Vatican City, Aug 28, 2017 / 02:00 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Monday the Vatican confirmed rumors that have been swirling the past few weeks about a papal visit to Myanmar and Bangladesh, announcing that Pope Francis will visit the two Asian countries Nov. 27-Dec. 2.
“Welcoming the invitation of the respective heads of state and bishops, His Holiness Pope Francis will make an apostolic visit to Myanmar from 27 to 30 November 2017, visiting the cities of Yangon and Nay Pyi Taw,” an Aug. 28 statement from Vatican spokesman Greg Burke read.
The communique also noted that after Myanmar, the Pope will head to Bangladesh “from 30 November to 2 December 2017, visiting the city of Dhaka.” The logo for the trip was also published, however, the schedule is expected to be released shortly.
The Pope has been talking about a visit to Asia for several months, however, until now nothing had been confirmed. Still, he managed to slip the visit in just before Christmas. It also falls just two months before a second tour of South America, which will take him to Peru and Chile in January 2018.
The Pope has been talking about a visit to Asia for several months, however, until now nothing had been confirmed. Still, he managed to slip the visit in just before Christmas. It also falls just TWO MONTHS before a second tour of South America, which will take him to Peru and Chile in January 2018.
Though India was initially part of the plan for this year’s Asia trip, a visit to the country had to be cut due to complications with the country’s government.
Despite hopes from all sides, it’s taken longer than anticipated to work out some of the details with the government of Prime Minister Narhendra Modi, a Hindu nationalist seen by many as hostile to India’s Christian minority.
Francis’ decision to visit Bangladesh and Myanmar, however, is not only a shining example of his attention to the peripheries, but it also speaks of the great attention he has placed on Asia since his election.
His second trip as Pope was a visit to South Korea in August 2014, made in part to celebrate Asian Youth Day, and just five months later, in January 2015, he traveled to Sri Lanka and the Philippines.
The upcoming visit to Myanmar and Bangladesh, then, will mark his third tour of Asia so far in his four-year tenure.
According to the 2014 census of the Burmese government, at 88 percent Buddhism is the primary religion of Myanmar. In an overall population of roughly 5.1 million, Christians make up just 6.2 percent, around 700,000 of whom are Roman Catholics, while Muslims make up 4.3 percent and Hindus are only .5 percent.
The Holy See and Myanmar officially established diplomatic ties in May, agreeing to send ambassadors to each others’ countries when the country’s de-facto civilian leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, visited the Vatican.
The move to officially establish diplomatic ties comes just two months after Myanmar’s parliament voted in March to make their country the 183rd nation to enjoy diplomatic relations with the Holy See.
Also serving as Myanmar’s Foreign Minister, Aung San Suu Kyi is a Burmese diplomat, politician and author who currently serves as the country’s State Counselor. Before her rise to power, she spent much of her career under house arrest due to her push for human rights and democracy, which contradicted the military rule at the time.
As far as the Catholic Church in Myanmar, the country has 16 Catholic dioceses and a total of 29 living bishops, both active and retired. In 2015 Pope Francis appointed Myanmar’s first-ever cardinal, giving a red hat to Charles Maung Bo, archbishop of Yangon.
Just this past year, in the November 19, 2016, consistory, the Pope made a similar gesture toward Bangladesh, naming Archbishop Patrick D’Rozario of Dhaka the first-ever cardinal for the Muslim-majority country.
Listed among the top ten most populated countries in the world, with roughly 163 million citizens, Bangladesh has a minority Catholic population of around 0.3 percent, while the majority of the population, about 90 percent, is Muslim.
In addition to Francis’ affinity for the global margins, another key element of the trip close to his heart is the plight of the persecuted Muslim Rohingya people, which he has spoken of often and is likely a key reason for his symbolic decision to travel to both Myanmar and Bangladesh.
The Rohingya
The Rohingya are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group largely from the Rakhine state of Burma, in west Myanmar. Since clashes began in 2012 between the state’s Buddhist community and the long-oppressed Rohingya Muslim minority, some 125,000 Rohingya have been displaced, while more than 100,000 have fled Myanmar by sea.
In order to escape forced segregation from the rest of the population inside rural ghettos, many of the Rohingya – who are not recognized by the government as a legitimate ethnic group or as citizens of Myanmar – have made perilous journeys by sea in hope of evading persecution.
In 2015, a number of Rohingya people – estimated to be in the thousands – were stranded at sea for several months with dwindling supplies while Southeastern nations such as Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia refused to take them in.
However, since last year around 87,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh amid a military crackdown on insurgents in Myanmar’s western Rakhine state, giving way to horrifying stories of rapes, killings and arson by security forces. Dozens of new deaths have been reported in recent days amid fresh clashes between the Rohingya and Myanmar’s army.
