Leo XIV to South America November 6 to 17: Uruguay, Argentina, Peru

The Holy See press office confirmed on 5 August an apostolic journey of Leo XIV, from 6 to 17 November 2026, to Uruguay, Argentina and Peru, the first trip of this pontificate to South America. Ten cities are announced: Montevideo, Paysandú and Florida; Buenos Aires, Córdoba and Luján; Lima, Chiclayo, Cusco and Pucallpa. Uruguay from 6 to 8 November, Argentina from 8 to 11, Peru from 11 to 17; the detailed itinerary is still to be published.

Peru is no foreign land to him: an Augustinian missionary there since 1985, bishop of Chiclayo from 2015 to 2023, he holds its citizenship. Argentina is the homeland of the late Pope Francis, who never returned there in twelve years of pontificate despite repeated invitations. Uruguay shows the lowest proportion of Christians on the continent, about 44 percent, and had not received a pope since John Paul II in 1988. The journey follows a first visit to France, from 25 to 28 September.

The office entrusted to Peter is missionary before it is diplomatic. "Going therefore, teach ye all nations: baptizing them": the mandate is not measured by the crowds nor by the welcome of presidents, but by the faith preached whole, the necessity of the Church, conversion, the last things. Outside the Church there is no salvation; there lies the motive of an apostle on the march, and the only one.

A country fallen to forty-four percent Christian is a land of mission, not a backdrop. The question is not the fervour of a day, but whether the ground lost is recovered there or its loss ratified. The apostolic traveller converts or he records; the Gospel knows no third outcome.

Sources. Gospel according to Saint Matthew, XXVIII, 19-20 (Douay-Rheims, Vulgate); Catechism of the Council of Trent (1566), Ninth Article of the Creed, on the Church and the apostolic mandate.