Pope Francis will pay an apostolic visit to Canada from July 24-30, Holy See Press Office Director Matteo Bruni said Friday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 13th May, 2022) Pope Francis will pay an apostolic visit to Canada from July 24-30, Holy See Press Office Director Matteo Bruni said Friday.
"Accepting the invitation of the civil and ecclesiastical Authorities and the indigenous communities, His Holiness Pope Francis will make an Apostolic Journey to Canada from 24 to 30 July 2022. During this time, he will visit the cities of Edmonton, Quebec and Iqaluit," Bruni said on the Holy See's website.
Bruni noted that the program and further details of the Pope's journey will be announced in the coming weeks.
In late March, the Pope received a delegation of Canada's Indigenous leaders and survivors of mistreatment in the country's residential schools. The survivors told the Pope stories of how they were among the 150,000 children subjected to cruelty and abuse by Catholic priests and school employees. The delegation sought an apology from the Pope on behalf of the Roman Catholic Church and a commitment to repair the decades of considerable harm done to Indigenous children. In early April, the Pope apologized for the Catholic Church's abuse of Indigenous children and asked for "God's forgiveness."
From mid-1800s until the 1970s, the Canadian government forcefully removed more than 150,000 Indigenous children from their homes and placed them in state-funded, mostly Catholic, schools. The children were beaten for speaking their native languages, maltreated because they were considered inferior, sexually assaulted, and brutalized while being Christianized. At least 3,200 of them died and were buried in graves at residential schools across Canada.
In 2021, the remains of 215 children were found on the territory of a former Catholic school in the Canadian province of British Columbia. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the existence of these schools and called events of the past a "tragedy."
