Pope Leo leaves on emotional South America tour weeks after surgery

Pope Leo XIV embarked on an emotional South American tour three weeks after undergoing lung cancer surgery. The 71-year-old head of the Catholic Church will visit Uruguay, Argentina, and Peru within 12 days, meeting political leaders, prisoners, and the poor, as well as old friends. The Church's first US-born pope, who served for almost two decades in Peru, expressed his excitement about returning to these countries, which hold deep meaning for him.

Pope Leo hopes the trip will strengthen faith, renew hope, and rekindle the fire of charity in nations facing challenges such as inequality, violence, demographic decline, and the shrinking Catholic population. Despite his recent surgery, doctors have given him the all-clear to travel. The trip begins in Uruguay, Latin America's most secular country, where tight security measures are in place due to the visit of a world leader.

In Montevideo, the capital, Leo will wave to onlookers before boarding his plane, accompanied by a popemobile and a large security force. His itinerary also includes Argentina, the homeland of his predecessor Pope Francis, and Peru, the country of his Peruvian citizenship. The visit to Peru is particularly symbolic, as it will take place in the former Inca capital of Cusco and the Amazon rainforest, places that hold special significance in the Pope's life.