Francis announces intense agenda for the trip to Hungary and Slovakia
Francis’ trip to Hungary and Slovakia in September will test his recovery from the colon operation.
The Pope will leave on Sunday, September 12, and return to Rome on Wednesday, 15.
The first day, September 12, he will get up early. The plane leaves Fiumicino at 6 a.m. and will arrive in Budapest at 7:45 a.m.
Over the next 6 hours the Pope will meet with Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and President János Áder. He will have a meeting with the bishops of the country and will meet with the representatives of the Ecumenical Council of Churches and with some Jewish communities in Hungary.
The last thing he will do before leaving the country is to preside over the closing mass of the International Eucharistic Congress.
At 2:40 p.m. you already have to be on the plane to go to the capital of Slovakia.
It arrives less than an hour later. And he still has two other meetings on the agenda: one ecumenical at the nunciature, where he will deliver his first speech in the country, and another, private, with the Jesuits who live there.
On Tuesday he travels to the city of Košice, where he will preside over the Byzantine liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom. Then he will meet with the gypsy community, which suffers a strong marginalization and finally with the young people before returning to Bratislava.
On the last day, Wednesday, Francis will visit the Šaštín National Shrine and participate in the annual pilgrimage carried out by Slovak Catholics. There is the image of Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows, its patron. The pilgrimages did not stop even in times of Soviet totalitarianism.
Francis will pray there with the bishops and celebrate mass. You will take the plane to Rome at 1:45 p.m., where you will arrive at 3:30 p.m.
It will be a trip of only 4 days but in which it will hold almost 20 events between liturgical celebrations and meetings with different groups of people.
Javier Romero/ Romereports.com
