ShareLife is more than a collection

Editor’s note: the following is the homily delivered by Cardinal Frank Leo at the Aug. 22 ShareLife Anniversary Mass at St. Michael’s Cathedral Basilica in Toronto. The special Mass marked 50 years of service by the charitable fundraising arm of the Archdiocese of Toronto.

Dear brothers and sisters, it’s so wonderful to see so many of you here on a Saturday morning coming to pray, worship God, open up our hearts to receive the gifts that our Heavenly Father wishes to deposit in our souls and our families so that we may live the abundant life evermore.

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In a very special way, the liturgical celebration today, the Queenship of Mary, is exactly one week after the Assumption of Our Lady. That is a dogma; that is a solemnity where we celebrate Our Lady. The end of her life on Earth was assumed, brought to Heaven, body and soul. The glorification of her body and soul in Heaven.

One week later, her crowning as Queen of Heaven and Earth. Vatican II’s document on the Church says it this way, “Mary was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory and exalted by the Lord as Queen over all things.” That’s a powerful statement. As Queen over all things, she might be more fully conformed to her Son.

So she is Queen because she is uniquely conformed to Jesus, both on Earth and in Heaven. And that’s the vocation of every Christian, to be conformed to Christ. And she is Queen, not like earthly queens that we are used to, where it’s about wealth, and it’s about prestige. She is Queen in a unique way.

She is Queen because her Son is the King. Christ came to preach and inaugurate the Kingdom of God, which finds itself present in the Church as a seed that keeps growing more and more and finds its fulfillment in Heaven. So Christ is the King, but the kingship of Christ is marked, is interwoven, unlike earthly kingdoms.

The kingship, the kingdom of Christ, is interwoven by humility, service and love. When Christ reigns in our hearts, on our hearts, in our families, communities, institutions, agencies, it’s about serving, it’s about helping, it’s about loving, and Mary is queen in that service to God for the sake of humanity and their needs.

She is queen of love who lives as a gift of herself to us. Maybe 12 years ago or so, Pope Benedict XVI asked the question, “How does the Blessed Virgin Mary exercise her queenship of love and service?” So queenship of love and service, how does she exercise that right now? And he says, “By watching over us, her children.”

The children who turn to her in prayer to thank her or to ask her for her motherly protection and her heavenly help, perhaps after having lost their way or when we are oppressed by suffering or anguish because of the vicissitudes of life. That’s how she is queen. She watches over us, to all of her children who go to her in their time of need.

The beauty of it is Christ the King, Our Lady the Queen, but you know, when we were baptized, therefore reborn, the moment of our baptism, we were incorporated into Jesus and through Him into His church, His new family, the Church, the body of Christ. And we participate, each and every one of us, in Jesus’ three roles as priest, prophet and king.

And in that king part, the royal part, the royal household, the royal family, which is the Church, each and every one of us has a role to play to strengthen and to spread the kingdom of God here on Earth. Following the teachings of Jesus and the example of Mary, a kingship of love, of service and humility.

For 50 years, ShareLife has done that. For half a century, the Church, in a very unique way, thanks to Archbishop Pocock and his prophetic gesture, has been spreading the kingdom of God among us. ShareLife is more than just a collection taken up for agencies and ministries. It’s how we strengthen and spread the kingdom of God.

It is a manner of being. It is a way of reaching out. We’re called to build, strengthen and spread the kingdom. ShareLife has been doing that and has called us forward to be those wonderful agents of transformation in the lives of many people over many, many years. Share life, that’s what we do, which means we share our thoughts with people.

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We think of those who are in need. That’s good, but not good enough. We love. We put affection in it. We love them, especially those who are suffering, because that’s what Christ did. And then we actually do something about it. We share our thoughts, we share our heart, we share our commitments, we share what we have with them.

We spread and strengthen and build the kingdom of God And we’ve been caring for people and upholding the dignity of human life from the womb to the tomb for half a century. We become the hands, the heart, the feet, the lips, the eyes, the feet of Jesus for those persons and those families and those communities who are suffering

And what ShareLife does, what God through ShareLife does in support to over 40 agencies and groups, and what the generous communities and the donors and so many among you here today, with magnanimity, which means with a big heart, have reached out to others in reaching down into your pockets to help, to serve, to love, to minister, to be like Christ.

