VIDEO: As Lionel Messi Retires From Team Argentina, His Ties to the Vatican Remain

Published September 2, 2026

by Tablet Staff

After 21 years, 207 games, and 125 goals, Lionel Messi is retiring from Argentina’s national soccer team.

The soccer player, who represented his country in six World Cups, leaves as a World Cup champion, a two-time Copa América champion, and a soccer legend.

But Messi’s history with Argentina also took him to the Vatican on several occasions.

In August of 2013, a few months after the election of Jorge Mario Bergoglio as pontiff, Pope Francis received the Argentina and Italy national teams before they played a friendly charity match in Rome.

Messi and Italian soccer player Gianluigi Buffon presented the pope with a small olive tree. And Pope Francis, then the spiritual captain of the world, revealed to them the value of this sport.

“In the game, when you’re on the field, you find beauty, selflessness, and camaraderie,” he told them. “If a game lacks these elements, it loses its power, even if the team wins.”

The connection between the soccer player and Pope Francis went even further: Messi and Buffon were founding patrons of “Scholas Occurrentes,” the educational network launched by the Argentinian pontiff that promotes inclusion through education, sports, and the arts.

When Bergoglio was archbishop of Buenos Aires, he had launched the Neighborhood Schools and Sister Schools projects. Soccer became one of his tools for building what he called the “culture of encounter.

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In September 2014, Messi participated in the Interfaith Match for Peace held at the Olympic Stadium in Rome.

Afterwards, he remained connected to that initiative. In 2022, he once again supported the Scholasâ Partita della Pace initiative.

A year later, Pope Francis spoke publicly, noting how he liked the player – even though already had his favorite: “Maradona was a great player, but as a man he failed. He slipped up because of the people around him who praised him but did not help him. Messi is very proper, a true gentleman. But I prefer Pelé.”

Messi leaves the national team as a world champion. But his history with the Vatican also leaves another impression: that of a soccer player who, alongside a pope, built bridges to discuss education, peace, and reconciliation.

Both Popes Francis and Leo XIV know that a soccer player is not just defined by what he does during the ninety minutes on the field – it’s also about what he achieves through his influence off the field.