Pope Francis’ diaries to be published next month, revealing reflections on Vatican years

NEW YORK (AP) — Journal entries kept by Pope Francis before and during his papacy will be published this fall for the first time.

Image, an imprint of Penguin Random House Christian Publishing Group, announced Monday that “The Private Diary of Pope Francis” will be released in English and four other languages on Nov. 24.

According to Image, the book will provide an “extraordinary glimpse” into the late pontiff’s “hopes and fears, struggles and prayers.” It will be issued in partnership with Libreria Editrice Vaticana, or LEV, the Vatican Publishing House.

The writings span from December 1992, just over two decades before he became pope, to August 2024, eight months before he died and was succeeded by Pope Leo XIV. The English-language edition of his private reflections was translated from the Spanish original by Sister Bernadette Reis and edited and annotated by Víctor Manuel Fernández, an Argentine cardinal who heads the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, Francis was a native of Argentina and history’s first Latin American pope. He was known for his down-to-earth style and emphasis on humility, including visits to poor countries with persecuted Christian minorities rather than the traditional strongholds of Catholicism. At the start of the coronavirus pandemic, from an empty St. Peter’s Square, he called for “all of us to row together, each of us in need of comforting the other.”

At times, he was controversial. He angered some conservatives with his outreach to LGBTQ+ Catholics and was widely criticized for saying that those who accused Chilean Bishop Juan Barros of helping to protect the alleged pedophile Rev. Fernando Karadima had committed slander. In 2016, commenting on then-presidential candidate Donald Trump’s vow to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border, Francis said that anyone building a wall to keep migrants out “is not Christian.”

In his lifetime, Francis’ books included “The Name of God Is Mercy” and the memoir “Hope.” He died on April 21, 2025 at the age of 88.

___

This story corrects in paragraph 4 that the writings span from December 1992, just over two decades before Francis became pope.