In Bangladesh, however, the Rohingya have had little relief, since they are not recognized as refugees in the country. Since last October, many who had fled to Bangladesh have been detained and forced to return to the neighboring Rakhine state.
Pope Francis and the Rohingya
Pope Francis has spoken out on behalf of the Rohingya on several occasions, first drawing attention to their plight during an audience in 2015 with more than 1,500 members of the International Eucharistic Youth Movement.
“Let’s think of those brothers of ours of the Rohingya,” he told attendees. “They were chased from one country and from another and from another. When they arrived at a port or a beach, they gave them a bit of water or a bit to eat and were there chased out to the sea.”
This, he said, “is called killing. It’s true. If I have a conflict with you and I kill you, its war.”
He brought the topic up again a month later in an interview with a Portuguese radio station, and he has consistently spoken out on behalf of the Rohingya in Angelus addresses, daily Masses and general audiences.
In his Feb. 8 general audience, Pope Francis asked pilgrims to pray with him “for our brother and sister Rohingya. They were driven out of Myanmar, they go from one place to another and no one wants them.”
“They are good people, peaceful people; they aren’t Christians, but they are good. They are our brothers and sisters. And they have suffered for years,” he said, noting that often members of the ethnic minority have been “tortured and killed” simply for carrying forward their traditions and Muslim faith.
He then led pilgrims in praying an “Our Father” for the Rohingya, asking afterward for St. Josephine Bakhita, herself a former salve and the patroness of annual international day of prayer and reflection against human trafficking, to intercede.
The Pope also used yesterday’s Angelus address to draw attention to a recent uptick in violence that has caused nearly 100 new Rohingya deaths.
His visit, then, will likely be used as an occasion to push for a peaceful resolution to the conflict that puts respect for human dignity above ethnic disputes.
As far as previous Popes, St. John Paul II visited Bangladesh in 1986. However, Francis’ visit to Myanmar will mark the first time a Pope has ever made an official visit to the country.
Other confirmed international trips for Pope Francis are his upcoming visit to Colombia Sept. 9-13, and his visit to Chile and Peru at the beginning of next year, from Jan. 15-21, 2018.
Hannah Brockhaus contributed to this report.
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If Jeffrey Epstein were still alive and free he would have visited Francis at the Vatican at least three times by now. Come to think of it, do we know he didn’t? The ways in which Francis has defiled the Church are innumerable. Over a decade of continuous scandal with no end in sight. In fact, the pace is accelerating.
Pathetic, ridiculous, sad – but not surprising.
Picking up more and more speed on that slippery slope to ungodliness. Looking from a distance, it’s sad and amazing how fast that church is unraveling.
We are the church. We must keep our lamps lit especially during these dark times. The Eucharist is still the Eucharist, and we should receive Him often. Perhaps the Lord will return sooner than thought. If not, hold down the fort and pass on the true faith on till we have a more traditional pope. We are not to be orphans.
We read: “However, the Open Society Foundations on June 30 announced it will lay off 40% of its approximately 800 employees around the world as part of major changes to its operating model.”
Now we understand why Soros came along with Clinton. Soros’ reduced operating model demonstrates to former employees “what the meaning of is, is.”
Soros and Clinton probably wanted assurances from Pope Francis that their ‘Open Society Foundations’ made a lot of money on the Vatican, London Luxury Building, deal.
If you watch Vatican Girl on Netflix, they talk about Pope John Paul II using Mafia Money from the Vatican Bank to finance political movements working to bring down the Berlin Wall. This was a shock to me. Why is the Vatican working with organized crime?
Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” The question is, did Pope Francis do anything to help the sinners repent or did the sinners influence the Pope?
i also wondered about the reason for the visit.
Performative.Boring.
We get it apostasy blah blah, anti Christ blah blah
What do they do for an encore?
“Rome will lose the faith”. – Our BV Mother of Lasallete. 😢
That could be read as HAS!
Indeed, at some point (soon, I hope) we need to begin to ask ourselves whether Our Lady’s statement has become reality. I wonder what a church would look like that has lost the faith, if not one that looks suspiciously like the one we have now. 🤔
While we witness yet another grotesque display of poor judgment (or worse) and other modernist antics, AB Marcel Lefebvre is looking more and more like a true and faithful son of the church.
“The Open Society Foundations give more than $1.5 billion a year to human rights and democracy advocates, among other causes in the U.S. and around the world.” REALLY. WOW.
