Pope aboard papal plane: ‘I travel to France to proclaim Christ’s peace’

By Isabella H. de Carvalho – Aboard papal plane

“Buongiorno a tutti! Bonjour! Good morning! As we say in English, welcome on board! Happy to see you all this morning, happy to greet you,” Pope Leo XIV said on the flight headed to France, as he begins his fifth international Apostolic Journey from September 25 to 28, which will bring him to Paris, Lourdes, and Metz.

“I, above all, am travelling to France, as to anywhere else in the world, as a follower of Jesus Christ wanting to proclaim peace, the peace of Christ throughout the world. It is a message which at this time, as we all know, is particularly important,” the Pope said to journalists travelling with him.

He thanked them for their work and noted that this Journey will touch on “a number of very important topics.”

More than 80 journalists form over 10 countries filled the airplane seats which had a head seat cover with the Pope’s coat of arms embroidered, along with the logo of ITA Airways, the Italian carrier operating the flight.

Members of the press were armed with notebooks, phones, laptops, photo cameras, and other equipment, as they got ready to relay to viewers, listeners and readers across the world everything about the Pope’s journey.

Across the aisles one could hear a myriad of languages: Spanish, English, Portuguese, Italian, French, of course, and many more.

The Pope took this opportunity to “apologize personally” for the fact that on his last Apostolic Journey to Spain in June 2026, due to a technical issue on the papal plane, the journalists returned to Rome on a separate flight from the Pope and thus the usual inflight press conference could not be held.

“I know,” he said, that this incident “left a number of you unhappy with the fact that we could not have the flight back together, back to Rome,” the Pope acknowledged.

Exchanges with the press

The Pope then greeted every journalist present individually, and many took the opportunity to exchange jokes, ask questions, or offer gifts.

Asked by a CNN reporter about his fellow colleagues who had issues accessing the White House in recent weeks, the Pope responded that he was “very happy that here you are all welcome and good coverage, I think, is very important and that we have it all the way around, for everyone.”

A New York Times journalist asked the Pope about the development of AI to which he answered: “Our Vatican Commission, in fact, is in contact with many of the leaders in the AI world, and we are continuing, if you will, the dialogue that I hope to have begun or continued in the encyclical. And I think from their perspective, many of them, they’re very much open to looking for ways of making sure that AI does not displace or ultimately destroy humanity, but rather than be a tool for human beings. Good things are beginning at least.”

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Another American journalist for the National Catholic Reporter asked the Pope if he will support his alma mater, Villanova University, in an upcoming basketball game to be held in Rome against Notre Dame. “They tell me that the people coming to the match, 90% are from Villanova and 10% Notre Dame, so the voice of the people of God will be very strong on the Villanova side,” the Pope replied.

A reporter from OSV News, an American publication, asked the Pope about the beatification of Archbishop Fulton Sheen and what he meant to the Pope personally.

“We watched him as a family, and it was a way of spending some time together as a family with the truth, the teachings that he shared in such a enthusiastic, lively way, especially considering that day and age watching on TV, this Catholic bishop, who was originally from Illinois,” said the Pope. “The message that he had was something that really came home to people. I think it helped us as a family, for example.”

In response to questions about his fluency in French, the Pope answered he has been practicing a little bit, but specified he is not using Duolingo anymore, as had been reported in certain media outlets.

A journalist working for the Spanish radio COPE gave the Pope a cross made out of the wood from the wildfires that devastated the Western Mediterranean country this summer. Around 300,000 hectares burned in Spain this year according to the European Forest Fire Information System. The cross contains charred remains collected near the Chapel of Our Lady of La Nueva in Getafe, Madrid, one of the few churches spared by the flames.

“In the face of natural disasters, we must show responsibility and care for our common home,” the Pope said. Above all, he added, we must “pray”, explaining that this is the first thing he does when faced with such tragedies. 

A Venezuelan photojournalist gave him a book with 74 letters from survivors from the earthquake that devastated the nation in June and caused over 6,000 deaths.

Another Spanish journalist asked him about the migration crisis in Ceuta, the Spanish enclave in northern Africa, to which he answered that he has followed the issue since the beginning and that responses need to be found in order to avoid this emergency. “It was really a humanitarian crisis,” he said.