Is the title “Bishop of Rome” just ceremonial, or does the Pope have actual and direct control over the day-to-day goings-on of Catholic churches in the city of Rome, in the same way that Francis Cardinal George has over Chicago?
Sure, the pope is the bishop overseeing the Diocese of Rome. However, as he doesn’t have all that much time to deal with the affairs of the diocese, he has appointed Agostino Cardinal Vallini as his Vicar General, to handle the day to day matters there.
^ Is that a matter of course for all popes, or have there been any popes who actually involved themselves in the day to day operations of Roman churches?
John XXIII regularly made pastoral visits to his Roman parishioners. However, he was the first pope to have done so in about a hundred years.
Between 1870 and 1929 no pope ever set foot outside the Vatican as that would involving traveling through Italy which they didn’t acknowledge the existence of.