Hours after celebrating Mass for an estimated 1.5 million people and leading a Corpus Christi procession through the streets of Madrid, Pope Leo XIV found himself in a very different setting.

In a sweeping address to the Spanish parliament, Pope Leo XIV delivered a forceful defense of the dignity of every human life, declaring that its protection is not a partisan issue but “a goal of civilization,” while addressing the issues of abortion, migration, freedom of conscience, the seal of confession and the Church’s role in public life.

More than 1.2 million people filled the streets of Madrid as Pope Leo XIV celebrated Mass and led a Eucharistic procession through the heart of the Spanish capital June 7 for the solemnity of Corpus Christi, the liturgical feast celebrating the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ.

Pope Leo XIV arrived in Spain June 6, invoking Saints Teresa of Ávila, John of the Cross and Ignatius of Loyola as spiritual guides for the polarized country as it navigates profound social tensions.

It’s a slim volume; the Ascension Press edition of “The Practice of the Presence of God” by the 17th-century French Carmelite friar Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection runs just 131 pages in the print edition, with notes.

A new poll shows President Donald Trump trailing Pope Leo XIV by 54 percentage points in net favorability.

Pope Leo XIV told Catholic university leaders on June 3 that they have a responsibility to instill in their students a passion for “not only intellectual truth, but the truth that is Christ himself.”

Pope Leo XIV has encouraged the faithful to keep alive the public witness of faith made visible in Eucharistic processions, recalling that this week the Church celebrates the solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, also known as Corpus Christi.

Shortly after the May 25 release of Pope Leo XIV’s encyclical “Magnifica Humanitas,” which calls for artificial intelligence ethics to be grounded in Catholic social teaching on God-given human dignity, OSV News spoke with clinical medical ethicist Daniel J. Daly, the founding executive director of the Center for Theology and Ethics in Catholic Health.

The rites and symbols of the liturgy are not arbitrary ceremonies but the means through which Catholics encounter God and are formed in faith, Pope Leo XIV said June 3.