“The main thing is that we’re all together.” The youth pilgrimage came about three months after the start of Leo’s papacy and 25 years after John Paul II organised the last such youth gathering in Rome. It was announced by Pope Francis during World Youth Day in Lisbon in 2023.

Young people from 146 countries celebrated with Pope Leo XIV at the concluding Mass of the World Youth Jubilee at Rome's University of Tor Vergata on Sunday. The Vatican put the number of youths attending the event at more than a million,

At a Mass for the Jubilee of Youth outside Rome, Pope Leo exhorted over a million young people to be "seeds of hope" and a "sign that a different world is possible."