Pope Leo XIV And The Responsibility To Care For The Poor

On October 4, 2025, Pope Leo XIV released the Apostolic Exhortation "Dilexi Te" that continues the Catholic critique of capitalism that began with Pope Leo XIII's 1891 encyclical "Rerum Novarum."

Almost every Pope since then, from more conservative popes like John Paul II, to more reformist popes like Pope Francis, have added to the critique of capitalism as capitalism has evolved over the past few decades.

Both Pope Francis and Pope Leo are from Latin America and both were deeply influenced by the 1968 Council of Medellin that pushed for the Latin American Catholic Church towards having a "preferential option for the poor".

A brief summary of the Catholic critique of capitalism: without moral constraints, a system based on maximizing profits and the pursuit of self interest creates a toxic environment of selfishness and greed.

This toxic environment of selfishness and greed sees people as commodities to be exploited rather than as human beings with rights that must be respected.

Here's a youtube video on my process on creating this cartoon
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmYJazM9uGY

REFERENCES

"Dilexi Te" by Pope Leo XIV
https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/apost_exhortations/documents/…

"Pope Leo delivers breathtakingly bold salvo on wealth, elitism and poverty" an editorial by The National Catholic Reporter
https://www.ncronline.org/opinion/editorial/editorial-pope-leo-delivers…

"Experts: Dilexi Te reinforces Catholic teaching that care for the poor is essential to holiness" by Kimberley Heatherington for The National Catholic Reporter
https://www.ncronline.org/news/experts-dilexi-te-reinforces-catholic-te…

"Pope Leo Declares Whose Side He’s On—and It’s Not JD Vance’s" by Katie Kelaidis for The New Republic
https://newrepublic.com/article/201602/pope-leo-apostolic-exhortation-d…

"Leo XIV speaks out on ‘dictatorship’ of economic inequality and support for migrants in first major text" by Christopher Lamb for CNN
https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/09/europe/leo-xiv-first-major-text-migrants…