Pope Francis yesterday flew deep into the jungle of the Southwestern Pacific island nation of Papua New Guinea (PNG) to visit Catholics living in one of the most remote areas of the world and deliver medical supplies and other aid.
Traveling 1,000km in a C-130 cargo aircraft provided by the Royal Australian Air Force, Francis arrived with a small entourage in Vanimo, a township of about 12,000 people in the northwestern corner of PNG’s main island, with no running water and scarce electricity.
The 87-year-old pope brought hundreds of kilograms of items to help support the local population, Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said.
Photo: Reuters
They included various medicines and clothing, as well toys and musical instruments for school children, he said.
The pope is visiting the nation of 600 islands as part of his ambitious 12-day, four-country tour of Southeast Asia and Oceania, the longest of his 11-year-old papacy.
He came to Vanimo at the invitation of local missionaries with the Catholic Institute of the Incarnate Word. They, like Francis, the first pope from the Americas, are from Argentina.
Photo: EPA-EFE
“You are doing something beautiful, and it is important that you are not left alone,” Francis told the crowd, which the Vatican estimated at 20,000, of missionaries and Catholic faithful from Vanimo in a meeting outside the town’s one-story, wood-paneled cathedral parish.
“You live in a magnificent land, enriched by a great variety of plants and birds,” the pope said. “The beauty of the landscape is matched by the beauty of a community where people love one another.”
The Reverend Tomas Ravaioli, one of the missionaries, said he could not believe the pope had actually come to Vanimo.
“He is keeping his promise to come,” the priest said. “We cannot believe it. At his age, he is making an enormous effort.”
A sprawling country of mountains, jungle and rivers, PNG is home to more than 800 languages and hundreds of tribes, including dozens of uncontacted peoples.
As with other events throughout his stay in the country, Francis was greeted in a field outside the cathedral with a traditional dance from a group wearing feathered headdresses and straw skirts. Some of the men wore koteka, a traditional gourd covering over the penis.
The pope also heard testimonies from local Catholics. Steven Abala, a lay teacher, described how some rural communities, cut off from roads, must wait weeks or months between visits by priests.
Abala presented Francis with a headdress with yellow and brown feathers, which the pope tried on.
The pope thanked the assembled thousands, some of whom had walked or sailed for days to come and see him, and praised the “contagious smiles and your exuberant joy” of local children.
In a speech to its political authorities on Saturday, Francis called for better treatment of its workers and appealed for an end to a spate of ethnic violence that has killed dozens in recent months.
In Vanimo, the pope asked local Catholics to work “to put an end to destructive behaviors such as violence, infidelity, exploitation, alcohol and drug abuse, evils which imprison and take away the happiness of so many of our brothers and sisters.”
The Vatican says there are about 2.5 million Catholics in PNG, which has an estimated population of 9 million to 17 million.
Additional reporting by AFP
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