Pope Leo XIV returns to Peru on November 11 for the longest and most personal leg of his 12 day Latin America tour, to the country where he spent two decades as a missionary and bishop and where he is seen, in the words of one report, as a native son. Leo, who remains a Peruvian citizen, first arrived in the country in his 30s, served three stints there, and was Bishop of the coastal city of Chiclayo before his election as pope. The visit is being billed as a homecoming, and the welcome is expected to be enormous.
Why it matters
The itinerary in Peru is the fullest of the three countries. Leo will visit Lima, Chiclayo, Cusco and Pucallpa, travelling to the coast, the Andes and even the Amazon, and he will meet President Keiko Fujimori, the daughter of former Peruvian dictator Alberto Fujimori, on his very first day in Lima, on Wednesday, November 11. On November 13 he will return to Chiclayo, where he will celebrate Mass at the Pampas de Pimentel, a desert plain where as many as 1.5 million people are expected to gather. On November 15 he will fly to Cusco, landing at one of the highest altitude airports in the world at nearly 11,000 feet, and he will visit the Inca site of Saqsaywaman.
The final day, November 16, brings the largest crowd of all. Leo will meet with the elderly in the port city of Callao before celebrating a final Mass at Las Palmas Air Base in Lima, where estimates put the attendance at around 1.2 million people. He departs that day and arrives in Rome the day after. The motto for the Peru leg is Let us open our hearts, and the programme, which is very demanding and remains unchanged despite the pope illness, includes 12 flights, 40 speeches and no fewer than nine giant Masses across the three countries.
What happens next
The Peru leg is also the most politically charged. The country has cycled through eight presidents since 2016 amid impeachments, resignations and social unrest, and the meeting with Fujimori will be watched closely, because her father ruled the country with an iron fist for 10 years from 1990 to 2000. Leo, who became a Peruvian citizen during his years there, is seen by many Peruvians as one of their own, and that gives him a standing no visiting pope has had. It also gives him a responsibility: to speak to a country that has lost faith in its politics, without becoming part of it.
What happens next is the journey itself, and the crowds will be the measure of it. A pope who spent two decades in Peru, who speaks the language of the country and who holds its citizenship, is not a visitor. He is a returning son, and the welcome in Chiclayo, in Cusco and in Lima will show how much that matters. For the Vatican, the Peru leg is the heart of the tour. For Peru, it is a rare moment of unity in a divided decade, and a chance to be seen by the world as something more than its politics.
