Pope Leo XIV has rebuffed efforts by freedom of religion advocates to focus his attention on the state-sanctioned Islamist persecution of Christians during his trip to Algeria on April 13-14, 2026.
The pontiff, who began a ten-day Africa tour with a visit to Algeria, honored Marxist and Muslim revolutionaries at the Martyrs’ Memorial, but did not visit the Tibhirine monastery on the thirtieth anniversary of the Islamist kidnapping and beheading of seven Trappist monks there.
French commentators underscored the irony of the papal genuflection at the Memorial, noting that Algeria’s war of independence resulted in the massacres and expulsion of one million pieds-noirs—mostly Algerian-born French Catholics.
The pontiff ignored pleas urging him to intercede for religious freedom.
On the eve of Leo’s flight to Algiers, the European Centre for Law and Justice spotlighted the oppression of Christians in Algeria, stating: “According to the Algerian Constitution, Islam is the state religion, leading the former president of the High Islamic Council to declare that ‘an Algerian can only be Muslim’ (2021).”
The pontiff ignored pleas urging him to intercede for religious freedom. “Algeria imposes a single identity, both Arab and Muslim, to the detriment of minorities, particularly Jews, Ahmadis, and Christians. In 2020, freedom of conscience was removed from the Constitution,” the petition, signed by political leaders, human rights experts, philosophers, jurists, writers, and exiled Algerians, warned.
Instead, addressing Algeria’s President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, the pontiff appeared to renew his rhetoric against the United States and Israel, condemning the “constant violations of international law and neocolonial temptations.”
The pope remarked on “opposed dynamics of fundamentalism and secularization” manifesting themselves with “religious symbols and words” becoming “blasphemous languages of violence and oppression,” or “empty signs in the immense marketplace of consumption.”
Leo faced backlash from Catholics after he visited the Grand Mosque of Algiers and used the word “communion” to define ties between Christians and Muslims under the “maternal love” of Mary, a link they argue is fictitious.
Human rights campaigners began pressuring Leo to speak on behalf of Algeria’s Christians after the Vatican announced his trip.
On day one of the pope’s visit, the Alliance for Defending Freedom posted tweets pleading for Pastor Youssef Ourahmane, a Muslim convert and church leader, whom Algeria imprisoned for “illegal worship.”
Highlighting another case, Vatican reporter Arthur Herlin said he asked Leo to plead for the release of journalist Christophe Gleizes, sentenced to seven years in prison. Herlin tweeted: “The pope nodded several times and replied to me: ‘Yes, I know the case of Christophe Gleizes.’”
Human rights campaigners began pressuring Leo to speak on behalf of Algeria’s Christians after the Vatican announced his trip. On March 18, the European Centre for Law and Justice addressed the United Nations on the deterioration of religious freedom in Algeria, anticipating the pontiff’s upcoming visit to the country.
Evangelicals are the most vulnerable because “their missionary commitment subjects them to constant pressure,” while “the Catholic Church now prioritizes interreligious dialogue alone at the expense of evangelization, and the Algerian authorities use this to project an image of tolerance,” European Centre for Law and Justice speakers noted.
Djamila Djelloul, a convert from Islam, urged Leo “to demand true freedom of conscience—the right to change one’s religion for those coming from Islam—not merely the freedom to practice for Christians already there.”
On April 8, the European Centre for Law and Justice published The Oppression of Christians in Algeria, a report that noted that the government reduced Catholicism to a state-tolerated religion with no missionary role when Algeria became independent in 1962.
International players do not want to upset [Algeria’s] government by raising the issue of religious freedom.
Since 2006, the government has closed fifty-eight Protestant churches, leaving only three churches open, including one international church, depriving Protestants of freedom of worship. The 2006 ordinance punishes any attempt to evangelize Muslims with five years in prison.
Since Algeria supplies energy to Europe, partners with the U.S. on counterterrorism, and buys weapons from Russia, international players do not want to upset its government by raising the issue of religious freedom, leaving bodies like the Vatican to plead for persecuted Christians.
Algerian whistleblower Chawki Benzehra explained that Leo’s visit “could have been a historic event had he chosen to denounce the persecution of Christians by Islamists, as well as the violations of their freedom of worship by the Algerian regime.” But, he said, “Unfortunately, he chose the path of not upsetting the Algerian authorities, even going so far as to forgo a visit to the monastery of Tibhirine, where monks were murdered. To this day, the Algerian regime still refuses to shed full light on this case.”
