When a 70-year-old pontiff throws up a 6-7 hand gesture from a popemobile, cracks jokes about losing ticket sales to Bad Bunny, and rides in a fighter jet cockpit while trash-talking Barcelona football fans, something unexpected is happening: the Catholic Church might actually be reaching young people again.
Pope Leo XIV’s recent visit to Spain wasn’t your typical papal tour of solemn masses and formal addresses. Sure, he did those things—he addressed 80,000 people at Real Madrid’s Bernabeu stadium and spoke to Spanish bishops about evangelism. But what made headlines was everything in between: the memes, the banter, the visible enjoyment of his own life. He held a private meeting with Puerto Rican music superstar Bad Bunny. He joked with pilots about Real Madrid’s white jerseys and Barcelona’s need for caution. He even used artificial intelligence as a punchline, telling guests about asking AI what to say to Spanish bishops, only to get a response about“Pope Francis”—prompting him to respond,“I think there’s another pope.”
What makes this worth paying attention to isn’t just that an elderly religious leader knows how to use memes. It’s that something tangible appears to be shifting. Surveys show a measurable uptick in Catholic identification among younger Spaniards, and visible presence of faith among Gen Z has become normalized in a way it wasn’t before. Rafael Ruiz, a sociology professor at Complutense University of Madrid, noted that recent data reveals this isn’t necessarily a full“Catholic resurgence”but rather“an increase in the visibility of Catholicism and in the normalisation of Catholicism among young people.”Around 56 percent of Spaniards now identify as Catholic, down from 90 percent in the 1970s, but the trend lines among youth are moving upward.
US Vatican expert Elise Ann Allen, who has written a biography of the pope, sees deliberate strategy layered with genuine personality.“He’s clearly making an effort to reach out to young people,”she said, adding that the spontaneous moments—the football banter, the cockpit ride, the genuine humor—feel authentic rather than calculated. That distinction matters. Young audiences have a finely tuned detector for performative religion, and what Pope Leo XIV seems to understand is that accessibility and joy are themselves forms of testimony.
One Spanish newspaper called it“making God fashionable,”and there’s something to that framing. After a prayer vigil at Barcelona’s Olympic Stadium, La Vanguardia wrote that the pope“displayed everything the world doesn’t have enough of: joy, firm beliefs, sensitivity, fairness, tenderness, hope, compassion. And on top of that, he smiles!”In a cultural moment defined by cynicism, fractured attention, and crisis fatigue, maybe that’s the least surprising thing that could capture young people’s imaginations—someone genuinely confident in what he believes, cracking jokes, and not taking himself too seriously in the process.
The real question isn’t whether memes and Bad Bunny jokes will fill churches. It’s whether an institution willing to change how it communicates—while keeping its core message intact—can rebuild trust with a generation that’s never known a time when Catholicism felt relevant to their lives. Pope Leo XIV’s Spain visit suggests the church thinks that’s possible. And judging by the crowds and the surveys, some young people are at least willing to listen.
About the Author
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson is a contributor to LocalBeat, covering local news and community stories.
