Pope Leo invites transgender women to Vatican lunch, but doesn't sit with them

Pope Leo has continued Pope Francis' tradition of inviting transgender women to the Catholic Church's annual "lunch for the poor," but not his tradition of sitting with them.

Francis began inviting a group of trans women as his guests for the annual World Day of the Poor lunch in November, 2023, many of whom were Latin American migrants in sex work. Both years, Francis selected two members of the group to dine at his head table.

Leo did not sit with any of the women this year, with all the women instead sitting at separate tables. Alessia Nobile, a trans woman and Italian author at the lunch, told The Washington Post that she managed to give the Pope a letter on behalf of the trans community, and he responded with a smile.

“That he’d mingle, that he [sat] close to [us], that’s a good sign, right?” she said.

Related: Pope Leo says blessing same-sex weddings is 'not what the Church teaches'

Leo's views on the LGBTQ+ community have not been widely reported, though he has so far taken Francis' approach of preaching compassion without changing church teaching on marriage equality or the ordination of women.

Leo lamented at a meeting of bishops in 2012 that Western news media and popular culture fostered "sympathy for beliefs and practices that are at odds with the gospel," according to The New York Times . He specifically mentioned the so-called “homosexual lifestyle” and “alternative families comprised of same-sex partners and their adopted children.”

Leo said in a private meeting with the Vatican diplomatic corps in May that the family is “founded upon the stable union between a man and a woman,” the Associated Press reported. In a September interview with Christian newspaper Crux, Leo said that "the church’s teaching will continue as it is" in regards to marriage equality, while criticizing some ceremonies in which priests have blessed couples as they legally marry.

"I’ve already spoken about marriage, as did Pope Francis when he was pope, about a family being a man and a woman in solemn commitment, blessed in the sacrament of marriage. But even to say that, I understand some people will take that badly," Leo said, adding of same-sex unions, “That doesn’t mean those people are bad people, but I think it’s very important, again, to understand how to accept others who are different than we are, how to accept people who make choices in their life and to respect them."