On 31 July 2026, Pope Leo XIV held a 40-minute private audience at the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican with the American rock musician, poet and artist Patti Smith (born 1946), the so-called “Godmother of Punk.” Both are from Chicago. The meeting was attended by Father Antonio Spadaro. There are several official photographs and a video of the encounter.
This innocuous meeting — I imagine that it mainly involved an exchange of pleasantries, with hardly anything of great significance for the Church — raises questions for me.
For a long time now, I have personally been troubled by the fact that, since John Paul II, popes have increasingly been speaking in a purely informal manner on all sorts of occasions (e.g. on a plane or by the roadside, as Pope Leo XIV does in Castel Gandolfo). They give spontaneous interviews and express personal opinions. They are accessible to all sorts of people who want to have their photograph taken with them.
Given a pope’s workload and responsibilities, does he really have nothing more important to do than grant such private audiences — which are particularly popular when the petitioners come from the world of show business or have some sort of cultural or elitist relevance?
Such appearances reinforce the impression among the secular public that the Pope is, at heart, simply another member of the international establishment. The humble fisherman from Galilee, at any rate, knew nothing of such “glamour.” Nor did Paul seek the limelight; rather, he went to the Areopagus in Athens to preach. I shall refrain here from discussing protocol obligations and state visits of significance.
Among those favoured with a private audience may also be people such as Emma Bonino, who spent her entire life at loggerheads with Church doctrine. Pope Francis even paid her a private visit to her home on 5 November 2024. However, the Pope’s role is not that of individual pastoral care. Nor should he teach through images, but through unambiguous words.
Continue reading at Edward Pentin’s Substack