It is a way of living out our faith with commitment, with responsibility, with generosity. We make a gift of our hearts, of our lives when we are united with those who suffer. It’s a lot more than just a pious thought, “Wouldn’t it be nice to help people?” Or take out the pen and I’m going to write a cheque. In between that, there is (the thought) that they are our brothers and sisters.

We love them, we care about them, we take care of them, we care for them because Jesus said so, out of the love for Jesus. There’s a big difference between helping someone because it’s a nice thing to do on a humanitarian philanthropic level. But to do it out of love for Jesus brings it up here. Because of the Lord, out of love for Jesus, I will love, I will forgive, I will serve, I will give out of love for Jesus.

That’s the motivation. Members of His body and the Church, the community, the family that Jesus established have always taken care of the needy. From when our blessed Lord said, in Chapter 25 of St. Matthew: I was hungry, you gave me to eat. I was naked, you clothed me. I was thirsty, you gave me to drink. I was in prison, you visited me. You welcomed me. You took care of me. From that moment on 2,000 years ago, the disciples of Christ have done that. And we, in 2026, continue to do that through ShareLife. We take care of one another. We’re a family, and families take care of each other, especially those in need.

Think of our own families: the young people, the kids growing up on the one spectrum, and the other side, the elderly and the sick who need help. We don’t abandon them. We take care of each other. And from that moment that Jesus uttered those blessed words, “You did it to me. You did it to them, you did it to me,” He identified Himself with the lonely, and the struggling, and the outcast, and the poor, and the suffering, and the sick, and the homeless.

He identified Himself with them. We do it to them; we’re doing it to Him. Imagine that. Do we have the eyes of faith to see Jesus in that person? The heart of Jesus to love that person, at times, not always lovable on a human level? It takes supernatural vision, we call that faith, supernatural heart and divine love to be able to see Jesus and help Jesus in them.

We’ve been doing that for 50 years, and we need to praise the Lord and thank Him for allowing us to do that. So since Jesus said those words, “You did it to me,” to the Acts of the Apostles when they’re saying, “We need to figure stuff out here because we’re preaching and teaching,” but we’re neglecting the orphans and the widows and the strangers, the generosity of people bringing to the apostles what they had, taking care of one another, to then the Church fathers at the beginning of the first century setting up hospices and hospitals and caring for the stranger, the pilgrim, the sick, the dying. This is the beginning of the Church.

In the Middle Ages, monasteries, where we went not only to worship God, but where the poor and the stranded and the sick went, and the monks and the nuns took care of them, through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and modern times, religious orders came up. God had emerged from His community, from the believers, men and women, oftentimes religious brothers and sisters and priests of religious orders to take care.

We’ve benefited here as well from the beginning of this archdiocese of that wonderful presence of the religious who’ve taken care of education, social services and health, and continue to do so today. And our parishes have been so generous, and donors have been so generous. Only God really knows our heart and the generosity that we give.

And He, as Jesus said, our Heavenly Father who sees in the secret of our hearts, will reward us for what we do for Him and for His children. And so, my dear brothers and sisters, we honour together now the past, and we continue the mission forward. Fifty years right now is a moment to give thanks and praise, show gratitude to the Lord who’s put that desire in our heart, show gratitude to the many donors and communities who have been extremely generous out of love for the Lord and love for the Lord’s family, His children and the generations of parishioners and the supporters, clergy, religious, volunteers, Catholic schools, agencies, staff, communities who continue the mission.

All of us here today continue the mission. How small or big, it has got to come from the heart. We think about them, we help them, but we love them first. We love them in Christ and for Christ. And so we today continue; God through us continues to shape lives, transform families and give those who are in need a second chance.

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In doing so, we strengthen, spread and build up the kingdom of Jesus after the example of Our Lady. 

Praise be to Jesus Christ, now and forever.

A version of this article appeared in the September 27, 2026 issue of The Catholic Register with the headline "ShareLife is more than a collection".