Pope Leo XIV set to dine with trans activists during Sunday’s Jubilee for the Poor
Alessia Nobile (L) is one of the trans activists whol dined with the Pope on Sunday. (Instagram/Getty)
Alessia Nobile (L) is one of the trans activists whol dined with the Pope on Sunday. (Instagram/Getty)
Pope Leo XIV will meet and dine with Alessia Nobile and other trans Catholic activists this Sunday, during a special Vatican lunch marking the Church’s Jubilee of the Poor, Catholic journalist Christopher Hale reports.
The annual event coincides with the World Day of the Poor and includes Mass in St Peter’s Basilica followed by a communal meal for people who are homeless, vulnerable, or socially marginalised.
During Transgender Awareness Week and as part of Jubilee, Pope Leo will meet with a group of trans women including trans activist Alesia Nobile, close friends of Pope Francis, in an invitee special luncheon this Sunday.
— Pope Crave (@ClubConcrave) November 14, 2025
(via @chrisjollyhale) pic.twitter.com/f6gYz4GGFe
Nobile, 46, was one of five transgender women invited after she formally requested an audience with the new Pope, who was born in Chicago and who holds dual American and Peruvian citizenship. The 69-year-old was elected on Thursday 8 May after a two-day papal conclave following the death of 88-year-old Pope Francis.
Her hope is to ensure the inclusive spirit fostered under Pope Francis is not lost following his death. “I ask Leo not to go backwards on rights,” she told Italian media.
In her interview, Nobile explained how her journey in the Church has been marked by rejection: as a teenager she endured secret “exorcism” rites by a school religion teacher and pressure on her family to consider electroshock therapy. Despite this trauma, she remained a practising Catholic and later wrote about her experiences in her memoir, La bambina invisibile.
“In the eyes of God, we are all His children”
She also explained how her life changed under Pope Francis. After their first meeting in 2022, Francis became a mentor and friend, urging her to tell her story “so prejudice does not grow” and reminding her that “in the eyes of God, we are all His children”.
She says that he ensured she sat in the front row at papal audiences and wrote her a handwritten letter affirming God’s unconditional love, a gesture that Nobile described as “unrepeatable”.
Pope Francis was notable for his outreach to LGBTQ+ people, often meeting trans communities privately, supporting local parishes that welcomed them, and emphasising pastoral closeness over judgement.
As Pope Leo XIV begins his papacy, Nobile hopes he will maintain that trajectory. Her invitation to the Jubilee lunch suggests that new pontiff intends to stand with those on the margins. However, his statements about the LGBTQ+ community so far have been mixed.
Following his election The New York Times reported that Pope Leo was critical of entertainment media in 2012, saying it held “sympathy for beliefs and practices that are at odds with the gospel,” including the “homosexual lifestyle” and “alternative families comprised of same-sex partners and their adopted children”.
The Pope has also previously said that family is “founded upon the stable union between a man and a woman”, adding: “No one is exempted from striving to ensure respect for the dignity of every person, especially the most frail and vulnerable, from the unborn to the elderly, from the sick to the unemployed, citizens and immigrants alike.”
And in September, the Pope said the LGBTQ+ community “aren’t bad people”, while also criticising same-sex blessings. However, for Nobile, these mixed messages aren’t cause for concern.
She says she hopes her attendance on Sunday will affirm that the Church remains a home for all, “no one excluded.”
