Schoolchildren eagerly wait for the pope’s arrival outside of the apostolic prefecture on Sept. 1, 2023, in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, where Pope Francis will be staying for the duration of his four-day visit to the country. / Credit: Colm Flynn/EWTN News
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, Sep 1, 2023 / 11:48 am (CNA).
Pope Francis received an enthusiastic welcome to Mongolia on Friday morning after a nearly 10-hour flight on the papal plane.
Upon his arrival at Chinggis Khaan International Airport at 9:52 a.m. local time on Friday, Sept. 1, Pope Francis was greeted with a bowl of Aaruul, dried curds that are a traditional food of Mongolia’s nomadic peoples.
Upon his arrival at Chinggis Khaan International Airport on Sept. 1, 2023, Pope Francis was welcomed with a bowl of Aaruul, dried curds which are a traditional food of Mongolian nomadic peoples. Credit: Vatican Media
A Mongolian cell service provider sent out a public service text message to all of its users to inform them of the pope’s arrival. The message said: “The Roman pope is visiting Mongolia for the first time in our history. Let’s welcome him with kind nomadic hospitality and enjoy the precious moments together.”
The 86-year-old pope was rolled in his wheelchair down a long red carpet flanked by the Mongolian State Honor Guard, who saluted the first pope to ever visit the Asian country.
The Mongolian State Honor Guard stands at attention for the pope’s arrival at Chinggis Khaan International Airport on Sept. 1, 2023. Pope Francis is the first pope in history to visit the Asian country. Credit: Vatican Media
Cardinal Giorgio Marengo was one of the first to welcome Pope Francis to Mongolia. Marengo is an Italian cardinal who has served as a missionary in Mongolia for nearly 20 years. He is the current apostolic prefect of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, and the world’s youngest cardinal.
Cardinal Giorgio Marengo was one of the first to welcome Pope Francis to Mongolia on Sept. 1, 2023. Marengo is an Italian cardinal who has served as a missionary in Mongolia for nearly 20 years. He is the current apostolic prefect of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, and the world’s youngest cardinal. Credit: Vatican Media
Mongolian Foreign Minister Battsetseg Batmunkh also met with the pope before the pope was taken to the Mongolian apostolic prefecture.
Mongolian Foreign Minister Battsetseg Batmunkh received Pope Francis at Chinggis Khaan International Airport and later met with him on his first day in Mongolia on Sept. 1, 2023. Credit: Vatican Media
At the apostolic prefecture, where Pope Francis will be staying for the duration of the four-day trip, he was greeted with enthusiasm by representatives of Mongolia’s small Catholic community of only 1,450 Catholics.
At the apostolic prefecture on Sept. 1, 2023, in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, where Pope Francis will be staying for the duration of the four-day trip, the pope is greeted with enthusiasm by representatives of Mongolia’s small Catholic community of only 1,450 Catholics. Credit: Colm Flynn/EWTN News
Schoolchildren eagerly waited for the pope’s arrival outside of the prefecture, where Marengo resides. Some children performed traditional Mongolian dances for the pope and were excited to receive rosary beads as a gift.
Two dancers who performed for Pope Francis upon his arrival at the apostolic prefecture in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, on Sept. 1, 2023, were proud to show the rosary beads the Holy Father gave them. Credit: Colm Flynn/EWTN News
After the welcome, Pope Francis spent his first day resting before his scheduled speeches and meetings on Saturday and Sunday.
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar.
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show.
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, Cardinal Kurt Koch, Cardinal-elect Stephen Chow, and other visiting clerics all participated in the festival.
Pope Francis’ first public event will be a welcome ceremony in the city’s Sükhbaatar Square with President Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh on Sept. 2. He will later meet with the country’s small Catholic community in the city’s Cathedral of Sts. Peter and Paul in the afternoon.
Pope Francis told journalists in the press corps traveling with him that to visit Mongolia is to encounter “a small people, but a big culture.”
“I think it will do us good to understand this silence … to understand what it means, but not intellectually, with the senses. Mongolia can be understood with the senses,” the pope said.
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
Schoolchildren eagerly wait for the pope’s arrival outside of the apostolic prefecture on Sept. 1, 2023, in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, where Pope Francis will be staying for the duration of his four-day visit to the country. Credit: Colm Flynn/EWTN News
Pope Francis greets the crowds at the apostolic prefecture on Sept. 1, 2023, in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, where the pope will be staying for the duration of the four-day trip. The pope was met with enthusiasm by representatives of Mongolia’s small Catholic community of only 1,450 Catholics. Credit: Colm Flynn/EWTN News
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
Cardinals, visiting Catholics, and the Vatican press corps were invited to experience Mongolian culture at a “Besreg Naadam” festival 24 miles outside the capital city of Ulaanbaatar on Sept. 1, 2023. The festival was filled with traditional Mongolian dancing, a wrestling tournament, musical performances, an archery competition, and a daring equestrian acrobatics show. Credit: Courtney Mares/CNA
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Canberra, Australia, Nov 19, 2018 / 05:01 pm (CNA).- After being slammed for his religion and told he would never understand abortion because it is a women’s issue, Australian senator Barry O’Sullivan declared himself a woman before parliament last week so that he could speak about abortion issues.
“I’m going to declare my gender today, as I can, to be a woman, and then you’ll no longer be able to attack me,” O’Sullivan told fellow representatives at parliament Nov. 14.
The declaration was part of longer and heated remarks given by the senator, who said he was tired of the “vomit” and “vitriol” he received from far-right colleagues whenever he tried to raise “issues around strong values.”
Earlier that week, O’Sullivan, a Catholic, had motioned for pro-choice protesters to be banned from the annual pro-life Day of the Unborn Child events. This prompted Larissa Waters of the Australian Greens party to say that O’Sullivan would never understand abortion as a women’s issue.
“Senator O’Sullivan needs to get his hands and his rosaries off my ovaries and those of the 10,000 Queensland women who have an abortion each year,” Waters said, according to the Australian Associated Press.
She later complied with a request to withdraw her comment on the grounds that it attacked O’Sullivan’s religion.
“These people come and attack me for my religion…using words like ‘rosary beads’, because I had the audacity to raise issues around late-term abortions, where babies who are only minutes away from getting a smack on the ass and a name, are being aborted under the policies of the Australian Greens,” he said.
“So I will not stand silent, I will not stand mute while these people try to continue to marginalize policies and ideas that we want to continue to discuss for this nation,” he continued.
O’Sullivan said that he believes many of the “values” issues he raises, including pro-life positions, reflect the values of an “ever-increasingly silent majority” of Australians, who are afraid to speak up for fear of being attacked for their beliefs.
“I’ve moved sensible motions here, reflecting the views of many people in our society, only to have formality denied,” he said, just before declaring his gender to be a woman.
“It is dispicable the behaviour of these people, for them to come in here with the freedom that they do, and that vomit, that vitriol that comes out of their mouths, it needs to be called out,” he added.
The senator’s gender-swap declaration sparked comments mostly of ridicule and disdain on social media. It also launched an extensive debate on Wikipedia about whether to change the pronouns on O’Sullivan’s page from “he/him” to “she/her.”
Thanks for the beautiful pictures of the rich and unique aspects of the Mongolian culture.