A new papacy involves both steady continuity and great change, and the arrival of Leo XIV has been no different. Thanks to the media-saturated world in which we live, there was great anticipation prior to his first foreign trip, not merely for the voyage itself but for the in-flight press conference on the return journey.
Would he even hold one, Vaticanistas asked themselves, or would he leave that as a chapter which closed with the death of Francis?
Such plane pressers often proved to be among the more controversial moments of the Francis papacy, with his seemingly off-the-cuff remarks about doctrine, morality and even politics delighting journalists eager to make a splash with the headlines. It was returning from his first international trip to World Youth Day in Brazil in July 2013 that Francis’s famous “who am I to judge” phrase was made. Given Leo’s notably measured and more precise style of language, it was hard to envisage what form such an in-flight conference might take.
