What do the Holy Father’s two roles mean in the context of his day-to-day work as the visible leader of the world’s Catholics?
Unique among world leaders, the pope serves simultaneously as the universal spiritual head of the Catholic Church and as the head of the Holy See, a distinct sovereign entity under international law that serves as the central government of the Catholic Church.
So what do these multiple roles mean in the context of a pope’s day-to-day work as the visible leader of the world’s Catholics?
Andreas Widmer, a former Pontifical Swiss Guard who served St. John Paul II and who now teaches at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., told EWTN News that the papal states once formed a substantial territorial kingdom in central Italy with the pope as its temporal ruler.
Following Italian unification in the 19th century and the loss of most of those lands in 1870, the Church further developed the concept of the Holy See as an enduring international presence independent of extensive territory.
The 1929 Lateran Treaty formalized the creation of Vatican City State — a tiny sovereign territory of approximately 109 acres centered on Vatican Hill — providing the pope with just enough independence to exercise his universal ministry free from external coercion.
“From then on, the pope filled two distinct roles,” Widmer said. “He’s the spiritual head of the Catholic Church, and he’s the head of state of Vatican City — the only absolute sovereign in Europe.”
In principle, the Church could lose the territory of Vatican City and still retain its international juridical personality and diplomatic relations through the Holy See — much as a sovereign could continue to exist and maintain diplomatic relations even without a fixed territorial capital.
“The Church could give up the Vatican and still have the ambassadors, because it’s the Holy See,” Widmer noted. “Anywhere the pope is, there the Holy See is.” This arrangement ensures the “libertas Ecclesiae” — the freedom of the Church.
In addition, the pope’s status as a recognized foreign head of state confers immunities under international law that place him outside ordinary civil obligations of his country of origin, such as the obligation to vote or the payment of taxes.
The pope may still retain citizenship of his home country, in addition to the Vatican citizenship he automatically acquires upon his election as pope.
Andrea Gagliarducci, a Vatican expert and EWTN News contributor, said that this unique position also explains why attempts to treat the pope as a corporate executive in civil lawsuits ultimately fail: As both a sovereign head of state and the institutional embodiment of the Holy See, all relevant immunities apply to him.
The personal immunity of foreign heads of state is a customary principle of international law that guarantees full exemption from criminal, civil, and administrative jurisdiction in another state and covers both official and private acts.
The small territory of Vatican City, in the words of Pope Pius XI, provides “just enough body to keep the soul united,” allowing the successor of Peter the freedom necessary to shepherd the universal Church without being bound by any single nation’s interests.
In practice, the Holy Father focuses primarily on his pastoral and moral leadership. When he addresses questions of war, peace, or human dignity, he does so first and foremost as vicar of Christ.
As Andrea Tornielli of the Vatican Dicastery for Communication has pointed out, the pope in his leadership of the Church invites the world to higher principles of justice and fraternity, while the practical diplomatic machinery of the Holy See operates in service of that mission.