In a deeply symbolic incident, King Charles III has become the first British sovereign in 500 years to join a Catholic Pope in prayer.
Although Charles has met the last three Popes, the meetings have never included joint prayers.
The 76-year-old Monarch and his wife, Queen Camilla, joined the Pope Leo XIV in the Sistine Chapel for a 30-minute service mixing Catholic and Anglican traditions.
The Pope led the Sistine Chapel service with the Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, currently the senior Cleric of the Church of England, while Charles and Camilla sat next to them.
The Pope and Archbishop led a midday prayer comprising psalms and a Gospel reading. Michaelangelo’s frescoed chapel was filled with a number of ecumenical guests, including the Archbishop of Westminster and President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, Cardinal Vincent Nichols, and the Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh, Leo Cushley, representing the Scottish episcopate.
Attended by Catholic and Anglican clerics, politicians and diplomats, the service centred on conservation and protecting the environment, a cause long championed by Charles.
The Sistine Chapel choir was joined by that from Saint George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, one of the king’s residences.
Originally scheduled for April, the visit was cancelled due to Pope Francis’ ill health. One of its goals was to highlight the shared commitment of King Charles and the Argentine Pope to the care of Creation — ten years after the publication of the encyclical Laudato si’.
Moreover, the ecumenical prayer service, held in Latin and English, built upon the good relations between the Vatican and the United Kingdom. It also fulfilled a wish of King Charles, who, as Supreme Governor of the Church of England, has long been committed to interfaith engagement.
The highlight of the royals’ state visit to the Holy See, the ceremony marked a significant rapprochement between the two churches.
It was the first time a reigning English or British monarch has prayed publicly with a pope since king Henry VIII broke with the Roman Catholic Church in 1534.
Triggered by the then Pope’s refusal to annul Henry’s marriage so he could marry another woman, the schism made the monarch head of the separate Church of England.
King Charles, who is officially supreme governor of the Anglican mother church, earlier had his first meeting with Pope Leo, who took over as head of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics in May following the death of Pope Francis.
Prior to the joint service, King Charles and Pope Leo spoke together in the papal library, before exchanging gifts to mark the King’s visit.
King Charles presented the Pope with an Icon of St Edward the Confessor, an 11th century English king renowned for his devotion to the Catholic faith.
In return, Pope Leo gifted King Charles a scale version of a mosaic of Christ Pantocrator – it depicts Jesus in a Normal cathedral in Sicily.
The King also met with the Vatican’s Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, who became the first papal representative to attend the coronation of a British monarch in 500 years when he accepted an invitation to the crowning of King Charles in 2023.
King Charles Made Royal Confrater
Thursday’s ceremony was another significant step as King Charles was also officially made a Royal Confrater, which means brother, and will be gifted a wooden chair to be used by future English Monarchs in Rome’s Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls.
The King also conferred two titles onto Pope Leo, making him Papal Confrater of Saint George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, and conferring on him the Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath.
A Spokesperson for King Charles described the visit as “historic”, adding closer ties between both churches would act as a “bulwark against those promoting conflict, division and tyranny.”
King Charles’ visit also comes at a delicate time for Charles following new revelations about his brother Prince Andrew, who is mired in a scandal surrounding late US sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
