Washington laid on a grandiose welcome on Tuesday for a visit by Pope Benedict XVI, who is aiming to renew the faith of American Catholics
WASHINGTON: Washington laid on a grandiose welcome on Tuesday for a visit by Pope Benedict XVI, who is aiming to renew the faith of American Catholics but also to touch on sensitive topics such as the Iraq war and predator priests.
A specially chartered Alitalia plane dubbed “Shepherd One” left Rome early on Tuesday for Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington, where the pope will be met by President George W. Bush in what the White House called an “unprecedented” gesture.
The official welcoming ceremony for Benedict will take place on Wednesday — the pope’s 81st birthday — at the White House, where he will be given a 21-gun salute in front of a crowd of between 9,000 and 12,000. Benedict will hold a mass for 48,000 in Washington Thursday before going to New York to visit the scene of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Centre and holding another mass for 60,000 at New York Yankee Stadium.
Posters announcing Benedict’s first papal visit to North America since he was elected in 2005 —and the first since John Paul II stopped in St Louis in 1999 — draped Washington buses. Banners on street posts waved in the spring breeze along boulevards lined with blossoming cherry trees that Benedict will take in the Popemobile and official motorcades.
“This visit is an opportunity for the Catholic faithful throughout the country to be renewed in our faith,” Archbishop of Washington Donald Wuerl said inside the new baseball stadium where the pontiff will celebrate mass on Thursday. Before sunrise on Monday, workers began erecting the altar and laying protective covering on the playing field.
The stadium gates will open nearly five hours early, to allow the thousands to go through stringent security checks In New York, he will follow in the footsteps of Paul VI and John Paul II and address the UN General Assembly.
Benedict is widely expected to make a plea for world peace, with some Vatican watchers predicting he will directly mention the war in Iraq.
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