ENCYCLICAL FOR PROJECT HOPE SUNDAY

Protocol No.: 26/2026

ENCYCLICAL FOR PROJECT HOPE SUNDAY

Sunday of the Last Judgment

February 15, 2026

Let us not love in word or speech but in deed and in truth (1 John 3:18); for the Lord Himself declares, Truly, as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me (Matthew 25:40).

Beloved children in the Lord,

As we stand on the threshold of Great Lent, the Holy Church places before us the awe-inspiring Gospel of the Last Judgment. In it, the command of the Apostle and the voice of Christ Himself are joined as one: love must be real. Love must be embodied. Love must express itself in mercy.

Our Lord speaks with holy clarity: “I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you welcomed Me.” He does not speak in abstractions. He points to the concrete, the visible, the personal. He binds Himself to the suffering so completely that our response to them becomes our response to Him.

In this Gospel, heaven and earth meet in a single, searching question: Do you love?

There can be no separation between love of God and love of neighbor. As Saint John teaches, the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. The love we offer before the Holy Altar must continue beyond it. The Divine Liturgy must extend into our neighborhoods, into our communities, and into the quiet places where loneliness and hunger often go unseen.

For this reason, today we inaugurate the first-ever Project HOPE Sunday throughout the Metropolis of Chicago.

Project HOPE—Humanitarian Outreach and Philanthropic Engagement—is not merely a program. It is a common offering. Since 2020, through more than 150 distributions, we have served over 2.1 million meals and provided more than 3,000 nights of shelter. These are not simply numbers. They are faces. They are lives. In each act of mercy, Christ Himself was present.

In every meal served and in every night of shelter provided, the same question resounds: Do you love?

This special ministry has united our people across all six states of our Metropolis. Philoptochos members, our youth and young adults, parish council members, families, and faithful of every generation have served side by side. Today, as we partake in Project HOPE Sunday, we stand as one Body in Christ—one heart, one witness, one offering of love.

The Sunday of the Last Judgment reminds us that we will one day stand before Christ; Project HOPE Sunday invites us to stand with Him today—among the hungry, the poor, the sick, and the forgotten.

When we stand before the Lord, we will not stand alone, nor only among fellow believers, but together with the world He loves—with those we have served and those who have served us—bound not by achievement, but by mercy.

May Project HOPE Sunday deepen our unity and teach us to love in deed and in truth. For in loving our neighbor, we answer the Lord’s question—Do you love?—with our lives.

With paternal love and prayers,