Asger Risom
A meeting of two spiritual leaders amid health concerns
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Pope Francis received King Charles III and Queen Camilla on Wednesday during their official visit to Italy.
The meeting, held privately at the Vatican, marked the monarch’s first audience with the pontiff since ascending the British throne.
The Vatican released a photo from the encounter, which had initially been cancelled due to the pope’s ongoing recovery from pneumonia.
In an official statement, the Vatican noted that Pope Francis offered the royal couple “his best wishes for their wedding anniversary and a speedy recovery” to the king, who is currently undergoing treatment for cancer.
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Buckingham Palace also confirmed the meeting, stating the royal couple were “delighted that the pope felt well enough to receive them and offer his personal greetings.”
Health challenges for both Pope Francis and King Charles
The audience took place amid ongoing health concerns for both leaders. Pope Francis, now 88, recently returned to the Vatican following a five-week hospitalization for double pneumonia. He remains in a fragile state, with a visibly reduced public schedule.
King Charles, meanwhile, is continuing cancer treatment.
The nature of the illness has not been made public, but the monarch was briefly hospitalized in late March and resumed public duties at the start of April.
As reported by Digi24, the meeting had originally been scheduled for Tuesday but was postponed by mutual agreement due to the pope’s health.
Their last meeting took place in 2019, when Charles was still heir to the British throne.
A long history of royal visits to the Holy See
Though this was King Charles’s first visit to the Vatican as monarch, it marked his sixth overall audience with a pope.
His past visits include notable moments such as attending the funeral of Pope John Paul II in 2005 and the 2019 canonization of Cardinal John Henry Newman — a former Anglican who converted to Catholicism.
The meeting also carries historical and spiritual weight.
As Supreme Governor of the Church of England, Charles leads a denomination that diverged from Roman Catholicism during the reign of Henry VIII. The Anglican Church now counts around 85 million adherents worldwide.
Despite doctrinal differences — including the Anglican allowance for married clergy and the ordination of women — the encounter between Charles and Francis underscores a continued effort toward interfaith dialogue and mutual respect between two of the world’s most influential Christian institutions.
