The longest journey of the pontificate (to date) for Leo
Included in that part of the world, Latin America, which the USA has always considered, albeit with different accents, its backyard. Robert Prevost voted in his county of origin, an area that has always been ultra-democratic (even though he had also signed up for the Republican primaries as a young man), and this gesture certainly created a strong impact on the American Catholic electorate, which this time seems to have turned its back on Donald Trump, who had instead benefited from broad consensus in the presidential elections.
Leone flies to Uruguay, Argentina and Peru: while in Montevideo - the capital of a highly stable country, considered perhaps the most European of all - there is a progressive president, in Buenos Aires and Lima there are two presidents who were and perhaps still are somewhat of Trump's fans, and were the terminals of the long arm of foreign policy defined as the "Donroe Doctrine", the Trumpian evolution of the now dated Monroe Doctrine of 1823, according to which south of the border only Washington can have weight and influence (after all, one of Trump's first acts was to have the dictator Maduro arrested in Venezuela).
This is the political context of the beginning of Leo's sixth apostolic journey - from 6 to 17 November - who will avoid making judgments (the Cardinal Secretary of State, Pietro Parolin, said that certainly something will change and that he hopes for peace and collaboration) but perhaps he will say something about what happened in America, especially in relation to the wars, between those unleashed and those never resolved despite the bombastic and ridiculous announcements. For some observers, this trip could be the trigger of a new political phase in the Latin American continent.
A return for Prevost to the places, in Peru, that saw him as a missionary and bishop: over the course of the twelve days, Leo XIV will deliver 36 speeches, all in Spanish, the language that will accompany the meetings with the communities and authorities of the three countries.
The last Pope to visit Uruguay and Argentina was John Paul II. He went to Argentina in 1982 and 1987, on the occasion of World Youth Day. He arrived in Uruguay in 1987 and returned in 1988. The Polish Pontiff also visited Peru in 1985 and 1988, while Francis went there in 2018. For Leo XIV, who spent a significant part of his priestly and episcopal life in the Andean country, the return takes on a personal and pastoral significance.
The journey will begin on Friday 6 November in Uruguay, a country with a strong secular identity, but with deep Christian roots, recalls Vatican News.
In Montevideo, the meeting with the authorities in Plaza Independencia, a symbolic place in national history, will offer the opportunity to reflect on coexistence, social cohesion and the responsibility of building a community capable of recognizing the dignity of each one. The Uruguayan capital, home of Mercosur, also recalls the challenges shared by the countries of the region, from environmental protection to arms and drug trafficking.
The Argentine stage will open on Sunday 8 November, where he will meet President Javier Milei, who in the electoral campaign that elected him had repeatedly insulted Pope Bergoglio, who however received him in the Vatican months after the election. The Argentine leader was and is one of the terminals of Trumpian politics, like the Bolsonaro state in Brazil.
In the cathedral of the capital there is also a moment of homage to the memory of Pope Francis - who in twelve years of pontificate never went to his country of origin, despite vague promises - in a place that preserves a testimony of his bond with the Argentine Church. The country, marked by a painful history but also by its capacity for hospitality and democratic reconstruction, will offer the Pope the opportunity to address the relationship between faith, social responsibility and the common good.
The last part of the pilgrimage will be dedicated to Peru: here too there is an iron Trumpian president, Keiko Fujimori Higuchi, daughter of the former president Alberto Fujimori, who served years in prison for a self-coup. But for Leo this is a true homecoming: from Lima to Chiclayo, from Cusco to Pucallpa, Leo XIV will find places and communities that he knows deeply.
It will also be a journey into the history of evangelization of the continent, marked by the testimony of figures such as Saint Rose of Lima, Saint Martín de Porres and Saint Toribio de Mogrovejo, promoter of the diffusion of the catechism in the indigenous Quechua and Aimara languages.
But Peru will also be the place in which some of the great contemporary issues - social inequalities, the protection of peoples and the environment, the exploitation of natural resources and the consequences of technological transformations on people's lives - can emerge with particular force. Themes which, as illustrated during the briefing, may find a reference in the encyclical Magnifica humanitas, especially in the relationship between faith and science, charity and technology.
