Church officials expect up to a million people to attend the pope’s first major Mass in Peru, which will be held outside Chiclayo on Friday morning local time.
“I am so happy he has returned,” said Rolando Antonio Mendoza, who sells pictures of the pope outside the cathedral where he used to celebrate Mass.
“Even though he is now Pope Leo XIV, he has not forgotten his homeland.”
The pope was born in the United States but worked as a priest and bishop in Peru, and is a Peruvian and American citizen. Less than a month after undergoing surgery for lung cancer, Pope Leo XIV began his visit to Latin America last Friday. The visit will now end in Peru.
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