VATICAN CITY — The Vatican officially confirmed Saturday that Pope Leo XIV will expand his packed 2026 international travel agenda with a four-day official visit to France, scheduled to run from September 25 to 28. The trip will include a stop at the Paris-based headquarters of UNESCO, the United Nations’ cultural and educational agency, marking a key engagement with a global multilateral institution during the pontiff’s busy year.
This forthcoming French visit will be Pope Leo XIV’s fourth foreign voyage of 2026. The pontiff has already logged two international trips this year: a short one-day visit to Monaco in March, and a longer multi-nation tour of four African countries in April. He is also scheduled to travel to Spain and the Canary Islands in June, ahead of the September trip to France. A potential end-of-year visit to Latin America — including Peru, which Leo has called his beloved second home — remains unconfirmed as of press time, with no final details released by Vatican officials.
The confirmed trip to France highlights a notable shift in papal travel priorities compared to the 12-year pontificate of Pope Francis. Unlike Francis, who repeatedly opted to prioritize small, remote Catholic communities far from Rome and largely avoided major historic Christian centers in Western Europe, Leo’s itinerary shows a clear new focus on the experiences of Catholic faithful in Europe. This shift comes as informal reports point to a resurgence of interest in the Catholic faith among young European adults, a trend the Vatican appears to be acknowledging through this high-profile visit.
Francis did travel to France twice during his time as pope, but never completed a full state visit to the French capital Paris. In 2014, he made a single-day trip to Strasbourg to speak to the European Parliament and the Council of Europe, and in 2023 he traveled to the southern port city of Marseille to attend an international conference focused on migration policy.
Leo’s stop at UNESCO headquarters will also give the pontiff a platform to address a global audience, a notable detail given his decision to forgo a trip to his native United States this year. Traditionally, popes have used invitations to address the U.N. General Assembly in New York as a key opportunity for major global addresses, but Leo has chosen not to make that trip in 2026, instead taking the global stage at UNESCO in Paris.