Mikhail Gorbachev once declared that while he remained an atheist, he had to admit that Soviet Communism had never produced anyone quite like Saint Francis, the Poor Man of Assisi, and his universal humanistic appeal.
The former Soviet premier, who visited Assisi in 2008, is one in a long list of global figures who’ve been drawn to the home of Saint Francis over the years, from Tariq Aziz, the Foreign Minister of Iraq under Sadaam Hussein and a Chaldean Catholic, to former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and even rock stars such as Bruce Springsteen and Patti Smith. (The Catholic Herald, admittedly with a slightly less well known band of individuals, was also drawn there on pilgrimage in 2023.)
