The Vatican on Friday released the program for the four-day visit, which includes stops in Paris, Lourdes, and Metz, and will be an opportunity to meet with those who have suffered abuse within the Church.
Pope Leo XIV will visit France from September 25 to 28, with the central part of his stay being a meeting with victims of clerical abuse. The travel itinerary, released by the Vatican on Friday, August 7, 2026, confirms that the Pope will personally meet with several victims, who will also participate in the preparation of the event. The exact time and place of the meeting will be announced later.
This meeting is part of Pope Leo XIV's ongoing commitment to addressing the issue of abuse within the Church. Recall that during his visit to Spain in June of this year, the Pope already met with six victims. In France, the problem is particularly acute, and according to a 2021 report, church personnel sexually abused approximately 330,000 children over a 70-year period.
Adding further weight to this issue is the recent appointment of French Bishop Thibault Verny to head the Vatican's advisory commission for the protection of children, which the Pope made last month.
The trip to France, confirmed back in May, is the Pope's fourth foreign visit this year. Earlier, he visited Monaco in March, four African countries in April, and Spain and the Canary Islands in June. In November, he is also expected to make his first visit to Latin America as pope, where he will tour Uruguay, Argentina, and Peru, the country where he served for more than three decades.
The visit to France begins on September 25 in Paris. The Pope will meet with President Emmanuel Macron at the Élysée Palace, followed by an address to representatives of the government, civil society, and the diplomatic corps. After that, he will deliver a speech at UNESCO headquarters. He will spend the evening in prayer at Notre-Dame Cathedral, and the day will conclude with a prayer vigil with young people at the national stadium.
The second day of the visit is dedicated to social inclusion. A visit is planned to the Maison Bakhita center, which focuses on social support and integration, where the Pope will meet with members of the synodal assembly discussing a greater role for laypeople in church affairs, as well as with individuals who have recently received the sacrament of baptism. His journey continues to Lourdes, a renowned Catholic pilgrimage site, where he will pray at the Grotto of Apparitions and speak with staff and patients at the Accueil Notre-Dame facility. The final part of his stay in Lourdes will feature the rosary prayer and a candlelight procession.
The visit will conclude on September 28 in Metz, a city near the borders with Luxembourg and Germany. There, he will join an interfaith gathering at a center named after Robert Schuman, the French statesman and one of the founders of the European community. Schuman, a Catholic, was declared a "Venerable Servant of God" in 2021, a step in the process toward his canonization.
This engagement by Pope Leo XIV in major European Christian centers differs from the approach of his predecessor, the late Pope Francis. During his twelve-year pontificate, Pope Francis largely avoided such visits. Although he visited France twice, he never made an official state visit to Paris. In 2014, he addressed the European Parliament and the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, and in 2023, he visited Marseille for a conference on migration.
