Pope Leo XIV Starts Longest Trip Three Weeks After Lung Surgery

Pope Leo XIV began a trip to Uruguay, Argentina and Peru on Nov. 6, the longest and farthest journey of his papacy. According to an Associated Press report carried by ABC News, it comes only three weeks after he had surgery on Oct. 13 to remove a cancerous tumor from his right lung, and his doctors cleared him to travel.

The trip, which runs through Nov. 17, takes the American pope back to the continent where he spent two decades as a missionary priest. It also lands in countries where the share of Catholics has been falling, and where politics and economic hardship are likely to shadow the visit.

The numbers behind the trip

• 40% of 1.4 billion: Latin America is still home to around 40% of the world's 1.4 billion Catholics, AP reported, though the Catholic proportion of the region's population has shrunk in recent years.
• Nearly 77% of 3.5 million: According to Vatican statistics, that is the share of Uruguayans who are baptized Catholics. Yet more than half of Uruguayans say they have no religious affiliation, the highest portion in Latin America, and only a fraction of Catholics attend Mass regularly.
• 71% to 58%: The Pew Research Center found that around 71% of Argentines identified as Catholic when Francis was elected. By 2024 the figure had dropped to 58%.
• 2.8 million: A record number of people joined this year's annual pilgrimage to the Basilica de Nuestra Señora de Luján south of Buenos Aires, despite persistent rain, AP reported.
• 32.3%: Official data show poverty in Argentina reached 32.3% of the population in the first half of 2026, about 15 million people.
• More than 400: The number of people with disabilities living at the Don Orione care home in Claypole, which Leo will visit.

Uruguay: a secular country, a patriotic feast day

The visit opens in Uruguay, where the separation of church and state is so entrenched that Christmas is officially called Family Day and Holy Week is called Tourism Week. Leo is due at a welcome ceremony at Plaza Independencia in Montevideo, then at a parish in Casavalle, a poor neighborhood on the city's outskirts that AP described as plagued by drug trafficking and gang violence. The church works there with national and city authorities on housing and addiction recovery.

He will also celebrate Mass in Paysandú, about 375 kilometers (230 miles) from the capital. On Nov. 8 he will mark the feast of the Virgin of the Thirty-three, Uruguay's patron. By tradition, 33 independence patriots carried her statue when independence from the Brazilian empire was declared on Aug. 25, 1825. AP said Leo is expected to stress that Uruguay's secular nationhood is tied to its Catholic heritage.

Argentina: Francis's legacy and a clash over spending cuts

AP said Pope Francis never returned to his native Argentina as pope, and his polarizing time there as archbishop and pontiff left a conflicted legacy. Leo will honor him at Buenos Aires' cathedral and at the federal prison where Francis, then Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, ministered to inmates.

Leo will meet President Javier Milei, a libertarian who once sharply criticized Francis and later apologized. Argentine church leaders have criticized Milei's spending cuts, including to disability funding. The Don Orione home has reported extreme financial strain from the cuts, outdated rates, inflation and late state payments. Union leaders told AP they plan to brief the pope on rising unemployment, poverty and shrinking household purchasing power when he meets business, labor and social representatives at the Argentine Catholic University.

Artificial intelligence is another possible point of friction. AP reported that Milei, an ally of President Donald Trump, has courted AI investment with promises of limited regulation, while Leo has warned of risks to humanity and the environment and called for strict, internationally policed safeguards.

Leo's first Mass in Argentina will be at the Monumento de los Españoles, where St. John Paul II led prayers for peace on June 12, 1982, during the war with Britain over the Falkland Islands.

What this means for Catholics and for the countries visited

For Catholics in the region, the trip is a rare papal visit to places where church attendance and affiliation are declining. In Argentina, the pope will hear directly about poverty and unemployment from workers and union leaders, and he will visit an institution that says it is struggling with government cuts. His meeting with Milei will put the church's criticism of the government's economic policy in front of the president.

The trip also tests Leo's health. It is his most demanding journey since his lung surgery, and the Vatican has not changed the itinerary, according to the AP report.

What comes next in Peru

AP described the return to Peru as the likely highlight. Peru is Leo's second homeland, and he will visit his former diocese of Chiclayo in the north, a sprawling midsize city near the Pacific coast. He will celebrate Mass at several of his old posts, including the mountain village of Santa Cruz de Succhabamba. The trip ends Nov. 17.

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Around Prague, based on reporting by ABC News