“plans to have a larger focus on U.S. domestic politics. Voting rights and abortion rights are among his causes. Soros also heads an Open Society Foundations-aligned political action committee called Democracy PAC, which has about $125 million to spend on domestic U.S. politics.”
MY MY MY…such a lovely force for good in the world. We will soon see the Third Reich and its system of retirement centers
Wouldn’t the Trads love to havi it in their pockets. All extremes play with the same cards. When will we wake up?
Does make one wonder what sort of “business” was discussed, what with the two most notorious financiers of evil having tea with the visible Head of the Church.
Color me apocalyptic.
As Pope Francis withdrew his hand from shaking these world “luminaries”, did he see the blood of countless murdered unborn children dripping from his?
If there was any doubt Pope Francis will be little more than a worn-down speed bump on the well-paved road to One World Government…
Clinton thanked the Pope for “all he has done for the Church… .” Yes, he and Soros are VERY thankful for that.
Reality or satire?
Bergoglio names the author of “Heal Me With Your Mouth” to one of the key posts in the Vatican.
Then less than a week later he meets with Bill Clinton?
The jokes absolutely write themselves.
There is no difference between reality and satire any more.
Shameless. Bergoglio inhabits an alternate world. Clueless. Drunk on the zeitgeist.
“Clinton thanked Pope Francis for all he has done for the Church…”
That has to be a misquote.
I’m sure what he actually said was, “Thank you for all you have done *to* the Church.”
Maybe I’m in denial but is it possible for anyone to be this overtly supportive of evil, that he repeatedly entertains its highest-placed earthly practitioners?
Is it possible? He’s 86; does he know anything about what’s going on around him? Isn’t it more likely that his entire schedule is managed by support-handlers?
Anyway, wow, Clinton and Soros. Add Satan and you’d have had a trifecta.
Just unbelievable to see the church brown nosing the devil incarnate soros, who has almost single handed funded the total destruction of every family/society values there ever were. Now leaving us with a totally sick society. Clinton and the other puppets one of the worst terrorist threats the world has ever known as bullyboy usa jackboots its way through every nation on the planet. In his case, along with we its eu/uk ladpogs, bombing the Middle East back into the dark ages from which it has never recovered. RIP all the victims of our very own so called “christian” tyranny inflicted on the world still today……most of whom we never even know their names, and care even less. God Bless them. This is the final nail in the coffin for the catholic church for me.
Kris Kristofferson –
Written about Layla Al-Atar, a cherished Iraqi artist who was killed when a missile struck her home, instead of its intended target, a building where a trial was taking place concerning the assassination attempt of George Bush snr. The missiles were fired by the Clinton government
And for the Argentinean disappeared, Los Olvidados
Who killed this woman this artist this mother?
Who broke the candle and snuffed out her light
Along with her husband and wounded her children
And sauntered away like a beast in the night?
“Not I” said the soldier
“I just follow orders and it was my duty to do my job well”
“Not I” said the leader who ordered the slaughter
“Im saddened it happened, but then, war is hell”
“Not us” said the others who heard of the horror
Turned a cold shoulder on all that was done
In all the confusion a single conclusion
The circle of sorrow has only begun
And in Argentina…
Straight to the circle on Sundays
Down through the canyons they come
Bearing names of their mothers and daughters
Names of their fathers and sons
Stolen away with no warning, never to ever return
On el Rio del Muerto, All the bridges are burned
Los desaparecidos, lost in the darkness alone
Gone from the face of the earth
With no trace left behind them to mark with a stone
And the faces of Los Olvidados, only survivors recall
But for the pain and the heartbreak, did they matter at all?
Slowly the circle of sadness, spins in the Plaza Mayor
Lonesome remains of the madness and pain
In a world gone insane in a war
And the song of those broken survivors, dancing alone in the dark
With the silence of Los Olvidados, like a hole in the heart
Los desaparecidos, lost in the darkness alone
Gone from the face of the earth
With no trace left behind them to mark with a stone
And the faces of Los Olvidados, only survivors recall
But for the pain and the heartbreak, did they matter at all?
thank you for reporting this horror story guys.
What is the attraction PF has for men with dysfunctional sexual appetites?
So sad really! Should not the Vatican be spending its precious time fighting for the rights of the unborn? Fighting for the rights of the Church? Spending what little time is available working with other Catholics to return to God and follow his original laws?
Meetings like these, I think, in the eyes of the regular person, comes across as trying to please the woke, the unfaithful, the ones who work to re-write Gods word and rules. These meetings do not draw the faithful or those who have fallen asleep
To return to God.
Please we need faithful servants of God to rush and help the world return to what is good, right & just.
I pray all see Gods light as it should be and not as what today seems to show