Vatican unveils program of Pope Francis 7-hour trip to Hungary

CNA Staff   By CNA Staff

July 21, 2021 Catholic News Agency News Briefs 0 Print

Heroes’ Square (Hősök tere), Budapest, Hungary. / Andrew Shiva / Wikipedia / CC BY-SA 4.0.

Vatican City, Jul 21, 2021 / 06:35 am (CNA).

The Vatican unveiled on Wednesday an intensive program for Pope Francis’ trip to Hungary on Sept. 12.

The pope is scheduled to spend just under seven hours in the country before embarking on a three-day visit to neighboring Slovakia.

A program released by the Vatican on July 21 confirmed that the pope would meet with Viktor Orbán during his whirlwind visit, following speculation that he would snub the Hungarian prime minister.

Pope Francis is traveling to Hungary to celebrate the closing Mass of the 52nd International Eucharistic Congress in Budapest.

The last time a pope took part in an International Eucharistic Congress was in the year 2000, when John Paul II attended the event in Rome.

Pope Francis will depart for Hungary from Rome’s Fiumicino International Airport at 6 a.m. on Sept. 12, arriving at Budapest International Airport at 7:45 a.m.

After an official welcome, he will meet for half an hour with Orbán and Hungarian President János Áder at the Museum of Fine Arts, located in Budapest’s Heroes’ Square.

The Museum of Fine Arts, in Budapest’s Heroes’ Square. / Lóránd Péter via Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 3.0).
The Museum of Fine Arts, in Budapest’s Heroes’ Square. / Lóránd Péter via Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 3.0).

Earlier this month, the Vatican’s “foreign minister” rejected suggestions that Pope Francis’ decision to make just a brief trip to Hungary was connected with the policies of the country’s government.

“No, it’s not any judgment on a government or authorities in Hungary,” Archbishop Paul Gallagher told an interviewer. “The pope was very clear right from the beginning that he was going to Budapest exclusively to celebrate the concluding Mass of the International Eucharistic Congress.”

After meeting with the prime minister and president, the pope will give a speech to the country’s Catholic bishops, followed by another address to representatives of the Ecumenical Council of Churches and Jewish communities.

He will then leave the Museum of Fine Arts to celebrate the closing Mass in Heroes’ Square at 11:30 a.m.

Afterwards, he will return to the airport for a farewell ceremony, leaving for the Slovakian capital, Bratislava, at 2:30 p.m.

Pope Francis formally announced on July 4 that he would travel to Hungary and Slovakia in September.

He had previously mentioned the possibility of visiting the neighboring central European countries during an in-flight press conference in March.

The week-long International Eucharist Congress was originally scheduled to take place in 2020 but was postponed to 2021 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Hungary has a population of 9.8 million people, 62% of whom are Catholic. The country, which borders Austria, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Romania, Ukraine, and Slovakia, last hosted the Eucharistic Congress in 1938.

St. John Paul II was the last pope to travel to Hungary, visiting Pannonhalma and Győr 25 years ago in 1996.

Cardinal Péter Erdő has said that Catholics in Hungary are looking forward to the papal visit, which he will host as the archbishop of Esztergom-Budapest.

“The Catholic community is waiting for the arrival of the Holy Father in great joy and love. We are praying for his visit to be the sign of hope and a new beginning after the abatement of the pandemic,” he said on July 4.

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‘I lost a dad’: Pope Francis speaks about losing Benedict XVI

January 25, 2023 Catholic News Agency 1
Pope Francis and Pope Emeritus Benedict embrace each other at the Vatican’s Mater Ecclesiae Monastery, June 30, 2015. / L’Osservatore Romano.

Rome Newsroom, Jan 25, 2023 / 08:50 am (CNA).

In a new interview published Wednesday, Pope Francis said the death of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI meant he had lost a “good companion” and a father figure. 

“I lost a dad,” Pope Francis told the Associated Press, praising his predecessor — who died on Dec. 31, 2022, at the age of 95 — as a “gentleman.” 

Francis said he would visit Benedict for counsel at the converted monastery Mater Ecclesiae in the Vatican Gardens, where the retired pope resided. 

“For me, he was a security. In the face of a doubt, I would ask for the car and go to the monastery and ask.”

The 86-year-old pontiff called Benedict’s decision to live in Mater Ecclesiae a “good intermediate solution” in the wide-ranging interview that also included remarks about the Church’s stance on homosexuality, the German Synodal Way — and his health.

Pope Francis blesses the coffin of Pope Benedict XVI at his funeral on Jan. 5, 2023, at the Vatican. Vatican Media
Pope Francis blesses the coffin of Pope Benedict XVI at his funeral on Jan. 5, 2023, at the Vatican. Vatican Media

Pope Francis has repeatedly praised his predecessor. In April of last year, he described Benedict as “a prophet” of the Church’s future and in November acknowledged his leadership in responding to sexual abuse. On Jan. 4, he said Benedict brought Catholics to an “encounter with Jesus.” 

Francis, who has not ruled out retiring, said Benedict’s decision to live in a converted monastery in the Vatican Gardens was a “good intermediate solution” but that future retired popes might want to do things differently.

“He was still ‘enslaved’ as a pope, no?” Francis said.

“Of the vision of a pope, of a system. ‘Slave’ in the good sense of the word: In that he wasn’t completely free, as he would have liked to have returned to his Germany and continued studying theology.”

Benedict “opened the door” to future resignations, Pope Francis said. The pope also confirmed what he said six months ago: If he should retire, he would choose the title of “bishop emeritus of Rome” — not “pope emeritus” — and live neither in his native Argentina nor the Vatican but in Rome.

Asked if he would reside at Archbasilica of St. John Lateran in a TV interview broadcast on July 12, 2022, Francis said “that could be,” since he would like to retire “to hear confessions at a church.”

[…]

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