The Pope meets Bob Dylan (wearing a black hood)

A photograph has been circulating on social media for several hours, showing Pope Leo XIV smiling as he shakes hands with Bob Dylan, the 85-year-old American singer-songwriter and poet, and former Nobel Laureate in Literature. The Pontiff received him yesterday at the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican: a brief audience, with greetings and a few words exchanged. Dylan arrived at the Vatican wearing a black hooded top, black gloves and carrying an umbrella, which he did not put down even for the official photographs. There was also an exchange of gifts: a rosary, to which Dylan responded with his autobiography "Chronicles – Volume 1".

The musician (whose real name is Robert Allen Zimmerman) will be performing today at the Palazzo dello Sport as part of the autumn leg of the Rough and Rowdy Ways Tour, a series of concerts that also includes stops in Milan and Bologna – venues also known for their ban on filming with smartphones. Leone XIV paid tribute to Dylan in the foreword to a book on disarmament published earlier this year – ‘Disarmati e Disarmante. Peace is a Gift’ – quoting from the anti-war song ‘Go Away, You Bomb’, written by Dylan in 1963 at the height of the Cold War: “I hate you because man made you, and man owns you, and man controls you.”

This is not the first time Dylan has met a Pope. It had already happened in 1997, when he performed alongside other artists at the 23rd National Eucharistic Congress in Bologna, in front of John Paul II and 300,000 young people. After playing three of his greatest hits, including ‘Knocking on Heaven’s Door’, Dylan removed his cowboy hat, climbed the steps to the papal stage and exchanged a handshake and a few words with Wojtyla, as reported by Vatican News. In his address to the young people, the Pontiff explicitly quoted the lyrics of ‘Blowing in the Wind’: “You ask me: how many roads must a man walk down before you can call him a man?”. A question to which the Polish Pope replied: “Just one. There is only one path for man, and that is the path of Jesus Christ”.

Nor is this the first time that Leone XIV has received a musician. Last July, in fact, he met another icon of American rock: Patti Smith.