Nicole Winfield

Matthew Schmalz, professor of religious studies at Holy Cross college in Worcester, Massachusetts, said the canonization extends the church tradition of popular piety to the digital age.

"Brothers and sisters, I say this with emotion: It is time to restore dignity to everyone, especially to those who have been denied it," Bishop Franceseco Savino said at a Mass for the pilgrims.

Fr. James Martin met with Pope Leo for about a half-hour. The meeting was officially announced by the Vatican in a sign that Leo wanted it made public. The audience was significant because it showed a strong sign of continuity with Francis.

"The voice of weapons must be silenced, while the voice of fraternity and justice must rise," Pope Leo XIV said.

Pope Leo XIV prayed Friday for a peaceful end to the "increasingly deafening violence" of wars around the world as he celebrated a Catholic feast day on the same day as a high-stakes U.S.-Russia summit over the war in Ukraine.

It all has the vibe of a World Youth Day, the Catholic Woodstock festival that Pope John Paul II inaugurated and made famous in 2000 in Rome at the very same Tor Vergata field. 

Italy agreed to a Vatican plan to turn a 430-hectare (1,000-acre) field north of Rome, once the source of controversy between the two, into a vast solar farm that the Holy See hopes will generate enough electricity to meet its needs and turn Vatican City into the world's first carbon-neutral state.

Pope Leo XIV will declare John Henry Newman a “doctor” of the church, bestowing one of the Catholic Church’s highest honors on the deeply influential 19th Anglican convert who remains a unifying figure in both the Anglican and Catholic churches.

Pope Leo XIV surprised tens of thousands of young Catholics and showed up unexpectedly at a Holy Year welcome ceremony, thrilling the kids and receiving a rock star's welcome in the first big youth event of his pontificate.

Pope Leo XIV called for a renewed commitment to diplomacy to resolve conflicts as he marked the 50th anniversary of the Helsinki Accords, the landmark Cold War-era agreement that ushered in a new era of security and human rights.

Pope Leo XIV received a rock star's welcome at the Vatican's festival of Catholic influencers as he urged them to ensure that human relations don't suffer with the spread of digital ecosystems and artificial intelligence.

Half a million young people are expected to pour into Rome next week for the biggest event of the 2025 Holy Year: a weeklong Jubilee celebration for young Catholics that will sorely test their tolerance for heat and the Eternal City's ability to provide public services, security and logistical support during its peak tourist season.

Pope Leo XIV called Sunday for "merciful compassion" for the world's poor, victims of tyranny and wars, as he celebrated Mass in a parish church that has special spiritual ties to Leo's own Augustinian religious order

Leo is a methodical, hard-working and well-prepared manager who wants to read entire reports, not just the executive summaries, before making decisions, people who know and work with him say.

Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni declined to explicitly confirm the authenticity of the documents, which were posted online this week by a Vatican reporter.

The Vatican Museums on Thursday unveiled the last and most important of the restored Raphael Rooms, the spectacularly frescoed reception rooms of the Apostolic Palace that in some ways rival the Sistine Chapel as the peak of high Renaissance artistry.

Pope Leo XIV doubled down on Friday on his appeal for unity in the polarized Catholic Church, urging priests to act in communion with their superiors and be models of reconciliation in a world driven by conflicts and divisions.

Leo met in St. Peter's Basilica with about 400 bishops and cardinals from 38 countries attending this week's special Holy Year celebrations for clergy.

Pope Leo XIV warned that artificial intelligence could negatively impact the intellectual, neurological and spiritual development of young people as he pressed one of the priorities of his young pontificate.

 Pope Leo has been credited by victims of helping to dismantle an abusive Catholic movement in Peru, but other survivors have asked him to account for other cases.