When Jack Lebon, 15, returns to his Texas high school in the fall, he will be able to share a summer experience few can match: a handshake with Pope Leo XIV. 

Pope Leo XIV took a road trip pilgrimage with his older brother to the scenic mountainside Sanctuary of the Most Holy Trinity in Vallepietra July 22 before stopping to pray in the Holy Cave in Subiaco, where a young St. Benedict sought refuge from the corruption of Rome in the early sixth century.

Pope Leo XIV said the conscience of just one person can “be worth the entire world” when it comes to preventing a nuclear catastrophe, in a new book foreword that also quotes an unpublished Bob Dylan song about the atomic bomb.

Pope Leo XIV made a surprise visit to the Benedictine Abbey of Montecassino July 20, where he prayed for peace at the tomb of St. Benedict.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his government’s representative to the Holy See are hopeful that Pope Leo XIV will visit Ukraine despite no firm indication from the Vatican that a visit is in the works.

Catholics from every inhabited continent gathered in Castel Gandolfo July 19 as Pope Leo XIV led the Angelus prayer from the papal summer palace in the small Italian hill town, where the pope reflected on how the kingdom of God grows through “the little things of daily life.”

When Pope Leo XIV sat down to lunch with people experiencing homelessness and poverty at Castel Gandolfo this month, he offered a model that one Catholic organization says any parish can follow.

As African bishops continue to back Pope Leo XIV over the excommunication of the Society of St. Pius X, known as SSPX, the traditionalist group in Kenya rejected the schismatic tag as it moved to assure followers of its Roman Catholic identity.

When the 8:21 a.m. train left Rome’s Termini Station to Castel Gandolfo July 12, people packed like sardines into the regional cars. While two or three passengers got off at stations along the way, most disembarked at Castel Gandolfo and headed up the hill to see Pope Leo XIV during the Sunday Angelus prayer — the first this summer to be said from his lakeview residence.

Under the Italian sun of Lake Albano and the shade of Castel Gandolfo’s Borgo Laudato si’ trees, Pope Leo XIV enjoyed lunch with people experiencing social vulnerability.