As Pope Francis began his tour to Myanmar and Bangladesh, Catholics in neighboring India regret missing a chance to meet him in their homeland, nostalgi-cally recalling past papal visits.
Catholic groups began discussing plans to host the pontiff after the Vatican early this year confirmed a papal visit to the region. Nobody then expected a papal itinerary would not include India, a nation of 19 million Catholics.
Cardinal Baselios Cleemis, president of the Indian Catholic Bishops’ Confer-ence, said the Indian Catholic Church was expecting to receive Pope Francis.
“But it did not happen,” he lamented.
In August, the Vatican announced that the Nov. 27-Dec. 2 journey would only include Myanmar and Bangladesh, whereas the original plan had been to visit India and Bangladesh.
The lack of an official invitation for Pope Francis to visit India is widely seen as being the result of political consi-derations by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government. The government is run by the rightwing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Observers say the BJP feared that Modi hosting Pope Francis would have alienated majority-Hindu voters ahead of scheduled 2019 national elections.
However, Cardinal George Alencherry of Ernakulam-Angamaly, said the outcome had disappointed the entire Indian church. Cardinal Alencherry joined in the papal Mass in Bangladesh.
A wide cross-section of people ucanews.com spoke to in India said a papal visit would have uplifted Christians now facing violence and threats from hardline Hindu groups, especially in northern India.
One of those who are unhappy about Pope Francis now not visiting India is Johana Xalxo, an Oraon ethnic minority women and a school principal in the capital, New Delhi.
