‘Argentina awaits’: Pope Leo XIV's visit confirmed, seven million expected

Argentina is preparing what the government describes as the largest security operation in the country’s history for Pope Leo XIV’s November visit, with authorities expecting around seven million people to attend events in Buenos Aires, Córdoba and Luján.

The 120-hour operation will involve three jurisdictions, three airports, four large public events and 11 closed-door activities, according to Security Minister Alejandra Monteoliva, who said a unified command would be in operation during the pontiff’s stay.

The Pope’s visit, which runs from November 8 to 11, will be an “apostolic” journey, said officials from President Javier Milei’s government, stressing that it is being organised primarily as a pastoral trip.

It will be the first papal visit to Argentina since 1987, Pope John Paul II’s second visit. 

Leo’s predecessor Pope Francis, an Argentine born Jorge Bergoglio who became pontiff in 2013 and died last year, never returned to his homeland during his papacy.

The Vatican formally released Leo XIV’s detailed itinerary on Monday, announcing details as part of a wider November 6-17 trip to Uruguay, Argentina and Peru. 

It will be Leo’s first visit to Latin America as pope. The American pontiff, who was born in Chicago and is also a naturalised Peruvian citizen, spent more than two decades working in Peru.

 

‘Enormous joy’

Officials in the Milei administration hailed confirmation of the visit. Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno said the Government had received the announcement “with enormous joy.”

“Holy Father, Argentina awaits you,” he said at a press conference Monday at the Casa Rosada attended by Monteoliva, Holy See official Apostolic Nuncio Monsignor Michael Wallace Banach and the head of the Argentine synod, Monsignor Marcelo Colombo.

Quirno said the visit had “a very special significance” for the government and was the result of months of dialogue with the Holy See and the Argentine Church, following an invitation from President Milei.

“Our objective is very clear: that the Pope can fully fulfil his pastoral vision and that Argentines can receive him and take part in this visit in an orderly and safe manner,” he said.

Officials said the four-day visit will combine institutional, pastoral, social, ecumenical and interfaith engagements, with the government stressing its essentially apostolic and pastoral character.

Qurino said the government had understood from the outset that the trip should be “above all an apostolic visit, a visit by the Holy Father to the Argentine people with its own pastoral dimension,” with the state respecting the trip’s religious nature.

Monteoliva said the scale of the security operation reflected the expected turnout of the Catholic faithful.

“This is the largest security operation of our history,” she said, describing a deployment involving the national government, Buenos Aires City government, Buenos Aires Province government and Córdoba Province government.

The three jurisdictions will coordinate the operation across the three cities and airports involved, with four mass events, 11 closed events and a unified command operating continuously for 120 hours.

Quirno said the challenge was to allow as many faithful as possible to be close to the Pope while ensuring safety and order.

“This is an event of a very, very large scale,” he said. “We expect a combined capacity of seven million people.”

 

Milei and Mass

According to the Vatican itinerary, Pope Leo will arrive at Jorge Newbery Airport in Buenos Aires at 4.30pm on Sunday, November 8, flying in from Montevideo.

After an official reception, he will visit the Monument to General José de San Martín and the Armies of Independence in Plaza San Martín at 5pm, before travelling to the Casa Rosada, where a welcome ceremony is scheduled to take place at 5.20pm.

Half an hour later, the pontiff will meet with President Milei, with a window of some 40 minutes allocated. At 6.30pm, Pope Leo is due to meet with government officials, civil society representatives and members of the diplomatic corps at the nearby Palacio Libertad, where he will deliver a speech.

The following day will combine religious, social and labour-related activities.

At 9.15am on Monday, the Pope will visit staff and residents at the Pequeño Cottolengo Don Orione, a Catholic care and residential centre for people with disabilities in Claypole, Greater Buenos Aires. 

At 11.30am, he will return to the capital to celebrate an open-air Mass at the Monumento de los Españoles in Palermo, an event which is expected to draw a huge public crowd. In the afternoon, the Pope will meet with labour representatives at the UCA Catholic university in Puerto Madero.

He will then meet leaders of Christian communities and representatives of other religious traditions at Palacio San Martín, the seat of the Foreign Ministry, before Vespers with Argentine bishops and synodal teams at the Metropolitan Cathedral, close to the Casa Rosada.

The second day of Leo’s visit will end with dinner with the country’s bishops.

 

Córdoba and Luján

On Tuesday, November 10, Leo will travel to Córdoba, Argentina’s second-largest city, departing Buenos Aires at 7.30am.

He will celebrate Mass at 10am on the grounds of the Military Aviation School, the Argentine Air Force’s officer-training academy in Córdoba, before meeting bishops, priests, deacons, religious figures, seminarians and pastoral workers at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Assumption, the seat of the Archdiocese of Córdoba, at 3.15pm.

The Pope will return to Buenos Aires later that day and at 8.15pm will lead a vigil with young people at the Monumento de los Españoles.

Leo’s final day in Argentina, Wednesday, will begin with an 8am visit to the Buenos Aires Federal Prison Complex, where he will address inmates.

He will then travel to Luján, around 70 kilometres west of the capital, where he will celebrate Mass at 10am at the famous square outside the Basilica of Our Lady of Luján, Argentina’s main site of Catholic pilgrimage.

A farewell ceremony will be held at Ezeiza International Airport at 1.30pm, with the Pope scheduled to depart for Lima at 2pm for the final leg of his South American journey, something of a homecoming for the pontiff.

At Wednesday’s press conference, Qurino confirmed that the Pope's flights between Montevideo and Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires and Córdoba, and Buenos Aires and Lima would be operated by state carrier Aerolíneas Argentinas.

 

– TIMES/PERFIL/NA