German Chancellor Angela Merkel will be received by Pope Francis in audience at the Vatican on October 7. She will then participate with the Pontiff in the meeting for peace organized by Sant'Egidio near the Colosseum.
German Federal Government spokesperson Steffen Seibert announced this on October 1.
This will likely be the last papal audience for Merkel as Chancellor, after 16 years as head of the German government.
Elected in 2005, a few months after the death of John Paul II, she only visited Rome once during the pontificate of her compatriot Benedict XVI, in 2006.
She was present at the inauguration mass of the pontificate of Francis, and has come to the Vatican three times since, in 2013, 2015 and 2017.
In recent years, a senior official at the Curia told I.Media, Merkel was one of the political leaders who knocked on the door of the Holy See "in search of wisdom."
"Help me be a leader," she even asked the Holy Father during one of their private chats.
