
Rev. Michael Jonas leading worship with the congregation at Rome’s Evangelical Lutheran community. Photo: Private
Lutherans were in St Peter’s square to witness Pope Leo’s election and share hopes for progress in ecumenical relations
(LWI) - Martin Luther and the new Pope Leo XIV share the same faith formation in the Augustinian tradition, sparking fresh hopes among Lutherans in Italy that this pontificate may strengthen and “write a new page of history” in relations with the Roman Catholic Church.
On the first Sunday following the election of Cardinal Robert Prevost at the conclusion of the conclave in the Vatican, Lutherans at Rome’s Christuskirche parish met together to pray for his ministry during their regular morning worship. Afterwards, they gathered in the garden behind the neo-Romanesque church, with its magnificent marble and mosaic interior, to toast the first pope born in North-America and to share hopes on what his ministry might mean for ecumenical relations.
“I was surprised when I heard the name of this new pope, but I was so touched by his first words pointing to Christ as the source of peace,” said Rev. Michael Jonas, pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran community in Rome. “That afternoon [8 May], I was at a school meeting with other religious education teachers, but afterwards I ran down to the square and was there to see the pope appearing on the balcony of St Peter’s Basilica,” he recalls.
I think this shared theology of God’s grace could be a common basis for us.
Rev. Michael Jonas, pastor of Rome's Evangelical Lutheran community.
“When he began to speak, I heard him saying ‘I am an Augustinian, a son of St Augustine,’ and my first thought was this coincidence with Luther’s same theological formation,” Jonas continued. “I have heard that he studied German in order to be able to read Luther’s writings, so I think this shared theology of God’s grace could be a common basis for us and a very good sign for our next ecumenical steps.”
Also in St Peter’s square that evening was Viktoria Losch, a student volunteer at the Rome parish and her friend Marie Luther, who volunteers with Mediterranean Hope, a project of the Federation of Evangelical Churches in Italy to support migrants and asylum seekers. After eight months in Rome, Losch said it was “really exciting to be part of such a historic event,” alongside the estimated 100,000 people who packed into the square and surrounding streets.
“We had gone to the square the previous day, so we saw the black smoke that evening as well,” Losch recalled. “I don’t know a lot about the new pope, but I do know that the visits of the previous popes to our Lutheran church have been very important events, so I hope we can establish good connections with Pope Leo and invite him to visit us as well,” she added.

Newly elected Pope Leo XIV greets crowds from the balcony of St Peter’s Basilica. Photo: CatholicPressPhoto/A. Giuliani
Papal visits to Rome’s Lutheran church
Professor Thomas Wolfram, who serves as president of the Assembly at the Christuskirche has clear memories of both the visits of Pope Benedict in 2010 and Pope Francis in 2015. [Pope John Paul II also visited in 1983 to mark the 500th anniversary of Luther’s birth]. A surgeon and former head of the orthopaedic department at Hamburg’s university hospital, Wolfram has been in Rome for 35 years and he underlined the importance of those visits of the Bishop of Rome for forging closer ties between Lutherans and Catholics.
“My main memory of Francis’ visit to our parish was his friendship, his simplicity. He didn’t give a sermon, but he had a conversation with us and gave us a meaningful gift of a chalice and patten,” he recalled. “I think the new pope is very international and brings a new spirit that I could feel in his first speech. He is a modern man who likes to play sport, so maybe he can do something new, but I also think and hope he will continue in the way of Francis,” Wolfram said.
Another parishioner, who was present for the previous two papal visits, was Heike Vesper from Saxony, a member of the ecumenical Focolare movement who lives at its International Center in the hills outside Rome. “We were so happy and surprised at the speed of the conclave, showing that, despite so many different nationalities, the cardinals were united in the direction of the church. That’s an important sign of unity for today’s world,” she said.
Can we write a new page of history and build bridges of reconciliation between our two communions?
Heike Vesper, Christuskirche parishioner and member of the Focolare movement
Vesper noted that it was earlier Pope Leo [Pope Leo X] who was responsible for Luther’s excommunication from the Roman Catholic Church in 1520. “But now we have a new Pope Leo who comes from the same Augustinian tradition as Martin Luther. Who knows if history can help us and, with these parallels, we can write a new page of history and build bridges of reconciliation between our two communions?” she reflected.
Vesper said she believes the choice of the name Leo will also resonate with Pentecostal Christians, who remember the way another Pope Leo XIII, at the turn of the 20th century, entrusted the new century to the Holy Spirit. “I meet Pentecostals in Rome who come to pray at the tomb of the previous Pope Leo, who was also known for his commitment to social justice, and this is important for them too,” she said.
“I was so pleased with our new pope’s first words about peace and bridge building,” Vesper recalled. “I was touched by him speaking in Spanish and Italian, which made him seem more Peruvian than American,” she said, reflecting on the new pope’s two decades of service as a bishop in Peru. “He has a strong spirit of mission, a clear spirituality with God at the centre, rather than doctrine, and a strong pastoral experience from his time in Peru. This is a very good sign, because you need both strong pastoral and theological formation for ecumenical dialogue,” she concluded.