Pope Leo urges husbands to respect wives amid femicide crisis across Latin America

Pope Leo XIV told men to treat their wives with respect Sunday, as he concluded the first leg of his tour of Latin America, which is plagued by gender-based violence. "Dear fathers and grandfathers ... treat your wives with respect, ask for forgiveness and live with integrity, even when doing so requires sacrifice," the head of the Catholic Church said during a homily in Uruguay. More than 3,800 women were killed in Latin America and the Caribbean in 2024 because of their gender, according to the UN's regional economic mission. Over the past five years, the region has recorded nearly 20,000 femicides, most of them committed by the victim's current or former partner. Read morePope warns of growing mental health crisis, domestic violence at Barcelona vigil Leo is on a 12-day tour of the continent where he served as a missionary and a bishop before becoming pope. He wrapped up the first leg of his visit in largely secular Uruguay with an open-air mass outside a basilica in the south-central city of Florida. The basilica is home to a shrine linked to Uruguay's fight for independence from Spanish colonial rule. "Let us pray for those who bear the responsibility of governing (Uruguay), t...