People wait for the arrival of Pope Leo XIV at the De la Croix hospital in Jal el Dib, Lebanon, Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Pope Leo XIV will offer a silent prayer at the site of the 2020 Beirut port explosion as he wraps up his first foreign trip to Turkey and Lebanon on Tuesday.

He also will meet with relatives of some of the 218 victims of the blast on Aug. 4, 2020. The explosion tore through Beirut and did billions of dollars in damage after hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate detonated in a warehouse.

No official has been convicted in a judicial investigation that has been repeatedly obstructed, angering Lebanese for whom the blast was just the latest crisis after decades of corruption and financial crimes. When he arrived in Lebanon on Sunday, Leo urged the country’s political leaders to pursue the truth as a means of peace and reconciliation in the country.

Leo sought to bring a message of peace to Lebanon as it copes with years of economic and political crises.

The American pope opens his final day with a visit to the De La Croix hospital, which specializes in care for people with psychological problems, and is expected to close with a Mass along the Beirut waterfront before returning to Rome.

On Monday, he presided over a gathering of Lebanon’s Christian and Muslim spiritual leaders, celebrating the country’s interfaith coexistence as a potent message of peace in the conflict-plagued region.

Here is the latest:

Leo speaks for the vulnerable

Pope Leo XIV has encouraged the Lebanese people to remember the most vulnerable among them.

Leo made an emotional visit Tuesday to the De La Croix hospital, which cares primarily for people with psychological problems.

The mother superior of the congregation that runs the hospital, Mother Marie Makhlouf, was overcome as she welcomed the pope. She told him that her hospital cares for the “forgotten souls, burdened by their loneliness.”

In his remarks to the patients and staff, Leo said the facility stands as a reminder to all of humanity.

“We cannot forget those who are most fragile. We cannot conceive of a society that races ahead at full speed clinging to the false myths of wellbeing, while at the same time ignoring so many situations of poverty and vulnerability," he said.

Leo is on the final day of his visit to Lebanon, his first foreign trip as pope.

Pope greeted at hospital

Pope Leo XIV has arrived at one of the Middle East's oldest psychiatric hospitals, the De La Croix hospital in Beirut’s northern suburb of Jal el-Dib, where he will meet with patients as well as nuns who work at the facility.

The road leading leading there was lined by thousands of women, men and children who waved Lebanese and Vatican flags. The pope was then received upon arrival by officials at the hospital, where about 175 nuns work.

The hospital visit is the pope's first activity Tuesday, which is his third and last day in Lebanon.

The hospital has a capacity of 1,200 patients and currently has about 700 patients mostly being treated for mental health illness and epilepsy and some for drug addiction.

A hall inside was packed with hundreds of patients and scores of nuns

“There was a rainbow over the monastery of the cross today. This is a sign of grace and blessing. We will not say anything more than God’s word,” said Jihan Khoriaty, a nun who works at the the De La Croix hospital. “The word of nature today was the biggest good sign."

Family member speaks about 2020 Beirut explosion

Ahead of his large public mass in the Lebanese capital’s seaside waterfront on Tuesday, Pope Leo XIV will hold a silent prayer nearby at the site of the deadly Beirut port explosion with some families of the 218 victims.

The blast on Aug. 4, 2020, was fueled by hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate stored in the port and flattened several neighborhoods.

Leo’s late predecessor, Pope Francis, openly advocated for the families.

Mireille Khoury, who lost her 15-year-old son Elias, is one of the family members who will join the prayer.

“I will not say that this anger will fully just disappear,” Khoury told The Associated Press before Leo’s visit. “But I think it will give some sort of relaxation of this anger that is in my heart until justice is served.”

An ongoing probe that has implicated a long list of politicians, judicial and security officials continues to face obstructions as families push for international support including from the Vatican.

Lebanon will never heal from its wounds without justice and the port blast probe could set a precedent, Khoury said.

“Justice is the basis of building any country,” she said. “Our children were killed in their homes. They were killed because someone kept (ammonium) nitrate in the main port of the city near a residential area.”

Crowd awaits pope at De La Croix hospital

Among those waiting to greet Pope Leo at the De La Croix hospital are throngs of children dressed as Swiss Guards in colorful gold, red and blue ceremonial uniforms.

Seamstresses worked for three months to make the outfits for the children, Sister Teresa Azar said.

The crowd also includes cardinals in their red cassocks and a boy dressed as the pope in white.

Pope Leo to hold silent prayer at Beirut blast site

Pope Leo XIV will offer a silent prayer at the site of the 2020 Beirut port explosion.

Leo also was expected to meet with relatives of some of the 218 victims of the blast, which tore through Beirut and did billions of dollars in damage after hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate detonated in a warehouse.

Five years on, no official has been convicted in a judicial investigation that has been repeatedly obstructed, angering Lebanese for whom the blast was just the latest crisis after decades of corruption and financial crimes.

News from © The Associated Press, 2025