Pope, addressing conductor Muti and concert performers, speaks of importance of music

December 16, 2025

Pope Leo XIV has twice paid tribute to music in recent days.

On December 12, conductor Riccardo Muti received the 2025 Ratzinger Prize and conducted a Christmas concert in Paul VI Audience Hall featuring the Luigi Cherubini Youth Orchestra and the Guido Chigi Saracini Choir of the cathedral of Siena.

Pope Leo delivered an address in which he recalled Muti’s friendship with the late Pope Benedict and cited St. Augustine, who linked music “to the art of guiding the heart to God.”

On December 13, Pope Leo received artists who would perform at the Vatican’s annual Christmas concert later that day; in that second concert, pop artists performed at the Auditorium della Conciliazione in Rome.

“Music is born from everyday life, accompanying our movements, our memories and our hardships: it is a shared diary that preserves everyone’s feelings—nostalgia, desire, expectation, bewilderment, rebirth—recounting our journey with simplicity and, at the same time, in a profound way,” Pope Leo said.

“Christmas, after all, reminds us that God chooses a human setting to reveal himself. He does not use impressive scenery, but a simple home; he does not show himself from afar, but draws near; he does not remain in an inaccessible place in heaven, but reaches us in the very heart of our little stories,” the Pope continued. “In this way, he reveals to us that everyday life—just as it is—can become the place where we encounter him.”

The funds raised at the December 13 concert will assist a Salesian missionary initiative in the Republic of the Congo.

 

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Further information:

• Christmas Concert conducted by Maestro Riccardo Muti (Dicastery for Communication - Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 12/12/25)
• To Promoters and Artists of the “Christmas Concert” (Dicastery for Communication - Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 12/13/25)