Five hundred years Christianity experienced a painful schism when the Protestant Reformation was born. Catholicism and Protestantism have been struggling ever since and its leaders—more often than not—have been unable to present a joint spiritual leadership to the masses. So it’s remarkable that Pope Francis marked the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation on Monday by traveling to largely secular Sweden to pray alongside the country’s Lutheran church leaders in a historic show of unity commemorating the birth of Protestantism. Francis prayed that the Holy Spirit “help us to rejoice in the gifts that have come to the Church through the Reformation, prepare us to repent for the dividing walls that we, and our forebears, have built, and equip us for common witness and service in the world.”