Plans are now underway for Pope Francis to visit Kazakhstan in September for an interreligious meeting.
Newsroom (1/08/2022 2:17 PM Gaudium Press) Matteo Bruni, director of the Holy See Press Office, confirmed that plans are now underway for Pope Francis to visit Kazakhstan in September for an interreligious meeting in a statement issued Monday, Aug. 1, 2022.
Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev announced in April that a papal visit was possible. In his meeting with the media on Saturday’s return flight from Canada, Pope Francis confirmed his intention to travel to the Central Asian country, saying, “That wouldn’t be too rigorous a journey.”
“Accepting the invitation of the civil and ecclesial authorities, Pope Francis will make the announced Apostolic Journey to Kazakhstan from 13-15 September this year, visiting the city of Nur-Sultan on the occasion of the VII Congress of Leaders of World and Traditional Religions,” the statement said.
In recent months Kazakhstan has been discussed as a potential location for a meeting between Pope Francis and Orthodox Patriarch Kirill of Moscow, also expected to participate in the congress.
The first pope to travel to Kazakhstan was St. Pope John Paul II, who visited the country with Armenia in September 2001. At 81 years old and suffering from Parkinson’s disease, John Paul II spent four days in Kazakhstan amid heightened security concerns following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
In Kazakhstan, there are five Catholic dioceses and approximately 250,000 Latin Rite Catholics, according to 2008 statistics, making up a small minority of its population of 18 million people.
Pope Francis erected an apostolic administration for Byzantine Catholics in Karaganda, Kazakhstan, in 2019, highlighting the growing number of Ukrainian Greek Catholics in the country, which some estimates put at around 10,000.
Compiled by Raju Hasmukh
(With Files from CNA)
