Vatican: King Charles and Pope Leo XIV will pray together in the Sistine Chapel

For the first time since the Protestant Reformation, a reigning British monarch and a Pope will pray together publicly during a state visit to the Vatican.

King Charles III will participate in an ecumenical prayer for the care of creation presided over by Pope Leo XIV inside the Sistine Chapel, on October 23, under the ceiling decorated by Michelangelo, during his first state visit to the Vatican with Queen Camilla.

The Sistine Chapel Choir will sing alongside the Choir of St. George’s Chapel of England and the Choir of Her Majesty’s Royal Chapel in this historic ecumenical prayer, centered on praising God the Creator, according to Vatican officials.

Stephen Cottrell, Anglican Archbishop of York, will also participate. The visit will mark the first meeting between King Charles and Pope Leo XIV. Both will meet first privately in the Apostolic Palace in the morning and, later, businessmen will join them in the Royal Room of the palace to discuss the care of creation and environmental sustainability.

During the state visit, Cardinal James Michael Harvey, Archpriest of the basilica, will confer on King Charles the title of Royal Confraternity of the Papal Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls during an ecumenical ceremony at the tomb of St. Paul on the same day. The Pope does not plan to attend.

The title, granted with the approval of Leo

The Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls maintains a historical connection with the English monarchy. Following the arrival in England of Roman missionary monks such as Saint Augustine of Canterbury and Saint Paulinus of York in the 6th and 7th centuries, Saxon kings such as Offa and Æthelwulf contributed to the maintenance of the tombs of the Apostles in Rome.

In the late Middle Ages, the kings of England were recognized as protectors of the Basilica and Abbey of St. Paul, and their heraldic shield incorporated the insignia of the Order of the Garter. That tradition was interrupted by the Reformation and the centuries of estrangement that followed.

It was the mother of the current monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, who became the first British sovereign since the Reformation to make an official visit to the Holy See, meeting with John XXIII in 1961. Years later, in 1966, Pope Paul VI received Archbishop Michael Ramsey of Canterbury in the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls, initiating formal dialogue between Catholics and Anglicans for the first time since the 16th century.

Without establishing a formal role for King Charles and his successors, the title of Royal Confraternity should be understood as a gesture of hospitality and ecumenical welcome that bears witness to those historical ties and the progress achieved since 1966, Pace said.

The basilica will also install a specially commissioned chair for the monarch, decorated with his coat of arms and a verse from the Gospel of John in Latin: That they may be one (May they all be one). The chair will remain in the basilica for use by King Charles and his heirs on future visits.

The ecumenical ceremony in St Paul’s Basilica on 23 October will be presided over by Fr Donato Ogliari, Abbot of the Basilica, with the participation of Anglican Archbishop Stephen Cottrell of York and the Rev Rosie Frew, Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.

The celebration will conclude with a hymn composed on a text by Saint John Henry Newman, the English cardinal convert from Anglicanism whom Pope Leo XIV will proclaim a Doctor of the Church on November 1. King Charles attended his canonization in 2019 and recently became the first monarch to visit the Birmingham Oratory, the priestly community founded by Newman in 1848.

Translated and adapted by the ACI Prensa team. Originally published in CNA.