Pope Francis is heading to Iraq for a four-day trip. This would mark his first-ever papal visit to the country. Pope Francis is heading to Iraq to urge the country's dwindling number of Christians to stay put and help rebuild the country after years of war and persecution. The Pope is defying coronavirus and security concerns to visit Iraq.
Keen to welcome the Pope, banners, posters and billboards depicting Francis have been put up in Baghdad with the slogan 'We are all Brothers', AP has reported.
The Pope is scheduled to meet Iraq's most revered Shia Muslim cleric, say a prayer in Mosul and hold a mass at a stadium in Irbil, the capital of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Region.
The Pope, in February 2019, visited Dubai, where he delivered a mass in public.
About 10,000 Iraqi Security Forces personnel are being deployed for the Pope's security. Round-the-clock curfews are being imposed too, to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein described the Pope's visit as a historic meeting between the minaret and the bells. The Pope has been living under lockdown for a year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Iraq's Christian community were largely displaced between 2014-2017 during the Islamic State's reign.
Pope John Paul II, who was to visit Iraq at the end of 1999, cancelled the trip after talks with the then Saddam Hussein government broke down.
In Iraq, Francis is seeking to not only honour Iraq's tormented Christians but deliver a message of reconciliation and fraternity.
The Pope's visit would have immeasurable importance for the less than 250,000 Christians remaining in Iraq. The church, the Pope is scheduled to visit in Baghdad was the site of one of the worst massacres by Islamic militants of Christians. 52 people lost their lives in the 2010 attack.
Pope Francis, in a recorded message ahead of his visit, said, "I am coming among you also as a pilgrim of peace... seeking fraternity and prompted by the desire to pray together and to walk together, also with our brothers and sisters of other religious traditions, in the steps of Father Abraham, who joins in one family Muslims, Jews and Christians," the BBC reports.
The Vatican spokesman, Matteo Bruni, said Iraqis should know that the Pope came to Iraq as an act of love.
