Pope Leo XIV visits Pavia’s CNAO and honors St. Frances Cabrini in Lombardy

On 20 June 2026 Pope Leo XIV began his northern‑Italy summer tour in Pavia. Arriving by helicopter, he entered the National Centre for Hadrotherapy Oncology (CNAO) – one of only a handful of such facilities worldwide – where he met the centre’s directors, more than 200 staff members and families of patients. The pontiff praised the centre’s use of proton and carbon‑ion beams to treat complex tumours, highlighted the link between scientific research and the church’s call to serve the sick, and personally greeted dozens of children receiving care.

After a short prayer at the Basilica of St. Augustine, Leo XIV travelled to the nearby town of Sant’Angelo Lodigiano, the birthplace of Mother Frances Cabrini, the first U.S.‑born saint and patron of migrants. He prayed before Cabrini’s relics, called her a model for Christians to care for migrants, and urged young people to learn about her missionary legacy. The visit underscored the Vatican’s emphasis on migration as a pressing humanitarian issue, echoing the pope’s recent appeals in Spain’s Canary Islands and foreshadowing a planned stop in Lampedusa.