VICARIATE OF ROME

PRESS AND SOCIAL COMMUNICATIONS OFFICE

PRESS RELEASE

VISIT OF POPE LEO XIV TO THE PARISH OF THE SACRED HEART OF JESUS IN PONTE MAMMOLO

The Holy Father will meet the various members of the community and celebrate Holy Mass at 17.00

The parish of Sacred Heart of Jesus in Ponte Mammolo (Via Casal de Pazzi, 88) will receive a visit from Pope Leo XIV next Sunday, 15 March. It will be the fifth parish visit by the Pontiff and will substantially follow the protocol of the previous meetings: the Holy Father will arrive around 16.00 and will be welcomed by children, young people and their families in the courtyard of the oratory. He will then enter the parish buildings and greet the sick, a representation of the poor, and the homeless people who use the shower service in the parish complex. There will also be volunteers from Caritas and the Sant’Egidio Community who take care of them.

Then, at 17.00 Pope Leo will preside over Holy Mass, which will be concelebrated by the Cardinal Vicar Baldo Reina, Bishop-elect Marco Valenti, the parish priest Don Francis Refalo, and the parish priests of the prefecture. Don Giuseppe Argento, former parish priest of the original community of Agrigento, and Don Jesus, a young Spanish priest who discovered his priestly vocation by attending the Ponte Mammolo community while in Italy participating in the Erasmus project, will also be present. At the end of the celebration, the Pope will meet with the parish pastoral council and then the priests who work and live in the parish. Finally, he will greet the faithful outside the church and then return to the Vatican.

“The news that the Pope will come to visit us has caused great excitement”, comments the parish priest Don Francis Refalo, originally from Malta, whom everyone affectionately calls “Don Franz”. “Many people have come, even those who do not usually attend the parish, and they want to help. It has lit a flame in them”. The Rebibbia prison is also part of the same area. “This proximity is a special vocation for our parish”, the priest emphasizes. “If we find ourselves here, it is not by chance, it is a reality to which we must respond. There is the desire to build studio flats for people on day release”.

There is a great deal of attention towards our brothers who are inmates, but also towards the elderly, the sick, the young, for whom the summer oratory has been opened. There are also many foreigners living in the area, from Asian countries such as the Philippines, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, but most of all Latin America, especially Peru. “A Peruvian family who attend our parish every day will participate”, says Don Franz. “They have a twelve-year-old daughter, who will receive the sacraments of Christian initiation during the Easter Vigil”. The parish is close to the migrants in the area in many different ways: with the listening Centre, and with the Italian language school for foreigners, active for twenty years and “which helps not only with integration but also becomes accompaniment”, remarks the parish priest.

Journalists and media operators who wish to participate must apply, no later than 24 hours before the event, exclusively via the Holy See Press Office online accreditation system at press.vatican.va/accreditamenti

12 March 2026

Giulia Rocchi
Press and Social Communications Office of the Vicariate of Rome
tel. +390669886343/150; +393393749085
e-mail stampa@diocesidiroma.it; giulia.rocchi@diocesidiroma.it