Tenerife - At the conclusion of the Holy Mass presided over on the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus at the Port of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the Holy Father Leo XIV travelled by car to Tenerife Norte–Los Rodeos International Airport for the farewell ceremony from Spain.
On his arrival, at 4.30 p.m., the Pope was received by His Majesty King Felipe VI of Spain, with whom he had a brief private meeting. The Sovereign wished to thank the Pontiff for his visit, while Leo XIV said he was very pleased with the journey. After greeting the respective delegations, the Pope boarded an Iberia A320 bound for Rome.
The plans, however, were thrown into disarray by a technical fault on the aircraft placed at the disposal of the Papal Flight. Leo XIV was therefore forced to disembark. It was the Royal Household that came to the Holy See’s rescue: the Spanish Sovereign made His Majesty’s Falcon available to Prevost, his closest aides and the heads of dicasteries. The journalists, meanwhile, will return in the coming hours on a second Iberia aircraft.
The aircraft carrying the Holy Father took off from Los Rodeos at 6.08 p.m. local time. Arrival in Rome is expected at 11.00 p.m. As he left Spanish territory, Leo XIV sent the following telegram to Felipe VI:
His Majesty Felipe VI - King of Spain - Madrid Returning to Rome at the conclusion of my Apostolic Journey, I wish to express once again my gratitude to Your Majesty, the Authorities and the people of Spain, for the warm welcome and generous hospitality given to me during this visit. Assuring you and all Spaniards of my continued prayers for the peace and unity of the Nation, I cordially invoke upon each of you an abundance of divine blessings. Leo PP. XIV
The dismay of the press hacks
A dismal showing, then, and on an international scale, for the Spanish flag carrier, forced to watch the Pontiff being whisked away by a royal Falcon because of a fault on its own aircraft. An image that will not easily fade. Yet Iberia must be credited with one achievement, and not a small one: it spared the Pope the now unbearable end-of-journey press conference. That secular liturgy in which, at the end of every apostolic mission, the press hacks compete to weary the Pontiff, seeking to turn a pastoral pilgrimage into the question time of any ordinary politician.
Andrea Tornielli did not board the flight offered by the King: he is not the head of any dicastery, although he has still not understood as much, and he is not a cleric. For these gentlemen, in the end, the journey was a total flop. Tornielli flew to Spain at the Holy See’s expense, remained there without producing anything useful, took his beatings after inciting his “sworn enemies”, and on top of that even lost the return press conference. It is difficult to imagine a more eloquent ending.
P.V.
Silere non possum