Pope Leo XIV speaks of his time as an Altar Server
Pope Leo XIV outside the Vatican July 2025 Summer Camp for children
At the Vatican 2025 Summer Camp for children, Pope Leo XIV made an unexpected appearance and took questions from the assembled 600 young people.
In unprepared remarks he responded to a child who asked if he went to Mass as a child, in reply he began to comment on his time as a young boy in Chicago, USA and his early days of serving Mass.
“But starting from when I was around 6 years old, I was an altar boy in the parish. And so, before going to school -- it was a parochial school -- there was Mass at 6:30am, and my mother would wake us up and say ‘We’re going to Mass!’ Serving Mass was something we really loved, because even as a child I was taught that Jesus is always close, your best friend is always Jesus and that the Mass was a way, let’s say, to find Jesus, to be with Jesus.
Back then it was in Latin, so we had to learn some Latin for the Mass, later for me it changed to English because I was raised in the United States, and we spoke English, for you it would be Italian. Still what mattered wasn’t so much the language of the celebration but really the meeting of other kids who also served at Mass together, that sense of friendship, and above all being close to Jesus in the church.”
