After praying the Sunday Angelus at his summer season retreat in Castel Gandolfo, Leo headed to the astronomical observatory positioned within the Pontifical Villas.
ROME, Metropolitan Metropolis of Rome Capital — Pope Leo XIV marked the 56th anniversary of man’s arrival on the moon Sunday with a go to to the Vatican astronomical observatory in Castel Gandolfo and a name to astronaut Buzz Aldrin.
After praying the Sunday Angelus at his summer season retreat in Castel Gandolfo, Leo headed to the astronomical observatory positioned within the Pontifical Villas, the place he took an in depth take a look at the telescopes which have supported celestial exploration from a faith-based perspective for many years.
The pontiff was accompanied by astronomers and college students taking part within the conventional summer season faculty organized by the observatory.
This was Pope Leo’s first go to to the observatory, based in 1891 by Leo XIII. The primary imaginative and prescient of it, nevertheless, may be traced again to the institution by Pope Gregory XIII of a fee aimed toward learning the scientific knowledge and implications of the calendar reform that happened in 1582.
The Vatican Observatory has generated top-notch analysis from its scientist-clerics, drawing lecturers to its meteorite assortment, which incorporates bits of Mars and is taken into account among the many world’s greatest.
Later Sunday, the pope known as astronaut Buzz Aldrin, who shared with Neil Armstrong and Michael Collins the historic 1969 moonwalk.
“This night, 56 years after the Apollo 11 moon touchdown, I spoke with the astronaut Buzz Aldrin,” Pope Leo wrote on his X account. “Collectively we shared the reminiscence of a historic feat, an affidavit to human ingenuity, and we mirrored on the thriller and greatness of Creation.”
Pope Leo then blessed the astronaut, his household and his collaborators.
There are a couple of precedents of papal calls to “area.”
In 2011, Pope Benedict XVI rang the area station and requested about the way forward for the planet and the environmental dangers it confronted.
Earlier than Benedict, Pope Paul VI despatched a radio message to astronauts Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins after their moonwalk, calling them “conquerors of the Moon.”
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