Papal visit coincides with Leo’s first anniversary of pontificate.
Naples is to close every school in the city on Friday 8 May as Pope Leo XIV makes a pastoral visit to the Campanian capital – a day that marks one year since his election as pontiff.
Naples mayor Gaetano Manfredi signed an order directing the closure of all schools of every level and type across the city, including nurseries, both public and private, all day on Friday.
The municipal authority stated that the measure was necessary to “guarantee the safety of citizens” and “the smooth running of the event”, noting that the papal procession would pass through several streets and major arteries of the city.
The council also cited a need to prevent disruption to school transport services and the provision of school meals, both of which could be affected by traffic restrictions.
Papal visit
The visit to Naples forms the afternoon leg of a longer day that begins in Pompeii, where the pope will preside over the traditional Supplication to the Virgin of the Holy Rosary at midday – a Marian devotion of particular personal significance to Leo XIV.
On the morning of 8 May 2025, the second day of the conclave, the Dean of the College of Cardinals celebrated Mass at the Pompeii shrine, and that same afternoon the white smoke rose above the Sistine Chapel to signal the election of Robert Francis Prevost as Pope Leo XIV.
The pope is due to arrive in Naples at 15.00, where he will be welcomed by Cardinal Domenico Battaglia, Archbishop of Naples.
Leo will meet clergy and members of consecrated life at the cathedral, before proceeding privately to the Royal Chapel of the Treasury of Saint Gennaro for Eucharistic adoration and to venerate the relics of the city’s patron saint.
Tens of thousands of people are expected to throng the central Piazza del Plebiscito for the papal greeting, with some 20,000 already registered ahead of the pope’s anticipated arrival there just after 17.00.
The gathering will conclude with an Act of Entrustment to the Virgin Mary before Pope Leo imparts his Apostolic Blessing and departs for the Vatican at 18.45.
The Pompeii and Naples visit – which comes the day after US secretary of state Marco Rubio travels to the Vatican for talks – is the first in a series of pastoral trips Pope Leo has planned across Italy in the coming months, including a visit to the island of Lampedusa on 4 July.
Photo credit: Riccardo De Luca – Update / Shutterstock.com
