When the Pope Comes, Shouldn’t the Liturgy Rise?
Aurelio Porfiri
During the Lent of 2026 that we are currently experiencing, Pope Leo XIV has chosen to celebrate Sunday Mass in several parishes of his Diocese of Rome. For him this represents a first opportunity to visit various local realities of the Roman Church: to see the people, to meet parish communities, ordinary faithful, but also priests and all those who gravitate around the life of the parish.
In my opinion, however, the very reality of the parish today needs to be reconsidered. The parish may have made perfect sense a few decades ago as a religious presence rooted in a specific territory. Today, however, it seems far less effective, especially in cities such as Rome. Many of the people who live within parish territories come from elsewhere—often even from outside Italy—and no longer have the same attachment to a specific neighborhood that people once had. In the past the parish was naturally a point of reference for the local population. That situation has clearly changed.
For this reason I believe, and I do not think I am the only one, that the parish structure needs to be revisited. We must rediscover the importance of a religious presence within a territory, but one that is also adapted to the realities of our time. Today many people prefer not to attend their territorial parish but instead choose churches—sometimes even non-parish churches—where they feel more comfortable.
Returning to the parish visits of Pope Leo XIV, I listened to some fragments of these liturgies. I did not feel the need to listen to the entire Mass, but I heard several parts of the celebrations. What did not surprise me—note well, it truly did not surprise me—was the poor quality of the liturgical music performed during these celebrations.
I did not watch all the celebrations, but from the ones I did hear it almost felt as though we had returned to the 1970s. These Masses with guitars and similar elements were, frankly, rather depressing.
I say that I was not surprised because, knowing the reality in which we live, why should I be surprised? Yet there was one element that could have caused some surprise. What was this element?
