Chiclayo (Peru) (AFP) - In Zaña, a dusty colonial city in northern Peru that has had a reputation for centuries for being cursed, the faithful await the visit of Pope Leo XIV as a blessing.

First modification: 03/11/2026 - 14:53

The streets of this arid town of 4,200 inhabitants, sometimes classified as a "ghost city", look lonely today. Among its alleys emerge the ruins of four imposing colonial churches, remains of its former wealth, where the buzzards now rest.

Zaña was a prosperous city centuries ago, destroyed by a flood that depopulated it. Its identity was marked by Catholicism, either by legends of divine punishments or by being the place of the death in 1606 of Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo.

The Spanish missionary evangelized indigenous Peruvians, denounced abuses and is now one of the models of the supreme pontiff, who will celebrate with the Zañeros the 300 years of his canonization.

"The curse is behind us," María Colchado, a 63-year-old housewife and member of one of the citizen committees preparing for the papal visit on Saturday, November 14, tells AFP.

Since the Pope "is entering Zaña we are already more than blessed," he comments in front of the sanctuary erected where the house in which Santo Toribio died was.

With other volunteers, Colchado is in charge of maintaining the modest temple that will receive the supreme pontiff. Some benches point towards an altar with a golden altarpiece in the background.

Stained glass windows illuminate the interior, while the white and burgundy red facade displays unfinished paint jobs.

Neighbors sold raffles to finance the remodeling, explains Colchado.

Suddenly, priest Edinson Farfán, successor of Robert Prevost as bishop of Chiclayo, enters the sanctuary with a delegation from the church to supervise the state of the temple.

"The holy father has Zaña in his heart," the bishop tells AFP. "Everyone wants to show the best" of the town, he adds.

León XIV will close his first tour of Latin America in Peru, which will also include Uruguay and Argentina, despite the fact that he underwent lung cancer surgery three weeks ago.

"Arriving home"

Zaña is about 50 kilometers southeast of Chiclayo, the city where Robert Prevost served as bishop between 2015 and 2023.

Born in the United States, he became a Peruvian national in 2015 after living almost two decades in the country. He left a deep mark on the region.

Many remember that every April 27 he arrived in Zaña for the Santo Toribio festival and other religious activities.

The pope "is coming home," says Colchado.

Another committee made up of municipal authorities, the local parish and neighbors has ordered hundreds of Vatican flags to be made so that they fly alongside the Peruvian ones over the homes.

Committee member Betty Burga, 56, warns that a "sea of ​​people" is expected.

The colonial churches of Zaña were destroyed in 1720 by a flood that the locals attributed to a supposed divine punishment.

"Sometimes they call it the ghost city," says early education teacher Rosario Cossio, head of the Afro-Peruvian Museum that disseminates local history.

According to her, the fame of the "cursed city" would be associated with the murder of a priest in colonial times. After the crime, the religious "no longer came to Zaña," which "was not suitable for Catholic sacraments."

But now it is a very devout town. On the walls of the municipality and the main church, where a piece of Toribio de Mogrovejo's tibia is kept as a relic, gigantographs of the saint and Leo XIV hang.

A motorcycle taxi has a painted motto: "Christ loves you."

The local parish has asked the faithful to open their doors to pilgrims who will arrive to see the head of the Catholic Church.

With extra mattresses and dozens of pots, María Colchado and her family are preparing to house thirty people in their extensive one-story house, with ocher walls.

The vegetables from your garden will be used to cook meals. Turkeys, chickens, rabbits and guinea pigs jump in their pens. "We are prepared" to receive them, he affirms.

© 2026 AFP

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