Pope Leo XIV hosts Bob Dylan at the Apostolic Palace ahead of Rome concert
Pope Leo XIV welcomed Bob Dylan to his official residence, the Apostolic Palace, on Wednesday, during the Rome stop of the singer-songwriter's Italian tour. The brief meeting between the two Americans saw the pope give Dylan a rosary and Dylan present a copy of his autobiography, Chronicles: Volume One.
Pope Leo XIV hosted Bob Dylan at the Apostolic Palace on Wednesday, as the 85-year-old Nobel laureate passed through Rome on his Italian tour.
The meeting between the two men, both from the US Midwest, was brief, according to Vatican News. Dylan arrived dressed almost entirely in black, with a hoodie pulled up, gloves and an umbrella, in sharp contrast to the Chicago-born pontiff's white vestments. Leo gave Dylan a rosary, and Dylan gave the pope a copy of his memoir, Chronicles: Volume One.
The visit came ahead of Dylan's concert on Thursday at Rome's Palazzo dello Sport, one of several Italian dates on his Rough and Rowdy Ways tour.
Leo has quoted Dylan before: in the preface to the book Disarmed and Disarming: Peace Is a Gift, he cited the unrecorded 1963 anti-nuclear song Go Away You Bomb. It is the second time Dylan has met a pope. In 1997 he performed for John Paul II and some 300,000 young people at the National Eucharistic Congress in Bologna, playing songs including Knockin' on Heaven's Door.