Pope Leo honoured Barcelona’s sacred Sagrada Familia Basilica on the centenary of the death of its architect, Antoni Gaudi, with a Mass on Wednesday under its soaring sandcastle spires.
Leo lit a candle and prayed at the tomb of Gaudi in the basilica’s crypt before the service, the highlight of Leo’s weeklong visit to Spain.
It is the first by a pope in 15 years to a once staunchly Catholic European country that, like many others, has experienced secularising trends.
The trip, though, has underscored how the country of 50 million people, which experienced a religious crisis after its 20th century dictatorship ended, still has plenty of faithful Catholics who have turned out in droves to welcome the American pope.
Tens of thousands of people lined the streets around Sagrada Familia awaiting Leo’s arrival, with streets closed to traffic and a heavy police presence, given that the country’s royal family was due to attend.
After the Mass, Leo was also to consecrate the final Tower of Jesus Christ atop the basilica that has made it the world’s tallest church.
“The entire structure of the Sagrada Familia is striking,” said Laura Rincon, who was waiting along with two friends for the pope, after she finished work in a nearby shop.
She said that she was sure the pope would be impressed by the church she marvels at every time she passes by.
“If you look at it just for its architecture, it is amazing,” she said. “Inside, its columns make you feel like you are inside a forest.”
Earlier on Wednesday, Leo celebrated the centuries-old Catalan tradition of popular piety by praying at Montserrat, a mountain complex outside the city that is dear to many Catalans.
The complex, which includes an 11th-century Benedictine abbey and a 16th-century basilica, is revered for its Black Madonna statue and is home to a boy’s choir that has existed since the 13th century and is Europe’s oldest.
Thousands of faithful arrived early at the monastery, with groups of nuns and schoolchildren singing and waving signs and photographs of the pope outside the basilica.
Bells rang out over the spire-like rock formations that top Montserrat and the valley below as Leo arrived in a golf cart.
In his remarks to the faithful in the abbey, Leo said that Montserrat for centuries has been a place of peace and reconciliation in a world marked by violence, “criticism that humiliates, condemnation that destroys and aggression that divides”.
He urged Spaniards to follow in the “path of mercy, reconciliation, truth and gentleness”.
In recent years, the Montserrat abbey has faced numerous accusations from survivors of clergy sexual abuse and was included in the Spanish ombudsman’s 800-page report on the crisis in 2023.
The report found 15 victims and three alleged perpetrators linked to the abbey.
“It’s very painful because there are members of the church who committed errors,” said the Reverend Cesario Escarda, a Toledo priest, as he waited for Leo at the abbey.
“What the pope wants to do is shine a light on the truth and ask forgiveness and bring in the victims and listen to them and accompany them.”
The highlight of Leo’s visit was expected to be his Mass on Wednesday evening in Barcelona at Sagrada Familia.
The Mass commemorates the 100th anniversary of the death of its designer, Gaudi, who died at age 73, three days after he was hit by a tram.
A century after construction began during the pontificate of Leo’s namesake, Pope Leo XIII, the basilica has become one of the world’s most visited but unfinished monuments, annually drawing upward of five million visitors a year.
Gaudi, the famed Catalan architect who is on the path to possible sainthood, spent four decades designing and building the temple as the summary of the Christian faith carved in stone.
The most important stories of Jesus’s life, the Nativity and Passion, are etched into the basilica’s east and west facades.
A third facade facing south, the Glory, will serve as the basilica’s main entrance when finished.
