A pilgrim draped with an image of Pope Leo XIV is seen Oct. 4 2026, outside the Basilica of Our Lady of Luj\u00e1n in Argentina, on the outskirts of Buenos Aires, during an annual procession in honor of Our Lady of Luj\u00e1n. Pope Leo will celebrate Mass on the plaza in front of the basilica Nov. 11 during his apostolic journey to South America. He will visit Uruguay, Argentina and Peru Nov. 6-17. (OSV News photo\/Antonio Becerra Pegoraro, Reuters)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nPeace came second, while doctrinal issues, Church transparency and sexual abuse ranked lower. Only 49% considered the visit very or somewhat important, and 65% expected it to have little or no effect on their own religious practice \u2014 though approximately 57% of Argentines continue to identify as Catholic, and another 17% as evangelical.<\/p>\n
Roberto Bosca, a scholar of religion and public life and former dean of the law school at Austral University, said the bishops\u2019 attention to social questions is sometimes read as populist, Peronist or left-wing, particularly by a largely secularized middle class that believes they have displaced God with social activism.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the bishops\u2019 teaching is read without ideological blinders, it is Christ-centered,\u201d he told OSV News in Spanish. But in Argentina, he said, even Christian language about placing the needy at the center is frequently translated into partisan categories.<\/p>\n
On Nov. 9, Pope Leo will visit residents and caregivers at the Don Orione \u201cLittle Cottolengo\u201d in Claypole, a center serving people with disabilities. He will celebrate Mass in Buenos Aires for a crowd expected to surpass 1.5 million people, meet representatives of the world of work, address Christian and interreligious leaders, and celebrate vespers with the Argentine bishops and diocesan synodal teams.<\/p>\n
The following morning he will travel to C\u00f3rdoba, before returning to Buenos Aires for a youth vigil on Nov. 10. On his final day, before heading to Peru, he will visit the federal prison of Devoto and celebrate what organizers are calling the \u201cMass of Charity\u201d at the Basilica of Our Lady of Luj\u00e1n, the country\u2019s national Marian shrine.<\/p>\n
Unlike in neighboring Uruguay, where Pope Leo will enter the disadvantaged Montevideo neighborhood of Casavalle, the Argentine schedule includes no visit to one of Buenos Aires\u2019 villas, or informal settlements \u2014 places closely associated with Pope Francis\u2019 ministry.<\/p>\n
Instead, its encounters with vulnerability are distributed across a disability center, a prison, a meeting focused on labor and the Luj\u00e1n Mass, where organizations including Caritas and the Hogar de Cristo network for people struggling with addiction will receive priority among approximately 8,000 invited guests.<\/p>\n
Meeting with abuse survivors<\/h3>\n
The Vatican also has announced that Pope Leo will hold private meetings with survivors of abuse by clergy or other Church personnel during his three-country journey, without disclosing where.<\/p>\n
The announcement is particularly relevant in Argentina, where survivors continue to demand transparency and canonical accountability in cases including the abuse of deaf children at Mendoza\u2019s Antonio Pr\u00f3volo Institute and that of Bishop Gustavo Zanchetta, convicted by an Argentine court of abusing seminarians.<\/p>\n
OSV News confirmed that in October 2024 he was seen in his former Diocese of Or\u00e1n riding a fire truck while wearing clerical attire. There has been no public update on his canonical status.<\/p>\n
In\u00e9s Franck, a member of Argentina\u2019s commission for the protection of minors and a former Vatican consultant on the issue, said the region \u201cis developing its tools for prevention and care with little resources, because these are also countries going through financial and development crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n
There is still \u201cplenty of work to do, resistances to overcome, resources to optimize and practices to implement,\u201d she told OSV News, \u201cbut the meetings of the pope with the victims speak to us about the will of the Church not to look the other way and to be there where there was pain and there still is.\u201d<\/p>\n
C\u00f3rdoba will give the visit a more federal character. Located near Argentina\u2019s geographical center, the city is more accessible for pilgrims from the northern and interior provinces. It is also the land of St. Jos\u00e9 Gabriel del Rosario Brochero, the \u201cgaucho priest\u201d who traveled the Sierras of C\u00f3rdoba by mule, evangelizing isolated communities.<\/p>\n
Papal visit to the \u2018blessed land\u2019<\/h3>\n
Pope Leo will celebrate Mass at the Military Aviation School and meet clergy, religious, seminarians and lay pastoral workers at C\u00f3rdoba\u2019s cathedral.<\/p>\n
Cardinal \u00c1ngel Sixto Rossi of C\u00f3rdoba, described the visit as both a source of immense joy and of \u201chealthy fear\u201d because of the responsibility involved in receiving the pope and pilgrims from throughout the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cC\u00f3rdoba is not only \u2018La Docta,’\u201d Cardinal Rossi said, using the city\u2019s traditional title as Argentina\u2019s historic center of learning. \u201cIt is a blessed land, walked by saints who knew how to transform faith into service, closeness and self-giving.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a reflection submitted to OSV News, Cardinal Rossi described the visit as a sign of continuity with Pope Francis, but said the new pope would give it \u201chis own imprint.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe shepherd comes to meet his people, to confirm us in faith, renew our hope and give us a pat on the back so that we do not lose heart,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n
The visit will conclude at Luj\u00e1n, the shrine of Argentina\u2019s national patroness and one of the few religious spaces capable of gathering Argentines across social and political divisions.<\/p>\n
Authorities are preparing for as many as 1.7 million people in a city of approximately 95,000 residents. Access roads will begin closing the day before the Mass, 1,500 extraordinary ministers are expected to distribute Communion, and Buenos Aires province plans to deploy about 11,000 police officers and cadets. The original 17th-century image of Our Lady of Luj\u00e1n will be brought out of the basilica for the celebration.<\/p>\n
Political rivals working hand in hand on papal visit organization<\/h3>\n
Organizing the event required cooperation among Milei\u2019s national government, the provincial administration of Axel Kicillof \u2014 one of the president\u2019s principal political opponents and Peronist governor of Buenos Aires \u2014 the local municipality and church authorities.<\/p>\n
The papal visit has obliged competing political sectors to work together before Pope Leo has spoken a word.<\/p>\n
If anything connects people divided by harsh polarization, it\u2019s the local Church\u2019s most revered shrine.<\/p>\n
Father Lucas Garc\u00eda, rector of Argentina\u2019s major Marian shrine, said devotion to Our Lady of Luj\u00e1n reaches Argentines who rarely take part in Church life but may still carry a family photograph, a promise or a prayer inherited from their grandparents.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn an Argentina that often experiences divisions, differences and difficulty encountering one another, the Virgin remains a point of unity,\u201d he told OSV News.<\/p>\n
\u201cLuj\u00e1n is much more than a place of pilgrimage,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is a home where Argentines can recognize one another as brothers and sisters.\u201d<\/p>\n
Different sectors will inevitably try to fit the pope\u2019s words and gestures into their familiar divisions. But for four days, his itinerary will also invite the country to meet outside those categories: alongside people with disabilities, workers, prisoners, young people, pilgrims and the Virgin whom Argentines call their mother.<\/p>\n
Whether that encounter lasts beyond the crowds will determine whether the visit becomes merely a historic event \u2014 or, as Cardinal Rossi hopes, leaves Argentina with \u201ctasks for the heart.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
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