Jakarta: Pope Francis is scheduled to visit Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Timor-Leste and Singapore from September 2 to 13 this year.
During his visit, the pope is scheduled to meet with world leaders, youth groups, local clergy, missionaries and parishioners. The Vatican’s tentative schedule calls for him to take part in four public Masses in stadiums in Jakarta, Port Moresby, Dili and Singapore.
The bishop of Thailand said Pope Francis has long been attracted to Asia and wants to learn from and support the churches and countries there, a sentiment he expressed during a June 25 panel discussion at the World Economic Forum in Dalian, China.
In Jakarta, Pope Francis will attend an interreligious meeting at Istiqlal Mosque and meet with the president of Indonesia, where more than 3 percent of the country’s roughly 280 million people are Catholic. Bishop Tige stressed the pope’s interest in the future of the church and the diversity of Catholicism around the world beyond a Western perspective.
The trip will be Pope Francis’ first overseas trip since his two-day visit to Marseille, France, in September 2023 and his longest time away from Rome during his 11-year papacy.
Bishop Tighe stressed the symbolic significance of the ambitious trip for the Pope, who will turn 88 in December 2024 and whose schedule has been affected at times by health issues, including missing the 28th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP28) in Dubai in November 2023.
Pope Francis will visit Indonesia from Sept. 3 to 6, followed by visits to Papua New Guinea from Sept. 6 to 9 and Timor-Leste from Sept. 9 to 11. During his final stop in Singapore from Sept. 11 to 13, he will visit St. Louis.
Teresa’s House and Catholic Junior College. Pope Francis has previously visited several Asian countries, including South Korea in 2014, Sri Lanka and the Philippines in 2015.
