Side view of Notre-Dame de Paris Cathedral in the French capital, Paris / Available for publication and general news use under the Creative Commons CC0 Public Domain Dedication.

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Paris – Attention is focused on Pope Leo XIV’s three-day visit to France, which is expected to place particular emphasis on the situation of Christians in the Middle East, especially during his scheduled stop at Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, where he will pray in a chapel dedicated to the Eastern Christian Churches and meet representatives of those churches.

According to a report published by The National on September 24, 2026, the Pope’s visit to France will include a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron, as well as a visit to the headquarters of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and prayers at Notre-Dame Cathedral, which reopened in December 2024 following years of restoration after the devastating fire that struck the cathedral in 2019.

A Chapel Dedicated to Eastern Christians at the Heart of Notre-Dame

The Pope’s visit to Notre-Dame carries particular significance because the cathedral houses a chapel dedicated to the Eastern Christian Churches, which was unveiled in conjunction with the cathedral’s reopening.

Monsignor Hugues de Woillemont, director of L’Oeuvre d’Orient, explained that the chapel contains eight icons representing different Eastern Churches and is open to visitors.

The icons are connected to regions associated with the early history of Christianity, including Jerusalem, Baghdad, Armenia, Ethiopia, and India, highlighting the Eastern roots of Christianity and the historical diversity of the Eastern Churches.

Pope Leo XIV is scheduled to pray in the chapel during his visit before meeting representatives of the Eastern Churches based in France.

De Woillemont said the Pope’s visit to the chapel would be an important moment, recalling Pope John Paul II’s famous reference to the Church needing to breathe with “two lungs,” Eastern and Western, highlighting the historic connection between the two branches of Christianity.

Support for Christians in the Middle East

Pope Leo XIV’s visit comes at a time when Christian communities in the Middle East have experienced a sustained demographic decline over recent decades, according to the report.

As an indication of the Pope’s interest in the region, he chose Lebanon as the first country outside the Vatican that he visited in December, a country home to one of the largest Christian communities in the region.

The history of L’Oeuvre d’Orient itself is closely linked to Lebanon. The organization was founded in 1858 to support Christian schools before expanding its activities to other countries across the Middle East.

The report noted that the organization took part last year in the reconstruction of two churches in Mosul, Iraq, which had been destroyed by ISIS.

“The Disappearance of Christians Means Losing an Entire Chapter of History”

De Woillemont stressed the importance of Christians remaining in their ancestral countries, arguing that their presence is not only a religious matter but also represents an integral part of the history of the societies in which they live.

The report quoted him as saying that Christians who choose to remain in their countries represent an important part of those nations’ history, warning that their disappearance would mean losing an entire chapter of the region’s history.

His remarks come amid continued Christian emigration from several Middle Eastern countries due to wars, conflicts, political and security instability, and economic pressures.

Visit to Paris, Lourdes and Metz

Pope Leo XIV is scheduled to celebrate an outdoor Mass in Paris, with approximately 600,000 people expected to attend in the Champs-Élysées and Place de la Concorde areas.

After Paris, the Pope will travel to Lourdes, one of France’s most prominent Christian pilgrimage sites, before concluding his visit in the eastern French city of Metz, where he is expected to deliver an address on world peace in the presence of several European leaders.

The visit is an apostolic visit rather than an official state visit, although the Pope will deliver a speech at the Élysée Palace after arriving in France. President Macron, meanwhile, will not attend the Masses celebrated by the Pope during the visit.

According to an adviser to the French president, whose remarks were quoted by the newspaper, relations between France and Pope Leo XIV have developed in the context of a number of international crises, including the war in Ukraine and the conflict in the Middle East, as well as global issues such as artificial intelligence and climate change.

The adviser stressed that France has long maintained a clear position on protecting Christians in the Middle East, pointing to close cooperation in this area.