Pope Leo heading to Turkey, Lebanon for closely watched first overseas trip

Itinerary includes meeting with Erdogan; speeches expected to focus on peace, will be delivered in English; Vatican spokesman says security arrangements to be undertaken in Lebanon

Pope Leo XIV begins his first trip outside Italy as Catholic leader on Thursday with a visit to Turkey — where he is expected to make appeals for peace in the Middle East and urge unity among long-divided Christian churches — and then to Lebanon.

His three-day itinerary in Turkey includes a meeting with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. And his first address in Turkey is expected to focus on dialogue with Islam in a country where Christians account for a fraction of a percent of the 86 million inhabitants, most of them Muslim.

Leo will be closely watched as he makes his first speeches overseas and visits sensitive cultural sites. He is expected to address the crises troubling the region and will deliver his speeches in his native English rather than the Italian he usually uses.

Israel’s yearlong ceasefire with Hezbollah in Lebanon has appeared increasingly fragile after the IDF killed the terror group’s military chief this week, accusing him of rebuilding the group’s capabilities. Israel’s relations with Turkey, meanwhile, collapsed during the war in Gaza.

“It’s a very important trip because we do not know much yet about Leo’s geopolitical views, and this is the first big chance for him to make them clear,” Massimo Faggioli, an Italian academic who follows the Vatican, told Reuters.

Despite the rise of religious nationalism in Turkey and the conversion of the Hagia Sophia — a church for more than 1,000 years — from a museum into a mosque in 2020, the Vatican seeks to maintain a dialogue with Ankara, which is considered a key player for peace efforts in the region, including by acting as a broker of the ceasefire in Gaza.

The first American-born pope chose Turkey as his first overseas destination to mark the 1,700th anniversary of a landmark early Church council there that produced the Nicene Creed, a statement of belief still used by most of the world’s Christians today.

The Holy See is also acknowledging Turkey’s efforts in taking in more than 2.5 million mostly Syrian refugees, according to authorities.

On the subject of refugees and migrants, Leo has followed in the footsteps of his predecessor, Francis, most recently criticizing what he called the “extremely disrespectful” treatment of migrants by the government of US President Donald Trump.

Foreign travel has become a major part of the modern papacy, with popes attracting international attention as they lead events with crowds sometimes in the millions, give foreign policy speeches and conduct international diplomacy.

Leo was elected in May by the world’s cardinals to succeed Francis. A relative unknown on the world stage before his election, Leo spent decades as a missionary in Peru and only became a Vatican official in 2023.

Francis had been planning to visit Turkey and Lebanon but was unable to go because of his worsening health.

Leo will fly on Thursday evening to Istanbul, home to Patriarch Bartholomew, spiritual leader of the world’s 260 million Orthodox Christians.

Orthodox and Catholic Christians split in the East-West Schism of 1054 but have generally sought in recent decades to build closer ties.

Leo and Bartholomew travel on Friday to Iznik, 140 kilometers (90 miles) southeast of Istanbul and once called Nicaea, where early churchmen formulated the Nicene Creed, which lays out what remain the core beliefs of most Christians today.

Peace is expected to be a key theme of the pope’s visit to Lebanon, which starts on Sunday. Lebanon has the largest percentage of Christians in the Middle East.

Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said on Monday that necessary security precautions were being taken to ensure the pope’s safety in Lebanon, but he would not comment on specifics.

Leaders in Lebanon, which is struggling to recover after years of conflict and economic crisis, hope the papal visit might bring global attention to the country.