On May 26, 2025, Pope Leo XIV arrived for a surprise visit in St. Peter's Basilica at the end of the final Mass of the Jubilee Pilgrimage for Peace in Africa. The event was organized by 14 African ambassadors to the Holy See, bringing together about 250 participants. Speaking briefly to the pilgrims, the Pontiff emphasized the “great witness” that the African continent offers to the “whole world” and urged participants to be “signs of hope” for humanity.
On the occasion of Africa Day (celebrated on May 25), African diplomats accredited to the Holy See, as well as ambassadors to Italy and to the FAO, decided to organize a day of Jubilee pilgrimage to Rome dedicated to “hope for peace in Africa.”
Gabonese ambassador Eric Chesnel welcomed the help of many members of the African communities in the Italian capital, who passed through the Holy Doors of the basilicas of St. Paul Outside the Walls, St. Mary Major, and St. John Lateran during the day’s events.
Attended by clergy, religious, and laity
The nearly 250 pilgrims — priests, religious sisters, and laypeople — then made their way to St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. There, Cardinal Francis Arinze, prefect emeritus of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, presided over a final Mass at the altar of the Chair in the late afternoon.
Also present were two senior African officials of the Curia: Cardinal Peter Turkson, president of the Pontifical Academies of Sciences and Social Sciences, and the secretary of the Dicastery for Evangelization, Bishop Fortunatus Nwachukwu.
Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah had been invited but had to decline.
At the end of Mass, Pope Leo XIV made an appearance. Before individually greeting the pilgrims, the Pontiff spoke briefly in English, urging those present to seek the hope “that only Jesus Christ can give us.” He thanked the ambassadors for organizing the pilgrimage.
How important it is that each and every baptized person feel himself or herself to be called by God to be a sign of hope in the world today.
It is our faith that gives us strength. It is our faith that enables us to see the light of Jesus Christ in our lives and to understand how important it is to live our faith. Not only on Sundays, not only during a pilgrimage, but each and every day so that we will be filled with the hope that only Jesus Christ can give us and that all of us together will continue to walk united as brothers and sisters to praise our God; to recognize that everything we have and everything we are is a gift from God, and to place those gifts at the service of others.
I am very happy to be able to greet you all for just a very brief moment this afternoon, but to say to each and every one of you: Thank you for living your life, your faith in Jesus Christ.
The rest of his brief greeting can be read here.
Africa's “great witness”
The Pope also paid tribute to the “great witness that you are all giving and that the continent of Africa gives to the whole world,” a message that was greatly appreciated by the organizers.
“We are very touched that 10 days after his accession to the papacy, the Holy Father wanted to be here with us,” said Chesnel, the Gabonese ambassador.
“Africa is a continent that continues to experience problems of development and war. However, it’s also a source of essential resources for the Holy Church,” said the ambassador, highlighting the dynamism of African Catholicism.
“It’s a continent where faith is alive,” agreed Régis Kévin Bakyono, ambassador of Burkina Faso. He emphasized the “symbolic and pastoral” value of the Pope's visit to the event.
The Burkinabe diplomat believes that the Pontiff is referring to Africa's “spiritual vitality and sense of the sacred, social cohesion and family cohesion” and calling on Africans to “make this the catalyst for social change.”
“This is a real compass in a world that is sometimes disoriented,” he said.
The question of African representation in Rome
This meeting with the Pope, Éric Chesnel explains, is also important from the point of view of the “visibility” of African Catholicism in Rome. The only Africans currently in office at the Curia are Cardinal Turkson and Bishop Nwachukwu.
“This is important because the Catholic Church is universal,” insists his Burkinabe colleague Régis-Kévin Bakyono, who laments the lack of representation of “Africa's important human and spiritual resources.”
“Beyond the presence of African cardinals, it’s a question of giving signs of the Church's commitment to Africa in Rome,” says Chesnel. He also hopes that African religious sisters will be able to “follow in the footsteps of the women appointed to important positions by Pope Francis in recent years.”
The Gabonese ambassador also hopes that the “memory of African saints” will be given greater prominence by the Vatican. He highlights some positive developments, notably the appointment of apostolic nuncios of African origin, and says he is actively campaigning for more priests from the continent to be sent to the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy, the “school for nuncios.”
Another positive sign would be the allocation of a “national parish” for certain African countries in Rome, he said, explaining that he had made the request and was satisfied with the response he had received. (Currently, only three countries in Africa out of 54 — one in six — have national parishes in Rome: the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eritrea, and Ethiopia. By contrast, eight out of 35 countries in the Americas — nearly one in four — are represented. St. Patrick’s is the national parish in Rome for the United States.)
A trip to Africa for Leo XIV?
On May 16, several African ambassadors also expressed to the new pope their common wish that he “may quickly make a trip to the African continent,” reports Chesnel.
The Gabonese diplomat expects a trip “of at least two or three stops,” as is usually the case, and highlights three areas that are “particularly critical” in Africa: eastern DRC, the Horn of Africa, and Sudan.
“He may come to Gabon, or to one of our neighbors,” explains the ambassador, emphasizing above all the shared desire for an African apostolic pilgrimage expressed by him and his colleagues.
On a more personal note, the ambassador hopes that the pontiff will visit his country (where the last papal visit, by John Paul II, dates back to 1982). He adds that the current president, Brice Oligui Nguema, formally extended an invitation to the Pope during the inauguration ceremony of his pontificate on May 18.
Pope Francis made five trips to Africa throughout his papacy, during which he visited 10 countries.
