Pope Francis has arrived in East Timor as part of his longest overseas journey yet to four countries across Southeast Asia and Oceania.
He will spend three days in the overwhelmingly Catholic nation, one of the world’s poorest countries, and take part in an open-air celebration of Mass the Vatican says could include more than half the population of 1.3 million.
The 87-year-old came to East Timor from Papua New Guinea and landed in the capital Dili, where he was met by President Jose Manuel Ramos-Horta, Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao and two women dressed in traditional outfits, who offered him flowers and a woven ceremonial scarf he briefly wore.
The pontiff wearing a Tais, East Timor’s traditional scarf. Pic: AP
Tens of thousands of people filled the area around the airport as the pontiff left in an open-top vehicle, with many waving Vatican and Timorese flags and many holding yellow and white umbrellas – the colours of the Holy See – to shade themselves from the scorching sun.
East Timor, which sits north of Australia, gained independence from Indonesia in 2002 following a brutal, decades-long occupation.
The pope praised the Timorese people for having recovered from their “greatest suffering and trial” to put East Timor on the path to development and praised them for having reconciled with Indonesia.
Francis is the second pope to visit after John Paul II came in 1989, when the country was still fighting for its freedom.
The pontiff travels to the presidential palace in Dili. Pic: AP
The country has struggled to rebuild its infrastructure and economy since independence, with the World Bank estimating in 2014 some 42% of Timorese live in poverty and some 47% of children are stunted due to malnutrition.
While the Vatican says some 96% of Timorese are Catholic – making it the most Catholic country in the world outside of the Vatican – the country has been rocked by abuse scandals.
In 2022, the Vatican confirmed it had sanctioned a Timorese Nobel Peace Prize-winning hero, Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo, following allegations he sexually abused boys in Timor in the 1990s.
A year earlier, a defrocked American priest, Richard Daschbach, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for sexually abusing girls in his care in Timor.
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“The pope must denounce the two men by name,” Anne Barrett Doyle, of the abuse tracking group BishopAccountability.org, told Reuters. “His words could have an enormous positive impact.”
Francis will remain in East Timor until Wednesday as part of a 12-day visit that has so far included a stop in Indonesia, before he travels to Singapore and then returns to Rome on 13 September.