MAIN EVENTS

POPE LEO XIV IN ALGERIA TO BUILD BRIDGES AND FOSTER DIALOGUE

Print

Algiers  ||  | 13 April 2026
Iniziative (EN) - Maison de la Paix (EN)

A delegation from the “United States of the World” and the “Mediterranean Foundation” took part in the various events during Pope Leo XIV’s visit to Algeria, in the capital Algiers and in Annaba, the city of St Augustine.
“A blessed visit” - with these words, the Pontiff thanked the Algerian authorities and the “small but significant” local Church, reaffirming the relevance of St Augustine’s message to “seek unity among all peoples and mutual respect despite differences”, and recalled his visit to the Great Mosque of Algiers: “Despite different beliefs and different ways of praying, we can live together in peace.”
The Holy Father recalled the “special visits” he made on 13 and 14 April to the Basilica of Notre-Dame d’Afrique in Algiers and to the Basilica of Saint Augustine in Annaba, on the hill overlooking the modern city and the ruins of the ancient Roman city of Hippo. According to the Pontiff, all this has “great symbolic value”, because Saint Augustine, Bishop of Hippo for more than thirty years, “is a figure from the past who speaks to us of tradition, who speaks to us of the life of the Church in the early centuries of its development”, yet, at the same time, remains an “extremely important figure even today”.
Secretary-General Capasso states: “St Augustine’s writings, teaching, spirituality, and call to seek God and the truth are the message we so desperately need in today’s world; a message that is highly relevant not only to all of us believers but also to every person.”
For a Pope who immediately declared himself a “son of Saint Augustine”, it was therefore “a special grace” to be able to return to Annaba and “offer to the Church and to the world” the vision of the great Father of the Church: “That of the search for God and the effort to build community, to seek unity among all peoples and mutual respect despite differences”.