Pope Leo XIV’s trip to Algeria, and to the Hippo (now Annaba) home of St. Augustine, will begin on Monday April 13, for four days. Pope Leo, a member of the Augustinian Order, introduced himself in his first speech as Pope as “a son of St. Augustine,” adding: “With you I am a Christian, and for you I am a bishop.”
Although this is his third overseas visit, it is the first that he organized himself rather than trips arranged by his predecessors.
Pope Leo was the head of the Augustinian Order for 12 years before becoming a Bishop. The present head of the order, Fr. Kevin De Prinzio, told the National Catholic Reporter that the trip shows “Leo deepening his own commitment to his Augustinian roots, giving great honor and homage to Augustine: who he was, who he is for him now and for his leadership.”
“On that very earth is where Augustine wrote the Confessions, the City of God, De Trinitate, our own rule, reflected on his own life, his baptism, lived in community, served the people of God, sat in dialogue with people, encountered difference, worked toward unity—all things that are very important to Leo and are ongoing needs of the church and the world right now,” De Prinzio said.
De Prinzio adds: “And as a reluctant shepherd, Leo has plenty to draw on from Augustine’s example. Both were tasked with holding together a church that crept toward divisions. In the fourth century, Augustine’s number one concern was really about fostering unity and communion,” De Prinzio said. In particular, the saint was active in combatting the divisive heresy of Donatism, which held that the church’s pastors had to be morally faultless in order to validly minister the sacraments. It may not be Donatism that we’re dealing with today, but Augustine was a bridge-builder and Leo sees himself also as a bridge-builder, so going back to Africa, to Hippo, is really him enacting what is important to him in a symbolic gesture.”
Pope Leo, discussing his plan to visit Algeria, said he wanted to continue the work of “building bridges between the Christian world and the Muslim world.” St. Augustine, he said, “helps a great deal as a bridge, because in Algeria he is very much respected as a son of the homeland.”
The Reporter writes: “The African saint came up in turbulent times for the church. Christianity went from the object of persecution in the Roman empire to the official state religion in his lifetime. Augustine also had to speak out against various and oftentimes competing strains of Christianity that emerged in North Africa, sometimes violently, within the still-young religion. As a result, Augustine called for people to unify ‘by a common agreement as to the objects of their love,’” urging Christians and non-Christians alike to band together in pursuit of the common good—a notion which reflects the message of Nicholas of Cusa in the De Pace Fidei.
The Reporter adds: “Perhaps in that spirit, Leo has made unity a central element of his pontificate, returning to the theme of unity time and time again as pope.”
The Pope will also visit Cameroon, Angola and Equatorial Guinea during his 11 day visit to Africa between April 13 to 23.
