# Patti Smith Reflects On Meeting Pope Leo XIV: ‘A Moment That Will Forever Produce a Smile’

- URL: https://talkfuse.com/story/patti-smith-reflects-on-meeting-pope-leo-xiv-a-moment-that-will-forever-produce-a-smile/
- Published: 2026-08-01T22:27:56+00:00
- Updated: 2026-08-25T20:44:19+00:00
- Original publisher: Billboard
- Original article: https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/patti-smith-pope-leo-xiv-meet-photo-1236307650/
- Topics: Music

## Key points

- Patti Smith met Pope Leo XIV privately at the Vatican on 31 July.
- The 40-minute meeting echoed her 1979 song about a former pope.
- Smith has a long-standing Vatican connection, having also met Pope Francis.

## Summary

Singer Patti Smith met Pope Leo XIV in a private audience at the Apostolic Palace on 31 July, an encounter she later described on Instagram as "a moment that shall forever produce a smile." The meeting underscores Smith's increasingly close relationship with the Vatican, built through her friendship with Rev. Antonio Spadaro, a senior official in the Vatican's culture ministry, despite Smith not being Catholic herself.

The roughly 40-minute conversation, described by Spadaro as feeling like two old friends reconnecting, echoed Smith's 1979 song "Wave," written about an imagined talk with the short-lived Pope John Paul I; Leo recognised the tune and called it "marvelous." Smith, who also met Pope Francis in 2013 and performed for him in 2014, wrote a tribute poem after his death in April 2025. She had earlier performed at the Vatican's Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in May, and her audience with Leo came days after the pontiff also hosted a concert by tenor Andrea Bocelli.

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