Mass of thanksgiving for our New Pope
On Monday 12 May, the Grand Priory celebrated a votive Mass of Ss Peter and Paul in thanksgiving for the election of our new Holy Father, Pope Leo XIV. Mass concluded with the Prayer for the Pope and the “Te Deum”.
Fr Gary Dench celebrated the Mass and preached, and the text of his sermon is set out below.
Mass of Thanksgiving for the election of the Supreme Pontiff
12th May 2025
It is no small thing when white smoke curls into the Roman sky. And the excitement which went out through the crowd in St Peter’s Square spread, in its own, on a plane about to land in the less exotic location of Stansted airport
Let it not be said that men cannot multi-task! Trying to keep a look-out for the baggage of our malades while also keeping an eye on the live-stream of the square is no easy task!
But how our joy sat in contrast with a man weeping before his saviour at the awful and terrifying responsibility which had just been thrust upon him. There is a reason the newly elected pope is taken to a place called the room of tears.
That gentle cloud is not just a symbol. It is the sign of a heavenly reply to an earthly prayer. It is the visible sign that Christ always keeps His promises. As we gaze upon the newly elected Pope Leo XIV, we are reminded again that Christ does not leave us as orphans, nor does He leave His Church to the mercy of the shifting winds of history.
The papacy is not a creation of man. Nor is it a piece of statecraft. Nor a a work of ecclesiastical ingenuity. It was not forged in the fires of politics, but it was instead breathed into being by the Divine Word Himself. Our Lord, standing before Simon the hot-headed fisherman, did not look at the man he was, but the rock he would become.
Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.’
Our Lord does not say, ‘a church,’ he says ‘My Church.’ And He does not say it will avoid conflict, simply that hell itself will not prevail against it. The papacy is the visible guarantee of this divine promise. Where Peter is, there is the Church. And where the Church is, there is Christ.
Imagine a world without Peter, a world without the Vicar of Christ steadying the journey. Such a world is not hypothetical. It is a reality.
We have lived through it.
We still live through it.
It is the modern age. It is a world where truth is no longer carved in stone but scribbled in pencil, reading to be wiped out and rewritten on a moment’s whim. It is a world where every man is his own pope, his own theologian, and, in all his pride and conceit, even dares to claim to be his own redeemer.
In this world, authority is despised and liberty is confused with license. There is an allergy to obedience and a suspicion of anything older than ourselves. Against this the papacy stands as a defiant contradiction It is a prophetic voice crying out not just, reminding us of what matters.
Remember who you are.
Remember who Christ is.
Remember the Church that has never bent the knee to Caesar, never married the spirit of the age, and never forgotten the blood of her martyrs poured out like Christ’s.
In Leo we find a name which resounds with courage and clarity. Think of Leo the Great, who faced down the barbarians not with swords, but with sanctity. Think of Leo XIII, whose encyclical Rerum Novarum breathed new life into a weary working class, reminding the world that social justice is not born of revolution, but of the Gospel. This Leo who proudly proclaimed the rights of the Church against secularism, and the rights of families against those who would see us all as nothing more than individuals, with nothing to stand between us and an over-reaching and over-bearing state. This Leo who clearly proclaimed the rights of man, but who never let us forget our duties to God.
This new Leo, our Leo, ascends the throne of Peter not in triumph, but in trial. There are no barbarians at the gates. Instead there are wolves.
Confusion masquerades as charity. Division wears the face of reform. But the papacy endures, not because of the man who wears the white cassock, but because of Christ who chose him.
The papacy is not a place of glory, but of sacrifice. It is the cross made visible in the world of politics and power. The Pope is not a king in the worldly sense, but the servant of the servants of God. He is Peter, walking again the shores of Galilee, still hearing the question: ‘Simon, son of John, do you love Me?’
To which he must answer, to which we all must answer,‘Lord, you know all things. You know that I love you.’
And if we love Him, we must love His Church. And to love the Church is to be faithful to Peter, even when Peter, like the fisherman of old, weeps over his own frailty. For even when Peter stumbles, Christ remains. And even when the barque is battered, she will not sink. She may be weathered, but she remains His.
Today we rejoice, not as the world rejoices in the latest fashion or pop-star, but as children rejoice when the father comes home. We do not worship the pope. We do not idolise his office. We venerate it, for it is a gift to the Church and a Cross to its bearer.
In Leo, the name and man, we find the importance of the proclamation of the truth of Christ and a concern for the rights of the oppressed. Or, put another way, the defence of the faith and aid to the poor.
Tuitio fidei et obsequium pauperum.
How can we not be moved by this , as we are by those same words which spur us to action in the aid of our Christian brothers and sisters, and our lords the poor and the sick?
In every age the Order has fought, above all, not for territory but truth, not for wealth but for the poor and the sick, and it has done this with and under Peter.
And today our assistance is needed again. With a new Pope is required a renewal of our efforts. Above all, we must continue to pray for our Holy Father as he seeks to navigate the storms ahead.
Whatever the shouts in St Peter’s Square, and whatever the titter excitement on our flight from Lourdes to Stansted, a pope needs more than applause. He needs the saints at his side, and the faithful on their knees.