On Friday, August 7, the Vatican's press office issued a brief statement: during his apostolic journey to France in late September, Pope Leo XIV will meet privately with people who suffered abuse within the Church. The communiqué added a significant detail — the victims themselves will participate in preparing the encounter. Further details, the Vatican said, would be communicated later, if appropriate.

The meeting forms part of a four-day visit running from September 25 to 28, taking in Paris, Saint-Denis, Lourdes and Metz. On the first day, the pope will be received by President Emmanuel Macron at the Élysée, visit the headquarters of UNESCO, preside over vespers at Notre-Dame Cathedral, and close the day with a prayer vigil with young people at the Stade de France. The following day he will celebrate Mass in the Place de la Concorde, where several hundred thousand people are expected, before travelling to Lourdes for an open-air Mass on Sunday. The journey ends in Metz, where Robert Schuman is buried and where the pope will deliver a "discourse on Europe."

The announcement coincided with the publication of the official programme and with the Vatican's confirmation that registrations for the various celebrations would open the following Monday. The context gives the encounter particular weight. A report by an independent commission published in October 2021 estimated that 330,000 minors were victims of sexual abuse within the Church in France. In late May, the principal collective of victims of the Bétharram Catholic school in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques — more than 200 survivors of physical and sexual violence, located some fifteen kilometres from the Lourdes sanctuary — wrote to the Conference of Bishops and the diocese of Tarbes requesting "a brief moment of audience in a spirit of prayer, blessing and truth."

The decision to announce the meeting in advance, without organisational details, appears intended to give the moment strong pastoral and symbolic value, privileging listening over communication and avoiding the risk of turning a delicate moment into a media event. It continues a pattern established by Pope Francis, who made personal encounters with survivors a significant part of his ministry, meeting groups in the Vatican and during numerous apostolic journeys. During a visit to Spain in early June, Leo XIV promised "additional efforts" and a "more effective response" to what he called the "scourge" of sexual abuse in the Church.

The image that lingers is one of preparation rather than spectacle: abuse survivors, unnamed in the announcement, helping to shape the terms of a dialogue the Vatican has deliberately left unscripted. For a Church in France that has yet to fully absorb the findings of 2021, the meeting may prove as significant as any public Mass on the itinerary.