an essential requirement for bearing witness to the faith before the world and communicating it to others in a credible manner.”