Pope Leo XIV to journey 19,000 miles on 14 flights throughout journey to Peru, Argentina, and Uruguay

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ROME (OSV News) — Pope Leo XIV will journey greater than 19,000 miles on 14 flights throughout a November journey to Peru, Argentina and Uruguay, in keeping with the total schedule the Vatican launched Sept. 21.

The Nov. 6-17 journey would be the first papal go to to Latin America of Pope Leo’s preach and his longest worldwide journey up to now. Over 12 days, he’ll rejoice 9 public Masses, go to seven cathedrals and preside over two stadium prayer vigils. The journey culminates with a return to Chiclayo, Peru, the place he served as bishop from 2015 to 2023.

The journey begins Nov. 6 with a flight of greater than 14 hours and 6,900 miles from Rome to Montevideo, Uruguay. The return flight from Lima, Peru, to Rome covers 6,700 miles. In between, the pope will journey to a new destination nearly every day, together with a 2,200-mile flight from Buenos Aires to Lima and a navy helicopter flight Nov. 14 to the Andes mountain city of Santa Cruz de Succhabamba, Peru.

By comparability, Pope Leo traveled 11,000 miles over 11 days throughout his journey to Algeria, Cameroon, Angola and Equatorial Guinea earlier this 12 months.

In addition to the detailed schedule, the Vatican additionally launched the motto and emblem for every of the three international locations. 

Uruguay (Nov. 6-8): ‘I bring you news of great joy’

Uruguay would be the pope’s first cease. Christians make up 44% of the inhabitants, the bottom share in Latin America, in keeping with the Pew Research Center. It would be the first papal go to there since St. John Paul II’s in 1988.

The motto is drawn from the angel’s announcement to the shepherds of Bethlehem within the Gospel of Luke, “I bring you news of great joy.”

Pope Leo will go to Montevideo, the capital and largest metropolis; Paysandú, a cultural and financial hub on the border with Argentina; and Florida, dwelling to the National Sanctuary of Our Lady of the Thirty-Three. 

In Montevideo, he’ll go to the Metropolitan Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception and Sts. Philip and James and lead a prayer vigil at a stadium. He will rejoice an outside Mass in París Londres Park in Paysandú.

The emblem for the go to options Our Lady of the Thirty-Three, Uruguay’s patroness, reflecting the go to’s culminating second: a Mass on the National Sanctuary of Our Lady of the Thirty-Three on Nov. 8, the date of the annual nationwide pilgrimage there.

Argentina (Nov. 8-11): ‘Welcome everyone. Go and proclaim’

The second leg of the journey might be Argentina, the homeland of Pope Francis, who served as archbishop of Buenos Aires earlier than changing into pope, however by no means returned throughout his preach. About 58% of Argentine adults establish as Catholic, in keeping with Pew. St. John Paul II made the final papal go to in 1987, practically 4 many years in the past.

Pope Leo will go to Buenos Aires; Córdoba, the nation’s second-largest metropolis; and Luján, the place he’ll rejoice Mass on the Shrine of Our Lady of Luján, Argentina’s patroness and one in every of its main pilgrimage websites. 

He may even provide Mass within the middle of Buenos Aires on the Monument of the Spanish and pray with native Catholics within the capital metropolis’s Cathedral of the Most Holy Trinity, in addition to rejoice an outside Mass in on the grounds of the Military Aviation School in Córdoba, the place he may even go to the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Assumption.

The emblem exhibits a wreath of small, stylized human figures in shades of Argentine sky blue, representing a society the place everyone seems to be welcomed and nobody is excluded, with Christ on the middle. The Spanish motto, “Bienvenidos todos. Vayan y anuncien,” is supposed to precise openness, concord in range, encounter and proclamation, in keeping with the Vatican.

Peru (Nov. 11-17): ‘Let us open our hearts’

The closing and longest leg is a homecoming for Pope Leo in Peru, the place he first arrived as an Augustinian missionary in 1985. He was appointed apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Chiclayo in 2014 and later turned its bishop. He obtained Peruvian citizenship in 2015.

Pope Leo will go to Lima, the capital and largest metropolis; Chiclayo; Cusco, the previous Inca capital within the Andes; and Pucallpa, a metropolis on the Ucayali River within the Amazon rainforest that has lengthy been a middle of Catholic missionary outreach.

He will rejoice 4 Masses: at an open house close to the “Pampas de Pimentel” in Chiclayo; in Santa Cruz de Succhabamba, at an altitude of greater than 6,000 ft within the Andes; at a sports activities complicated in Pucallpa; and on the “Las Palmas Air Base” in Callao exterior of Lima.

The emblem exhibits Pope Leo surrounded by Peruvian saints, in entrance of a map of Peru enclosed in a big pink coronary heart. The saints depicted are St. Rose of Lima, St. Turibius of Mogrovejo, St. Martin de Porres, St. Francis Solano and St. John Macias. The coronary heart represents the motto, “Let us open our hearts,” an invite to open one’s coronary heart to God, to others and to the long run with hope, expressing welcome for the successor of St. Peter with religion, unity, and a missionary spirit.

Courtney Mares is Vatican editor for OSV News. Follow her on X @catholicourtney.