Pope Allows Raphael’s Madonna to Leave Vatican, Visit Sister

It took an act of papal intervention for Raphael’s “Madonna of Foligno” to leave the Vatican and travel to Dresden, where she is on show alongside her sister, the “Sistine Madonna,” for the first time.

Pope Benedict XVI is paying an official visit to Germany, his native country, from Sept. 22 to 25. To coincide with his stay -- which includes meetings with Chancellor Angela Merkel and her former boss, Helmut Kohl -- he wanted a “unique cultural event,” according to Germany’s ambassador to the Holy See, Walter Juergen Schmid.