Chaldean Catholics from around the world gather with patriarch at the Vatican

Hundreds of Chaldean Catholics from Iraq and global diaspora communities gathered at the Vatican last week to join Patriarch Paul III Nona for liturgical celebrations.

The gathering included a Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica on Oct. 15, which used the Chaldean rite and featured Aramaic chants. This followed a Mass in St. Peter’s Square on Oct. 14. During that earlier service, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, acting for Pope Leo XIV, publicly affirmed the ecclesiastical communion the pope granted to Nona after his election as patriarch of Baghdad of the Chaldeans in April.

For the scattered community, the event served as a time to pray and reflect on the challenges facing Chaldeans in their homeland and abroad. Father Fawaz Kako, a Chaldean priest in the United States, described the gathering as a historic spiritual blessing for the community.