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Pope Leo XIV Launches Mental Health Prayer Intention for October
Confirmed
In Short: Pope Leo XIV has launched a prayer intention for October, focusing on mental health and urging the faithful to support those struggling with mental disorders.
In a video released Oct. 1, Pope Leo said, “Melancholy, bad character, confusion of senses — today, we understand that behind these old labels lies a deep, silent suffering not only of those affected by mental disorders but also of their loved ones and their communities,” according to EWTN News.
The Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network describes the intention as an effort to make the Church an “open house” where people facing mental health challenges find welcome, dignity, and hope.
Father Charles Sikorsky, president of Divine Mercy University, said Pope Leo’s first encyclical, “Magnifica Humanitas,” can be “of tremendous importance” to the practice of psychology in addressing AI's impact on mental health.
Pope Leo also prayed that the Church may become a “safe space where everyone has a place — a community that accompanies and never excludes, that listens without judging and draws near without fear.” He also remembered those who provide care, including professionals, family members, and volunteers, asking God to give them strength and compassion.
According to data from the World Health Organization, more than a billion people worldwide live with a mental disorder, while public spending on mental health accounts for barely 2% of health budgets.
Father Cristóbal Fones, international director of the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network, noted that many people experiencing mental illness have felt unable to speak about it, or have encountered judgment and misunderstanding.
The Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network invites the faithful and people of good will to pray that the Church may become an open house, able to accompany without judging and without casting aside anyone who bears a mental health condition.
The global average of mental health professionals is only 13 per 100,000 inhabitants, with enormous inequalities between countries: high-income countries devote $65 per person annually to this area, compared with just a few cents in low-income countries.
Numerous ecclesial institutions already accompany this reality: mental health ministries, Catholic universities, support and recovery groups, parishes, and communities of support.
Pope Leo’s prayer intention is also a call to personal action to consume water responsibly and moderately, according to the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network, which is encouraging people to do what they can to take shorter showers, fix leaks, turn off faucets not in use, and to avoid polluting drains and rivers.
What this adds
The Pope's intention responds to a reality confirmed by international data.
The Pope's Worldwide Prayer Network recalls that numerous ecclesial institutions already accompany this reality.
What's confirmed
- Pope Leo’s prayer intention for the month of October is for the mental health ministry.
- Today we bring before you our brothers and sisters who struggle with challenges to their mental health, who suffer in solitude with anxiety, depression, or any other mental illness.
- Forgive us for the times we have looked the other way, feeding the stigma and discrimination of persons with mental illnesses.
- More than a billion people worldwide live with a mental disorder, while public spending on mental health accounts for barely 2% of health budgets, according to data from the World Health Organization, presented in September 2025.
- He prays that the Church may become “a safe space where everyone has a place — a community that accompanies and never excludes, that listens without judging and draws near without fear.” The pope also remembered those who provide care, including professionals, family members and volunteers, asking God to give them strength and compassion.
- Holding a holy card of Saint Dymphna — patroness of people suffering from mental disorders, anxiety and depression, and also of mental health professionals — Leo XIV begins his prayer in the Pope Video this month by addressing the “God of life”, who knows the innermost depths of the human heart and those “ silent wounds ” that so often go unseen by anyone.
What's still developing
- Pope Leo XIV hugs a child as he rides through the Lluís Companys Olympic Stadium in Barcelona on Tuesday, June 9, for a prayer vigil.
- “Catholic mental health ministry is not about diagnosing, prescribing, or treating. We accompany those walking a difficult road and help them encounter their God-given dignity,” he explained.
- During the Prayer Vigil with young people in Barcelona, on June 9, 2026, in response to a young woman who had shared her experience with depression, the Pontiff observed that it is important to become aware of how mental health is increasingly threatened in the context of societies that consider themselves advanced, and warned that this is a sign that something is profoundly wrong with a certain idea of progress that subjects people to pressures, expectations and tensions that compromise “fundamental balances”.
- Pope Leo prays that the Church becomes increasingly a place to help.
- What began in Caracas, Venezuela, in 2005 as a simple initiative inspired by children praying the Rosary has, with ACN’s support, grown over more than 20 years into a worldwide movement of prayer for peace and unity.
- The Pope is not only joining the children in prayer on October 1; with his appeal at Lourdes in France, he has extended the invitation to pray the Rosary for peace throughout October to the whole Church.
- ACN had invited the Holy Father to join children in praying the Rosary for peace and unity and had also proposed bringing this appeal for prayer to the wider Church.
- On October 1, Pope Leo XIV will pray the Rosary with hundreds of children gathered at the Lourdes Grotto in the Vatican Gardens, spiritually united with children, families, schools, parishes and Christian communities around the world.
- The worldwide ACN campaign will take place from October 1 to 7, culminating on the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary.
- Registration helps to make visible the extraordinary worldwide chain of prayer and to show how children and communities from different countries and continents are united in the same intention for peace.
- Join the worldwide prayer and register your participation here.
- For both of his Octobers as pope, Leo XIV has made a special appeal to make this month a time to begin or renew our devotion to the Rosary, prayed especially for the intention of peace.