Pope Francis paints a mural during a meeting with young members of Scholas Occurrentes in Cascais, Portugal. He is in the country for World Youth Day 2023. August 3, 2023. Vatican Media/ Handout via REUTERS
The mural is part of the "Life between Worlds" project by Scholas Occurrentes, an international educational movement that links about half a million schools on five continents. Francis is the group's main sponsor. The ceiling and walls of the room where the Pope spoke to the students, and where the mural ends, were covered with painted themes such as human figures floating in the cosmos.The 86-year-old Pope was given an artist's paintbrush attached to a virtual reality gadget that allowed students at a school in Mozambique to see his brush strokes on a wall in their school in real time.
"It's very virtual but not very physical," José María Del Corral, president of Scholas Occurrentes, joked between the pope's first and second attempts.