Leo XIV Leaves Uruguay for Fraught Milei Meeting
Despite October lung-tumor surgery, the 71-year-old skips no events on a tour ending in Peru; bishops decry health cuts and 32.3% poverty.
On Sunday, November 8, 2026, Pope Leo XIV concluded his visit to Uruguay in Florida, north of Montevideo, with Mass for the feast of the Virgin of the Thirty-Three, tied to the country’s independence from the Brazilian empire on August 25, 1825. He then flew onward to Argentina, the second stop on a three-nation South American tour that will close with six days in Peru.
The 71-year-old pontiff proceeded with the journey despite lung-tumor surgery on October 13 and has not shortened any scheduled event. He was due to land in Buenos Aires at 4:30 p.m. from Montevideo, with a welcome ceremony at the Casa Rosada at 5:20 p.m., a stop at the General San Martín Monument, and a private meeting with President Javier Milei.
Austerity, Poverty, and Church Concerns
Argentine Church leaders have sharply criticized Milei’s austerity program. Since December 2023 health spending has been cut by 48 percent in real terms. Official data place poverty at 32.3 percent of the population in the first half of 2026—about 15 million people. Milei has called social justice “an aberration” amounting to theft and dismissed as “huge stupidity” complaints that families cannot stretch their income to month’s end.
The Cottolengo Don Orione home in Claypole, which cares for some 400 residents with disabilities, reports that government deliveries of medication, specialized foods, and diapers have stopped. Bishops wrote to Health Minister Mario Lugones on April 1 about institutions in crisis; no resolution has followed. The itinerary also includes a Tuesday Mass at FAdeA in Córdoba, where workers have protested the cuts. A University of Buenos Aires study finds 57.7 percent of Argentines identify as Catholic, down from 76.5 percent nearly twenty years ago.
Past Tensions and Present Contrasts
On June 7, 2025, Leo XIV received Milei at the Apostolic Palace without a stole, though he had worn one the previous day for Italian President Sergio Mattarella. The stole is reserved for Catholic heads of state; the Holy See issued no statement. Milei has described himself as Catholic who also “practices Judaism a little.” Argentina’s state intelligence agency reported Saturday that a person had been arrested over death threats against the pope, on orders from a federal court in Campana.
The meeting at the Casa Rosada thus opens under the weight of unresolved questions of social teaching, public charity, and the dignity of the vulnerable—central concerns of the Church’s mission in every nation.