Photo: CNS As Pope Francis continues his tour to Myanmar and Bangladesh, Catholics in neighbouring India regret missing a chance to meet him in their homeland, nostalgically recalling past papal visits, reported ucanews.com.
Catholic groups began discussing plans to host the pontiff earlier this year, after the Vatican confirmed a papal visit to the region.
According to the report, nobody then expected a papal itinerary would not include India, home to 19 million Catholics. Cardinal Baselios Cleemis Thottunkal, president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India, said the Indian Catholic Church was expecting to receive Pope Francis, “but it did not happen”.
The lack of an official invitation for Pope Francis to visit India is widely seen as being the result of political considerations by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government. The government is run by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.