Although etymologically they are called upon to build bridges, the image of Roman pontiffs always comes with the rich treasure of edifices they ordered built in times when they were also sovereigns, for the greater glory of both God and their own reigns. True, Peter’s successors today may no longer wear the tiara, nor let themselves be carried in the sedia gestatoria, but they have not renounced the theater from which the universal Church is governed, knowing full well that for the nut of religious faith to mature, it needs a beautiful shell – to quote from one of Manuel Vicent’s columns in the daily El País. And current society, albeit ever more faithless, is not immune to such powerful seduction: bedecked by the great masters of the history of art and architecture, the procession of cardinals toward the Sistine Chapel and the appearance of the Augustinian Robert Francis Prevost on the balcony of the Vatican basilica brought the world to a standstill in May, with the recent success of Paolo Sorrentino’s television series The Young Pope and Edward Berger’s feature film Conclave in view. Leo XIV bears the name of the pope who established the Church’s social doctrine, but also that of a Medici who sponsored the Renaissance of Bramante and Raphael: a fortuitous meeting of religion and beauty, of spirit and form.