Pope Leo XIV has arrived in Beirut for a three-day visit focused on political talks and interfaith outreach. The pope said he wanted to bring a message of peace to the region, while Israel continued strikes on Islamist militias in southern Lebanon and Gaza. In the Lebanese capital, the pontiff met political leaders from the country's three main religious communities: President Joseph Aoun, a Christian; Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, a Shiite Muslim; and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, a Sunni Muslim.
Screenshot CBS News foreign correspondent Chris Livesay gifted Pope Leo XIV a prized baseball bat once owned by a Chicago White Sox legend. On Thursday, Livesay was aboard the papal plane for a trip to Turkey. In a video posted online, Livesay explained his plan to give the Pope a special bat that had been in his family's possession for years. The bat, he revealed, once belonged to star second baseman Nellie Fox.
On the second day of his inaugural foreign trip, Pope Leo XIV visited the site where early Christian leaders met 1,700 years ago for the First Council of Nicaea the gathering that produced the creed still spoken in churches today. The first American pope prayed alongside Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the spiritual leader of the world's Eastern Orthodox Christians, amid the archaeological ruins of the lakeside church where bishops met in 325 to resolve divisions threatening to tear the early Church apart.
Pope Leo XIV set off for his first foreign trip to Turkey and Lebanon on Thursday, arriving in Ankara for the first leg of his visit. The trip is being seen as an opportunity to strengthen relations between those of the Christian and Muslim faith. The primary focus is to mark the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea Christianity's first ecumenical council that produced the Nicene Creed that is still used by most of the world's Christians today.
Pope Leo has embarked on his first foreign trip as Catholic leader with a visit to two Muslim-majority countries of Turkiye and Lebanon, where he is expected to make appeals for peace in the Middle East, ravaged by conflicts, and urge unity among long-divided Christian churches. The pontiff, who has a crowded three-day itinerary in Turkiye starting on Thursday, before heading on to Lebanon, will be closely watched as he makes his first speeches overseas and visits sensitive cultural sites.
