[Editor’s Note: These are the third excerpts of a two-part interview between Pope Leo XIV and Crux Senior Correspondent Elise Ann Allen contained in her new biography of the pontiff,  León XIV: ciudadano del mundo, misionero del siglo XXI, or “Leo XIV: Citizen of the World, Missionary of the XXI Century.” The book is published in Spanish by Penguin Peru and will be available for purchase in stores and online Sept. 18. English and Portuguese editions will be available in early 2026.]

Allen: Shifting direction a bit, running and reforming the Roman Curia is also something that you are responsible for. Pope Francis carried out many reforms, he got Predicate Evangelium done, but there is still some unfinished business. What will your approach be to reform? What will you continue, and what might you do differently?

Pope Leo: I think that the basic inspiration of Predicate Evangelium is valid and very important, in that it has presented a renewed understanding of the Holy See, the Roman Curia, as being at the service of both the ministry of the pope and also of the local bishops. It has to be available in both ways. Many, many bishops have said to me, already from the time when I was in the Dicastery for Bishops, that when they would come to Rome, they were petrified. What am I being called to Rome for? What’s the problem? Instead of understanding that the Holy See is here to help them, to serve them.

So, beginning with that as a basic understanding, and that we are here as part of the mission to preach the Gospel, what the title [Predicate Evangelium] itself says. I think significant amount of work went into trying to find the way to organize the institution of the Holy See, to place the Holy See at the service of others. Now, as in any human organization, there are positive things and there are things that need to be improved. I think there will be some questions about Predicate Evangelium, some of the decisions that were made that might probably need some adjustment at some point, but also very important in this process is to continue to look at how we in the Holy See are serving others and what we can do to improve that.

One of the specific issues which I hope to begin working on in the very near future is continuing to break down or transform the isolated manner in which each Dicastery works. There are many issues in the Holy See, in the Church, that are not just the purview of one Dicastery. The lack of dialogue, of instruments of communication, between the different Dicasteries has at times been of great limitation and harm to the government of the church. So, I think that there is an issue there of, someone used the expression ‘a silo mentality’. Well, ‘my Dicastery is the Dicastery of Bishops, and we see this, and I don’t want to talk to anyone else. Consecrated Life is Consecrated Life’, and that. There are many, many issues in the Church that actually touch on the areas of responsibility of two or three or four or more Dicasteries. We have to find a way to bring people together to talk about that.

Predicate Evangelium provides the base for that, the groundwork, and it has begun to happen. I can remember, in my two years, we would call for the prefects from a couple of different Dicasteries, ‘come on over, we want to talk about this or that’, and we were doing that already. But I remember someone who’s been here for years saying to me, ‘I never had a meeting with another dicastery in 20 years’ or something like that. I thought, ‘you’re kidding’. So, some of that stuff is beginning already, but I want to find a way to formalize the vehicle that will make that happen more easily. That means, of course, bringing people together, let’s talk to each other, the prefects and the secretaries.

Regarding the financial situation of the Holy See, you mentioned previously that it’s not as bad as it’s sometimes been made out to be. Can you explain why that is? What is the financial situation of the Holy See, and how are you planning to manage it?

I don’t know how I’m going to handle it yet, but I’m getting some clear ideas. There are a number of different financial units that make up the entire reality of the Holy See, of the Vatican. Several of those financial units are doing quite well. APSA [the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See] just published their 2024 financial report and for the year they report a positive result of over 60 million euros. Why are we crying about a crisis? APSA is one of the primary financial supporters of the work of the Holy See.

There are a lot of employees in this outfit, so there are salaries to be paid. There is a pension fund that does have to be looked at. I don’t know of any country in the world that’s not crying about ‘our pension fund is going to go broke in 30 years or 20 years’. That’s a universal issue that has to be looked at and can be dealt with. But you don’t say we’re in a crisis today and then say what are we going to do? You make a plan and say, how are we to respond to that?

There was a serious crisis during the time of the pandemic because one of the most significant sources of income for the Vatican comes through the Vatican Museums. The past several years, praise God, people are traveling again. There are more tourists in Rome this year. There are things going on that have made a significant turnaround in some of the issues that have been causes of concern in the past. Everything that I might have in this pocket doesn’t always get over to this pocket, and we have to learn to work together in a positive way also within the Holy See, within the Vatican.

We have to avoid the kinds of bad choices that were made in recent years. There was great publicity given to the purchase of this building in London, Sloane Avenue, and how many millions were lost because of that. I think during Francis’ time already, significant steps were taken to put new checks and balances, controls, on what the financial operation would look like, how it would work. There have been some very positive things in that respect, so the results are showing.

