Maronite Patriarch Elias Hoyek

Pope Leo XIV receives Spain’s atheist president amid a political crisis in the country he is about to visit

The approximately 45-minute private audience between Sánchez and the Pope unfolded against a turbulent domestic backdrop. On the same day, Spanish political debate was dominated by developments involving investigations linked to the Socialist Party and the legal scrutiny surrounding former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero