Archbishop Gänswein: With Pope Leo, ‘normality’ is returning to the Vatican

Archbishop Georg Gänswein says last year's change of popes has brought a "whole new positive dimension" to the Vatican. "Above all, there has been a change for the better in the atmosphere" with Pope Leo XIV, the Vatican’s nuncio to the Baltic states and Pope Benedict XVI's former secretary told Rudolf Gehrig of EWTN News during a Jan. 20 interview in Vilnius, Lithuania. Gänswein said he met Leo twice last year, most recently in mid-December. "Both meetings went very, very well. And the intervening period has made it very clear to me that — to put it somewhat idiosyncratically — normality is slowly returning," he said, calling it a sign for him that "faith and the Holy Spirit are indeed at work." "I used the term normalization. For me, it is important to see that Pope Leo has simply emphasized some matters that are not new, but which have been completely overlooked in recent years." Gänswein has been nuncio to Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, based out of Vilnius, since 2024. The archbishop’s …