At an open-air Mass in Douala attended by more than 120,000 people on Friday, Pope Leo XIV delivered a passionate plea for peace as the second leg of his 11-day Africa tour continued. The US-born pontiff — preaching in French to a crowd waving Vatican flags and “branches of peace” — told those who had come from afar: “Do not give in to distrust and discouragement. Reject every form of abuse or violence, which deceives with easy gains but hardens the heart and makes it insensitive.”
Leo called on Cameroonians to be “protagonists of the future,” addressing frustration tied to conflict and greed across the continent where many “hunger for peace, freedom and justice.” After the Mass he planned to visit a Catholic hospital in Douala and then return to Yaoundé to speak with university students and professors.
The pope also took aim at economic exploitation, criticizing “those who, in the name of profit, continue to lay their hands on the African continent to exploit and plunder it.” He urged national leaders to root out corruption and warned against abuses carried out in the name of maintaining civic order, remarks delivered in the presence of President Paul Biya, who has led the country since 1982. Critics say security forces violently suppressed demonstrations after Biya’s reelection last October, killing dozens.
Leo’s stop in Cameroon follows earlier stops on the trip—including an interfaith peace conference in Bamenda, the center of a nearly decade-long separatist uprising that has killed thousands. He emphasized the growing importance of Africa to the Catholic Church — some 290 million Catholics on the continent, roughly 20.3 percent of the Church’s global membership — and spoke directly to young people facing high unemployment and the strains of internal conflict and entrenched power structures.
The visit comes amid heightened scrutiny of the pope’s public statements. He has recently been criticized by US President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance after denouncing the folly of war and the misuse of religion to justify violence.
Archbishop of Douala Samuel Kleda, a vocal clerical critic of President Biya, expressed hope the papal visit might help ease tensions, calling on Cameroonians to “commit ourselves as architects of peace.”
Pope Leo XIV is scheduled to conclude his Cameroon visit with a Saturday morning Mass. After stops in Algeria and Cameroon, he will continue to Angola and Equatorial Guinea before returning to Rome.