The Conférence des évêques de France announced that Pope Léon XIV could visit France at the end of September 2026, and said the planned program could include Paris and Lourdes. Jean-Marc Aveline, who officially invited Léon XIV on behalf of the bishops, told reporters he had worked with the pope on an outline of the program the previous week.
That outline, the bishops said, could take the pope to Notre-Dame de Paris and the sanctuary of Lourdes, and to places in Paris proper as part of an apostolic visit. The invitation had the support of the French president, the conference noted, after a meeting with Léon XIV in Rome on 10 avril. Aveline framed the move as both personal and institutional: "Léon XIV a exprimé, à différentes occasions, la grande estime qu’il porte à notre pays et à son histoire spirituelle," he said, and added that "Sa venue serait l’occasion de partager au Pape ce que vit notre Église en France et de nous laisser encourager par sa parole."
The announcement carried immediate practical weight: the bishops placed the date window at fin septembre and named Paris and Lourdes explicitly, raising the prospect that the pope would visit Notre-Dame de Paris and the sanctuary of Lourdes if the trip proceeds. Léon XIV himself has spoken of a desire to "inaugurer une relation nouvelle avec les Français" and to "renouer avec les Français," according to a conseiller proche du pape whose comments were cited by the conference. The bishops asked the faithful to "porter dans la prière la préparation de cet événement."
Context for the proposed visit matters. Le Point noted that a papal visit to France had not happened since Benoît XVI in 2008, a fact that anchors the announcement in a longer absence of full papal visits. By contrast, Pope François has travelled to Strasbourg, Marseille and Ajaccio in recent years, but those trips have been described as targeted visits rather than official visits to France. Church officials described the Léon XIV trip as apostolic and said an official announcement awaited the Holy See.
The timetable in the bishops' statement and Aveline’s account contains an internal tension: the pope and the conference appear to have sketched specifics while simultaneously placing the visit under the Holy See’s pendency. Aveline said he and Léon XIV worked recently on a draft program during an entretien the previous week, yet the conference itself did not present a formal, final itinerary. The French president’s backing on 10 avril lends political weight to the invitation, but it does not substitute for a Vatican confirmation of dates and venues.
For ordinary Parisians this will be more than a calendar item. A papal presence in Paris would mark a public moment for the French church and for the state, with symbolic stops at Notre-Dame and Lourdes already mentioned. Local life will watch both faith and sport: seasonal attention will fall on the city as the leagues resume, and fans will remember that Paris FC must respond after Lille loss — — while Matias Fernandez-Pardo’s penalty sealed Lille’s 1-0 win at Jean-Bouin — and earlier reports recounted the match action —
The decisive outcome now rests with the Holy See. If Rome confirms an apostolic visit for fin septembre 2026, it would be the most significant full papal trip to France since 2008 and a clear first act toward the new relationship Léon XIV says he hopes to establish with the French people. Until that confirmation arrives, the bishops will continue to prepare and ask the faithful to "porter dans la prière la préparation de cet événement," leaving the calendar and the program to be finalized in Rome.
