If the papal trip to Spain had an underlying message, it is the one that took place this Thursday at the Arguineguín dock, in Gran Canaria. There, next to two migrant survivors of the crossings from Africa, Leo XIV threw a bouquet of flowers into the sea in memory of the thousands of people who die every year in the Atlantic trying to reach the archipelago. According to data from the NGO Caminando Fronteras, 635 people have already died since the beginning of the year. In this scenario, the pontiff's words were very forceful on the very day the so-called Migration Pact in the European Union comes into force: "Human dignity has no passport and does not lose value when crossing a border – he recalled–. What remains of our humanity?", he asked.

Thirty-four years later, Barcelona is once again dazzling the world while Madrid sees that three decades of turbo-capitalism and concentration of resources and power have not served it to shorten distances with the Catalan capital when it comes to achieving a global impact like that of 1992. Thirty-four years later, Madrid has not only not had the Olympic Games, but has had to see how the blessing ceremony of the tower of Jesus of the Sagrada Família by Leo XIV has taken all the praise and headlines in the world press and left the visit of the Pope himself to the Spanish capital a few days earlier in an absolute second place. And this without going into comparing the quality of what has been seen in Catalonia in recent days (cathedral, Lluís Companys stadium, Brians, Montserrat and Sant Agustí) with the events in Madrid, particularly the performances with an evangelistic air at the Santiago Bernabéu.

Some 600 members of various choirs who were due to participate this Wednesday in the mass and the act of blessing the cross of the tower of Jesus of the Sagrada FamiliaWhile they were singing the Virolai, however, they observed "a lot of secret police" climbing up to where they were. "I thought it was just the general protocol for the Pope and that was it," admits one of the affected singers. Before they had even finished singing the hymn to the Virgin of Montserrat, the officers began to make them come down from the choir lofts and led them outside.

After assigning homework to politicians in a forceful intervention at the Royal Palace of Madrid, this Sunday the Pope continued in the same vein and addressed businessmen. At this afternoon's event at the Movistar Arena, which featured a combination of artists, athletes, and union and business representatives, Leo XIV once again raised his voice to ask businessmen to treat workers "with dignity".

I understand everything but comprehend nothing. In the world of permanent exhibition, religious experience these days becomes a kind of mass spectacle televised by the minute. Spiritual experience is sublimated in stadiums and grand performances, massive avenues and a lot of paraphernalia. Peter's representative arrives in Madrid and will pass through Barcelona and the Canary Islands with an excess of solemnity.

"It is one of the largest police operations ever deployed in Catalonia". This is how the Minister of the Interior, Núria Parlon, described this Thursday the deployment of the Mossos d'Esquadra that will take place during the visit of Pope Leo XIV to Catalonia. Up to 5,600 agents of the Catalan police will be activated for this event. It is an almost unprecedented figure, as it means that 25% of the force's members will be active for the Pope's presence. Furthermore, this entire operation is joint with the National Police, the Civil Guard, the royal household, the Vatican Police, and the Guàrdia Urbana de Barcelona, which will have 500 agents available. In other words, there will be many police officers on the streets. "Catalonia is prepared," stated the Minister of Justice, Ramon Espadaler. The Minister of Justice explained that the visit is covered by an agreement between the Generalitat, the City Council, and the Archbishopric, which he has quantified at 1.6 million euros financed by the tourist tax and which will be audited later.

Artificial intelligence (AI) "is not neutral", but rather "an unprecedented form of colonialism" that reduces victims to data to feed those behind this technology, warns Pope Leo XIV in his first encyclical, the most relevant papal document. A highly anticipated writing, which gathers the principles that will guide his pontificate and which, for the first time in history, has been presented by the Pope himself in an event this Monday at the Vatican. In the text, Robert Prevost calls for protecting “the magnificent humanity inhabited by God”, promoting truth, the dignity of work, social justice, and peace.

Peace in the Middle East and the promotion of religious freedom have been some of the issues addressed this Thursday by Pope Leo XIV and the United States Secretary of State, Marco Rubio. The head of US diplomacy was received by the pontiff amid a diplomatic crisis between the White House and the Vatican, after the unprecedented attacks by US President Donald Trump.

I have had the grace of meeting Pope Leo, and in his presence I have discovered something more than a shepherd: I have seen a man who listens with the ear of his heart, who speaks with the serenity of one who prays, and whose gaze embraces like a sacrament. His prudence is not a fearful silence, but a wisdom that discerns and dares to point the way. His commitment is not limited to diplomatic gestures: it is a radical commitment to the Gospel, to justice, to peace, and to the care of the Earth, our common home entrusted to us and today in agony.

In the window of the Antico Forno in Legna, at the gates of Castel Gandolfo, Daniela proudly displays a letter sent by the Vatican Secretariat of State and signed by the Pope Francis in which the Argentine pontiff thanks them for sending some artisan pastries. "His Holiness thanks you for the gift and the feelings of filial veneration that this kind gesture has suggested […] and gladly sends you his blessing," reads the letter, dated 2022. "Pope Francis was a fan of our pastries. Every Sunday, someone would pass by and take them to Rome."

