Pope Francis will visit Corsica on Sunday December 15, confirms the Vatican

Pope Francis, almost 88 years old, will travel to Ajaccio for a one-day visit.

Pope Francis will visit Ajaccio on Sunday December 15, the Vatican confirmed on Saturday November 23 in a press release. This will be the first visit of a pope to the Isle of Beauty.

François, soon to be 88 years old, will make the trip for a day. The visit will take place a week after the reopening of Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral, for which he had declined the invitation launched by Emmanuel Macron last year.

“Responding to the invitation of the civil and ecclesiastical authorities of the country, Pope Francis will make an apostolic trip to Ajaccio on December 15, on the occasion of the closing of the Congress Popular Religiosity in the Mediterranean”, announced in a press release the director of the press service of the Holy See, Matteo Bruni. The Argentine Jesuit will arrive in Ajaccio at 9 a.m. and leave shortly after 6 p.m., according to the program published by the Vatican. He will deliver two speeches and preside over a mass in the afternoon at the Casone green theater, before meeting with Emmanuel Macron.

At the origin of this invitation to Corsica is Mgr François-Xavier Bustillo, 56 years old, very popular and media-friendly bishop of Ajaccio since 2021, who was created cardinal in September 2023 by Pope Francis. On Thursday, Mgr Bustillo unveiled the poster and the official website of the visit while explaining that “some administrative and diplomatic adjustments” delayed official confirmation from the Vatican.

From Malta to Sicily via the Greek island of Lesbos, Francis has visited the Mediterranean basin several times, a region which focuses several priorities of his pontificate, such as interreligious dialogue or the reception of migrants.