Traditionally celebrated on June 29th, Saints Peter and Paul, the Pope’s Charity Day, legacy of the traditional Saint Peter’s Pence, in 2026 it was moved to today, the previous Sunday, except in the Diocese of Rome, where the 29th is still a public holidaythe feast of the patron saints falling there.
The Church in Italy participates in this event by allocating the offerings collected during the Eucharistic Celebrations to the Holy Father, for his intervention towards the neediest people and communities. «A propitious occasion», defines it Giuseppe Baturi, Archbishop of Cagliari and General Secretary of the CEI, in the letter to the Dioceses, «so that, through our small contribution, the caress of the Father can reach those who suffer».
“We are convinced that faith, to be authentic, must in fact translate into a love that is not satisfied, that does not confine itself to the perimeter of our needs, but that ‘overflows’, reaching the point of touching the wounds of the entire world”, writes Monsignor Baturi in a letter sent to all Italian parishes.
«As Churches in Italy and in communion with other Churches», concludes the General Secretary, «we renew our commitment to actively participate in this great plan of love, aware that our every concrete gesture is transformed into essential aid for many charitable works, in favor of people and families in extreme difficulty, populations devastated by wars or affected by natural disasters, communities that need urgent support in terms of health care and education».
The day refers to the tradition of St. Peter’s Pence, born in reference to the public life of Jesus, dedicated to the announcement of the Good News, who accepted material help to support himself with the apostles and help the needy. Not only that, in the apostolic journeys of Saint Paul the theme of giving and sharing represented, from the beginning, one of the themes of his preaching, soliciting collections in favor of the Mother Church of Jerusalem
This concrete participation in the needs of the community has taken different forms throughout history, bringing out the awareness that all the baptized are called to support, according to their possibilities, the work of evangelization and at the same time to help those most in need everywhere in the world.
«The Pence, as a donation to the Successor of Peter», we read in the Vatican sources on the history of this tradition, «dates back to the 7th century, with the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons, who, having been evangelized by the missionaries sent from Rome, had a strong bond of devotion towards the Pope and began to go on pilgrimage to Rome. Here the Schola Saxonum arose, a sort of pilgrim’s house for spiritual and material assistance to pilgrims. In order to maintain it, the Saxon sovereigns established a collection which, according to the first laws of the 11th century, was collected by family unit, on the days of the anniversary of the solemnity of the Saints of Peter and Paul, and then delivered to the Pope, who divided it in equal parts between the Holy See and the Schola. In the following centuries, with the adhesion to Christianity of other European peoples, it increasingly became a contribution of devotion, an expression of unity and co-responsibility in the Church”.
The situation changed with the end of the Papal State (1870) when: «In many countries the bond between Christian peoples and the Holy See changed. This also made Peter’s Pence acquire a completely new meaning, which has been handed down to the present day.
In Europe and overseas, a spontaneous movement of Catholics arose to spontaneously offer material help to the Pope, who began to allocate part of the Pence also to the care of the most suffering (for example the earthquake in Croatia in 1881)”.
