Pope Leo XIV opens France visit with calls for peace, ethics in technology and "missionary conversion"

Pope Leo XIV arrived in Paris on Friday, Sept. 25. The Vatican's published programme has him in France through Sept. 28, with stops in Paris, Lourdes and Metz.

President Emmanuel Macron welcomed him at Orly airport. At the Élysée Palace, the pope then spoke to French officials, civil society and diplomats. There he warned against becoming resigned to war and said nuclear weapons "must be banned," Religion News Service (RNS) reported. With artificial intelligence spreading, he said people urgently need to be educated in ethical discernment. The Guardian reported that he also voiced concern about surrogacy, organ trading and "arranging one's own death." Reporters tied that last remark to France's new assisted-dying law.

In the afternoon he spoke at the headquarters of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). Vatican News reported him saying that "peace cannot be built by treaties alone." He asked that new technologies stay at the service of the human person.

He then rode through Paris in the popemobile. OSV News said the Holy See press office estimated 300,000 people along the route. At the restored Notre-Dame Cathedral he led Vespers for about 2,000 clergy and religious. Vatican News said his homily called them to "missionary conversion" and to reverent liturgy. "Without the liturgy, it would lose its soul," he said of the cathedral, according to OSV News.

To end the day he held a prayer vigil for some 80,000 young people at the Stade de France, Vatican News reported. An outdoor Mass at Place de la Concorde is set for Saturday. In Lourdes he is due to meet privately with abuse survivors, and on Monday he speaks in Metz about peace in Europe.