MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay — The Pope Leo South America trip opened Friday with the pontiff’s arrival in Uruguay for a 12-day, three-country tour, his longest journey to date and his first major overseas travel since lung cancer surgery.
According to the Holy See, Leo’s schedule includes 12 flights, two helicopter legs, 36 speeches and stops in 10 cities. The itinerary features Cusco, Peru, which sits above 11,000 feet, where even seasoned travelers can suffer altitude sickness and sometimes need supplemental oxygen.
Vatican officials said Leo recently underwent surgery to remove the lower lobe of his right lung and has completed a two-week recovery. They said no further treatment is required.
Maria Montserrat Alvarado, the Vatican’s communications chief, said the pope was eager to travel. She added that doctors are confident about his condition and that medical support will be available in flight.
The Pope Leo South America trip and first stop Uruguay
First stop Uruguay
The decision to start in Uruguay, Latin America’s most secular nation, has drawn attention. The country of about 3.5 million people is not expected to produce large crowds, and its public life has been strongly secular for more than a century. Leo spent two decades in Peru as a missionary and later as Bishop of Chiclayo before his election.
Asked why Uruguay was on the agenda despite its high share of atheists and a strict church-state separation, Alvarado replied, “Why not?” and said the Gospel should reach all places.
In Montevideo, few welcome signs were visible beyond posters at churches. A large banner of the pope covers the facade of the Blessed Sacrament Church in the Pocitos neighborhood, where 70-year-old retiree Ana Maria Saprissa paused to pray. She said she was grateful the pope remembered “this tiny country that has so many needs.”
Uruguay formally refers to Christmas as Family Day and Easter week as Tourism Week. Only about one-third of Uruguayans identify as Catholic and fewer practice, according to Mariana Pomiés, a political analyst and director of the polling firm CIFRA. A practicing Catholic herself, Pomiés said officials sometimes conflate secularism with hostility to religion, noting that state neutrality in faith matters “became an absolute.”
Pope celebrates “positive secularism”
Volunteers in the working-class Casavalle area, about a half hour north of the capital, prepared a simple outdoor stage at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, where Leo is scheduled to visit Saturday. Father Pablo Coimbra, the community’s pastoral leader for six years, said he was grateful that attention had turned to a place where many feel forgotten. He said people who live on the margins will be “in the heart, in the center” during the visit.
A plan for the pope to address parliament was dropped after public and political pushback. President Yamandú Orsi, from the left, is hosting a welcome outside Montevideo’s main cathedral, where Leo will lead evening prayers with church leaders and laypeople.
Sunday Mass is scheduled in Florida, about an hour from the capital, a town steeped in religious and national tradition. Each Nov. 8, worshippers honor the Virgin of the Thirty-five, linked to Uruguay’s 1825 independence movement from the Brazilian empire.
A long awaited Papal return to Argentina
The Pope Leo South America trip continues Sunday in Argentina, realizing a goal his predecessor, Pope Francis, had expressed but did not fulfill. Before his death, Francis had said he wanted to avoid inflaming Argentina’s polarized politics with a papal visit.
Leo’s stop in Argentina will test how he engages with a surge of right-wing populism in the region. Similar tensions have appeared in the United States, where Leo has openly differed with President Trump on immigration and the treatment of migrants.
In Argentina, President Javier Milei’s sweeping austerity program has deepened poverty for millions, which could place him at odds with Leo, a long-time advocate for the poor. Milei has also promoted data centers and light-touch regulation of artificial intelligence, while Leo’s first encyclical urged ethical caution and protections for human dignity in the AI era.
Saving the best for last?
The tour’s final leg is in Peru, framed as a homecoming. Leo served there as a missionary priest and later as Bishop of Chiclayo over a span of two decades. He became a naturalized Peruvian in 2015 and has said the country shaped his life more than any other place.
The pope will visit several locales where he once lived and will meet President Keiko Fujimori, daughter of former leader Alberto Fujimori. As a priest during the Fujimori era, Leo was an outspoken critic of military violence and human rights abuses and later backed efforts that led to Peru’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission after democracy was restored.
In Montevideo, some residents said they were still getting to know the new pontiff. Passing the stage prepared for his welcome, Juan Martin Guerreiro said he was unsure whether he would attend. He said Leo did not yet feel as influential to him as Pope Francis, though he was open to giving him a chance because he is South American. On learning Leo was born in Chicago, Guerreiro said that would not count against him.
Similar to how each Nov. 8, worshippers honor the Virgin of the Thirty-five, cultural traditions across the region will continue to shape how people remember this visit, just as Halloween Highlights anchor a week of art and remembrance in Mexico City and beyond.
According to the Holy See, the Vatican’s official announcements about the trip will be available through the Holy See online. For updates on Leo’s engagements in Argentina, readers can also consult the official site of the Argentine presidency.