I’m not saying we can relax and say the crisis is over. I don’t think the crisis is over, I think we have to continue to work on this, but I’m not losing sleep over it, and I think that it’s important that we communicate a different message. I had a meeting with the Council of the Economy, which was another structure that Francis created to have greater oversight over these different entities. They agreed with me, they said part of our problem has been communications, and that the Vatican has oftentimes given the wrong message, which certainly doesn’t inspire people to say, ‘oh, I’d like to help you’, [but rather], ‘I’ll keep my money, because if you’re not going to administer properly, why should I give you more money?’

So, I’m not just changing the message to change the message. After having studied some of these questions over the past couple of years, I’ve been on a couple of the different councils since I’ve been here, things are going to be okay, but we do have to continue the process of reform that Francis began.

In terms of the clerical abuse crisis, we’ve spoken about this already, but at a more general level there is still a perception that while the church has new laws targeting abuse and coverup, they are not being implemented, and victims are still largely left in the dark about the process, they are seen as not having any rights. You mentioned previously that you have already initiated a study to determine why canonical cases take so long, but at a general level, how can the church do better in this regard? What is your strategy for responding to the clerical abuse crisis?

There are obviously some serious issues, and this is one of the questions in terms of the protection of minors and how to respond to the crisis. I think this is a real crisis, the other one not so, finances, that the church has to continue to address because it’s not solved. This will continue to take time because victims must be treated with great respect and with an understanding that those who have suffered very deep wounds because of abuse, sometimes carry those wounds for their entire life. It would be naive for myself or for anyone to think that while we gave them some kind of financial settlement, or we dealt with the cause and the priest has been dismissed, as if those wounds are just going to go away because of that.

So, first and foremost, an authentic and deep sensitivity and compassion to the pain, the suffering that people have endured at the hands of church ministers, whether that be priests, or bishops, laity, religious, men or women, catechists, et cetera. That’s an issue that is with us, and I think it needs to be treated with deep respect.

At the same time, one of the complicating factors in this, and where people are beginning to speak out more and more: the accused also have rights, and many of them believe that those rights have not been respected. Statistics show that well over 90% of people who come forward and make accusations, they are authentically victims. They are telling the truth. They are not making this up. But there have also been proven cases of some kind of false accusation. There have been priests whose lives have been destroyed because of that.

Law exists, and we can talk about civil law or church law, but the law exists to protect the rights of all people. In order to have, as much as possible, a reliable system of justice that respects the rights of all, that takes time. So, one of the things that many victims do comment upon is, why do these processes take so long? Well, we live in Italy, I lived in Peru, even in the United States, many processes that go into the courts take years and years, and that’s just a fact. The fact that the victim comes forward and makes an accusation and the accusation presumably is accurate, that does not take away the presumption of innocence. So, the priests also have to be protected, or the accused person has to be protected, their rights have to respected. But even saying that at times is cause of greater pain for the victims.

So, we’re in kind of a bind there. The church certainly has tried to make new legislation that would both speed up the process, would respect especially the issues that I was speaking of earlier, the victims and their pain and their right to have that pain recognized in some kind of response from the church, but at the same time the respect of the accused. The protection of the rights of the accused party is also an issue.

There is something that has also become more and more common, in terms of victims looking for healing and wanting to come forth and to speak about their pain, and that I think is very healthy for them. But the Church hasn’t always found the best way to handle, to process, that with them. So, there are challenges in that. I think that many of us are perhaps still novices learning about what is the best way to accompany these people in their pain. I think there is one of the areas where we continue to need the help of professionals to assist us with that and to accompany the victims.

I think that Pope Francis had some very good insight into this issue. He recognized the importance of the issue, but at the same time recognized that the issue of sexual abuse cannot become the center focus of the Church. The Church has a mission. People along the way have been deeply hurt and we will try to attend to them as best we can and accompany them, and they are part of the church as well, those who still wish to be. I know people who have abandoned the church because of the pain that they suffered, and their choice has to be respected.

At the same time the church also has a mission to preach the Gospel, and thanks be to God, the vast majority of people who are committed to the church, priests, and bishops, religious, have never abused anyone. So, we can’t make the whole church focus exclusively on this issue, because that would not be an authentic response to what the world is looking for in terms of the need for the mission of the church.

That’s a really difficult thing to care for, because someone who has had their lives oftentimes deeply wounded or even destroyed by sexual abuse, only can feel that. That’s where we need to respect them and accompany them. There are many other people in the Church who also have a right to be accompanied in whatever they are living and experiencing, and the Church has to be with them as well. It’s one more of the many challenges that I’m trying to find a way to deal with.