Macron, the 'pope-loving' president, faces strained relations with Vatican ahead of Leo XIV's Paris visit

The Elysée's proposal quickly fell through. After Pope Leo XIV celebrates vespers at Notre-Dame de Paris, which he is scheduled to do on the afternoon of September 25, he will not have a private meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron. The president wanted to personally present the restoration work on the cathedral – efforts launched after the fire on April 15 and 16, 2019 – to the pope, as well as introduce the tradespeople who contributed to the project. According to reports from the newspaper La Croix, which Le Monde confirmed, the Holy See politely declined the invitation. Officially, the pope's schedule was too full. Unofficially, he did not want the occasion to be reminiscent of the cathedral's lavish inauguration, which was held in late 2024, with several dozen heads of state and billionaires present, including Elon Musk. Moreover, as sources in Rome said, one should not give a pope a tour of a place of worship as if it were the Louvre or a historical monument. Macron's policy of "'at the same time' – posing alongside the pope at Notre-Dame, all while passing a law on assisted dying that goes against the Church's positions – came up against a firm 'non possumus'" (Latin for "we cannot"), said historian Camille Pascal, a former adviser to ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy and former premier Jean Castex. You have 85.22% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.