Queen Letizia has taken advantage of a privilege only a few consorts in the world have: wearing white in front of the Pope. Three weeks after attending Pope Francis' funeral this Sunday, both she and Felipe VI have traveled to Rome for the Inauguration of the new pontificate of Leo XIV in the Piazza Sant'Etienne in the Vatican. However, it was the Queen's attire that has become the center of attention, as only six women in the world have been allowed to wear the color white.

"So you've seen all the Rome ritual on TV?!" Some of my friends, most of them agnostics and republicans, are amazed when I explain that I'm a ritual junkie and that I never miss the election of the Pope, or any royal wedding or funeral, or coronation.

Pope Leo XIV made a firm defense of freedom of expression and of the press and recognized the "courage" of journalists who work in adverse places or circumstances, "even at the cost of their lives." Before thousands of journalists at the first audience of his pontificate, the Pope expressed "the Church's solidarity with journalists imprisoned for seeking and reporting the truth" and called for their release. "Only informed people can make free decisions," the American pontiff affirmed, precisely at a time when the government of his home country is engaged in an open struggle against the media.

Since Thursday afternoon since we have a pope And no: none of the predictions or the occasional Vatican experts' predictions were correct in predicting that the chosen one would be Robert Francis Prevost, a Chicago native but a Peruvian national. In fact, they didn't even come close. And no, the Church hasn't initiated the counter-reformation, as the vast majority of the prescient predictions predicted, nor has it fallen into the hands of the ultra-Catholic sectors that, according to some, had an unbeatable offensive prepared. And no, Pope Francis must not have been as disorganized or as idiotic as some painted him, because the conclave has given continuity to his doctrinal, pastoral, and political legacy. If this had happened after the pontificate of a conservative pope, a crowd of analysts with their eyes rolled back would be talking about the subtlety of a two-thousand-year-old tradition of diplomacy, etc. However, if it happens when the time comes to hand over the reins to a progressive pope, it turns out to be a fluke. The unwritten law of automatic lowering of appraisals when progressives reach—or maintain—levels of power is therefore once again imposed.

When on Thursday the cardinal Robert Prevost stepped out onto the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica As the 267th pope, Chiclayo, in northern Peru, exploded with joy and disbelief. This city, the fifth largest in the country with just under 800,000 inhabitants, was little known until last week, when many people had never even heard of it. For days now, the only thing talked about in Chiclayo is this.

Pope Leo XIV has launched an appeal against war in his first prayer of the Regina Caeli This Sunday at noon in front of thousands of faithful gathered in the Vatican's Piazza Sant'Pere. Quoting Pope Francis, the American pontiff denounced the "current dramatic scenario of a Third World War in pieces" and firmly appealed to world leaders: "Never again war!"

"Peace be with you all." So the pontificate of Leo XIV began. Standing on the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican, the new spiritual leader of 1.4 billion Catholics launched a plea for peace in his first address to the world. "An unarmed peace," he urged. Despite his affable face and almost trembling voice, the new pope's political program was already evident in his speech. In these turbulent times, the American pontiff's priority will be to achieve an end to conflicts. An ambitious goal that will test the leadership of Francis's successor.

With the conclave, everyone has talked about the countercultural aura of secrecy in a society tired of transparency and the fascination with liturgy in a world without rituals. This is all very well, but I would say it's being discussed in a rather poor way, assuming a logic of caprice according to which we desire what we don't have simply so we can romanticize the past. But what if behind all this calling us the Catholic Church there were answers to important questions, whether we are religious or not?

So many good words uttered from the Vatican in recent weeks—starting with the latest from Pope Francis—heard globally, and so little echo in the political sphere. new pope, Leo XIV, speaking after bridges and peace on their first outing on the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica, and the following day one of the first news items on the news was The military parade, with 11,000 troops, in Moscow's Red SquareThe message consisted of a display of equipment, the martial prowess of the troops, and Vladimir Putin accompanied by Chinese Prime Minister Xi Jinping, next to the Kremlin Wall. The purpose of the event was to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, but Putin turned the whole thing—including the international guests—into a personal propaganda event. In parallel, another scene showed Donald Trump expressing his respect for Pope Francis in the Oval Office, while his advisors, who surrounded him, burst out laughing, perhaps because they remembered his head. disguised as a pontiff by artificial intelligence a few days before.

Pope Leo XIII devoted much of his term to combating the so-called "Americanist heresy," a liberal Catholic movement that emerged in the United States that embraced the separation of church and state (which the Vatican rejected) and prioritized evangelization over dogmatism in the 20th century. The formerly powerful diocese of Munich, with 1.7 million members, had only one seminarian at 99 in 2022. the country that contributed the most money, in the form of a grain of sand, in the Catholic Church. Now the country that contributes the most annually, with more than 10 million dollars (a similar sum in euros), is the United States. Both American continents represent almost half of the world's Catholicism. And the new pope, who has decided to resume the name of the anti-American pope and call himself Leo XIV, is American.