Pope Francis in Uruguay in November: the pope chooses the Latin American periphery

Cardinal Sturla confirms the visit of Leo XIV to Uruguay in November 2026. Missionary signal towards a secularized periphery.

The fact

Cardinal Daniel Sturla, Archbishop of Montevideo, confirmed on July 15, 2026, to Infovaticana that Leo XIV will visit Uruguay in November. The official announcement from the Holy See is expected in the coming weeks. This would be the first papal apostolic journey to the country since John Paul II's visit in 1988.

Our reading

The pastoral choice is eloquent. Uruguay is the most secularized country in Latin America: less than 40% of declared Catholic baptized, a 1918 constitution that sealed a radical separation between the Church and the State, and a public culture marked by historical anti-clericalism (religious festivals renamed, public schools secularized in a militant way). To come as a pilgrim is not to visit a Christian community: it is to meet a secularized periphery, right in the heart of the most Catholic continent in the world. This orientation extends, without reproducing the gestures, Francis' call in Evangelii gaudium (n° 20): "to go out from one's own comfort and have the courage to reach all the peripheries that need the light of the Gospel". Leo XIV, trained by his long Peruvian mission, adds his own accent: that of a shepherd who knows the secularization of the southern cone not through theory but through parish life. The trip also shows that the pope does not reserve his presence for major capitals: he honors a minority, discreet Church, still marked by the memory of the ecclesiastical-political confrontations of the past century.

To ponder

May this journey be prepared by prayer. A minority Church that receives its universal shepherd is reminded that it is never alone. Where Rome comes, communion is gathered.