|
Pope begins home pilgrimage
09/09/2006 18:28 - (SA)
|
|
|
 |
|
| Pope Benedict XVI arrives to a mass of Bavarian flags at the Munich airport in southern Germany. (Michael Probst, AP) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Munich - Pope Benedict XVI arrived in the southern German region of Bavaria on Saturday, beginning a six-day homecoming pilgrimage re-tracing the early stages of his life.
The Alitalia jet carrying the pope from Rome touched down at Franz Joseph Strauss airport in Munich, the Bavarian capital, at 1320 GMT.
The former cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was archbishop of Munich before being called to the Vatican in 1982.
He was to go from the airport to the Marienplatz square in the centre of Munich, where 500 000 people were waiting to welcome him.
The trip is Benedict's fourth abroad since he succeeded the late Pope John Paul II in April 2005. His homecoming pilgrimage will include private visits as well as three open-air masses.
He will also visit the house, in the small town of Marktl-am-Inn near the Austrian border, where he was born in 1927.
The pope will give the first of three open-air masses in Munich on Sunday.
'More a personal visit'
He will also lead masses in Alltoeting and Regensburg.
It is the second time that Benedict, 79, has visited his homeland as pontiff, having attended the World Youth Day celebrations in Cologne last year.
The Vatican however, says this will be a more personal visit.
The pope has set aside Wednesday to spend with his brother, Monsignor Georg Ratzinger, in Regensburg. They will visit the graves of their mother, father and sister.
"I wanted to see again the places and the people I grew up with and which shaped me and formed my life, and to thank those people," said the pope in an interview with German television this week.
Benedict said he also wanted to convince those German believers with wavering faith that Catholicism was more than just a set of rules.
"We've heard so much about what is not allowed that now it's time to say: we have a positive idea to offer, that man and woman are made for each other," he said.
He said he was reluctant to travel often, that he "never felt strong enough" to plan many long trips.
'Why shouldn't it be a good event?'
"But where such a trip allows me to communicate a message or where, shall I say, it's in response to a sincere request, I'd like to go," he said.
Benedict has visited Poland and Spain in recent months. He also plans to go to Turkey in November and to Brazil in 2007.
The election of a German pope has been credited with slowing the flow of people leaving the Catholic faith in the country. But the current Archbishop of Munich, Cardinal Friedrich Wetter, said he did not foresee a rush of converts as a result of the papal visit.
"I am not expecting there will now be a mass of people going to church," the cardinal told Saturday's Sueddeutsche Zeitung daily.
"But why shouldn't we just have a good event that strengthens people and shows them they are not alone in their beliefs?"
- AFP
|
