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In an official document last Nov. 13, Pontiff Pope Leo XIV established the new body that will be tasked with promoting the pastoral care of “people of the sea.”
While there is no real Ministry of the Sea in Italy to date, the Church and the Vatican are thinking about it to be more far-sighted and close, at least on a spiritual level, to the seafaring people. In fact, it was Pope Leo XIV himself last Thursday, November 13, who established with an official document (chirograph) the so-called “Apostleship of the Sea” as a central body to coordinate all pastoral care activities aimed at the “people of the sea”: sailors, seafarers, families and all people whose lives are linked to navigation and fishing on seas, rivers and lakes.
In the same act, the Pontiff approved the Statute that regulates the functioning of the body, giving it legal personality within the Catholic Church.
The Church at the international level has long accompanied people of the sea, understood as seafarers, seafarers and their families. Even before 1900, several Catholic missionary initiatives existed to provide spiritual, social and material assistance to crews calling at ports in London, Bootle, Montreal, New York, New Orleans and Sydney. Already in France, in December 1894, the Augustinians of the Assumption had founded the “Society of the Works of the Sea” to provide medical, material, moral and religious assistance to seafarers from France and other nationalities, especially those engaged in deep-sea fishing off Iceland, on the shoals of Newfoundland, in the Faroe Islands.
Later, in the late 1890s, members of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul began regular ship visits to numerous ports in Great Britain. But it was not until the early 1920s, specifically in 1922, that the activity of the International Apostleship of the Sea, as we know it today, was officially approved by the Apostolic See.
Today in 2025 comes the establishment of the Apostleship of the Sea, a central and coordinating body which, as Pope Leo XIV himself pointed out, was born out of the “lively desire that the spiritual care of the Church in the area of the pastoral care of the sea may continue with enthusiasm and generosity.” According to the Statute, the Apostleship of the Sea enjoys public canonical juridical personality and is based within the Vatican City State. Canonically dependent on the Dicastery for the Service of Integral Human Development, it has a president elected by the General Assembly who cannot hold office for more than two terms.
At the level of tasks, the Apostleship of the Sea will coordinate the action of local pastoral realities established by the Bishops’ Conferences with maritime, river or lake territory, promoting the attention of the same Bishops’ Conferences and offering them pastoral orientations, formative opportunities, accompaniment and support to initiatives in favor of people and communities devoted to navigation, fishing and the care of the related environments.
In short, while waiting for the much infamous “Sea Plan” (here our concrete proposals) desired by the Italian government becomes effective and efficient on a practical level, for the time being sailors and mariners can at least count on spiritual support. And looking around, it takes a lot of it….
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