Justin McLellan

Pope Leo XIV finished his seven-day trip to Spain in extremely atypical fashion: riding to Rome in the Spanish king's jet. 

"Every life lost on these routes is a failure for the human family," the pontiff said.

Before a blue cross made from the wood of a shipwrecked boat, Pope Leo XIV stood at the port of one of Europe's deadliest migrant destinations and condemned widespread indifference toward the plight of migrants.

At Pope Leo XIV's prayer vigil for young people June 6, National Catholic Reporter speaks with Bilbao Bishop Joseba Segura Etxezarraga about the church's role in Spain's migration debate.

Pope Leo XIV closed his two-day stint in Barcelona June 10 by celebrating Mass at the Sagrada Família on the death centenary of Antoni Gaudí, the basilica's architect.

Pope Leo XIV met privately with Puerto Rican reggaeton sensation Bad Bunny during his final hours in Madrid.

Pope Leo XIV met with victims of clergy sex abuse Monday in Madrid, engaging with the abuse crisis that has loomed large over the papal visit. But the issue of clergy abuse remains far from settled in Spain.

Pope Leo XIV warned of a "profound spiritual and cultural crisis" gripping the world, taking aim at war, rearmament and the decay of international cooperation in one of his most politically charged speeches since becoming pope just over a year ago.

Pope Leo XIV brought bustling Madrid to a halt Sunday, drawing 1.2 million people — the largest crowd he has encountered yet in his 13-month pontificate — for his first public Mass in Spain and a Eucharistic procession through the Spanish capital.

NCR Vatican correspondent Justin McLellan got a belly laugh when he asked the pontiff to hold off praying for his beloved Chicago White Sox when they played the Philadelphia Phillies, the reporter's favorite team.

"The temptation to gain popularity by fanning the flames of polarization seems to have grown rather than diminished, and human dignity continues to be violated," the pontiff said.

Alvarado was named the dicastery's prefect on June 2 in a surprising move given the U.S.-based TV network's previous public flare-ups with Pope Francis. She will begin in the role Nov. 1.

With stops in Madrid, Barcelona and the Canary Islands, Leo's June 6-12 visit will bring the pope to a polarized democracy, a deadly migration route and one of Catholicism's most iconic landmarks.

The church's delayed moral development on the issue of slavery constitutes "a wound in Christian memory, one from which we cannot consider ourselves detached," Leo XIV wrote in Magnifica Humanitas.

Leo and 33-year-old atheist tech leader Christopher Olah made an unlikely duo in championing a partnership between the Catholic Church and the tech industry to develop safeguards for the precarious development of AI.

In Magnifica Humanitas, the pope says just war theory is "outdated," condemns lethal AI weapons and asks pardon for the church's delayed condemnation of slavery.

"This being the 250th anniversary of the United States of America, I would invite you to recall in a special way the guiding principles of the foundations of our nation," said Leo, in a message to graduates of his alma mater.

Pope Leo XIV will personally present his first major teaching document on AI's ethical challenges alongside the co-founder of the AI research company that recently thrust into a public clash with the Trump administration.

Since Pope Francis was buried in the Basilica of St. Mary on April 27, 2025, the basilica has been transformed from a prominent Roman church into one of the city's major pilgrimage sites for admirers of the late pope.

"This very spiritual malaise of many young people reminds us that we are not the sum of what we have, nor matter randomly assembled in a mute cosmos," the pope said May 14. "We are a desire, not an algorithm."