10_08 - Pope Francis is welcomed by children dressed in Mongolian attire as he attends the inauguration of the House of Mercy in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, the final event of his four-day trip to Mongolia before returning to Rome, September 4. Cindy Wooden
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia – In a land bordering both Russia and China, and having deep ties with both, Pope Francis told Mongolian leaders their country can play “a significant role in the heart of the great Asian continent and on the international scene,” particularly in peacemaking.
After paying tribute to Mongolian history at a statue of Genghis Khan outside the State Palace early September 2, the Pope invoked the Pax Mongolica of the 13th and 14th Centuries when peace reigned throughout the conquered lands of the vast Mongolian empire.
In a country with only about 1,450 Catholics, just a few hundred people came to Sükhbaatar Square outside the State Palace to see the Pope.
After the formal welcome in the square, Pope Francis held a private meeting with Mongolian President Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh in a ceremonial ger, sometimes referred to as a yurt.
Pope encourages small Mongolian flock
In a cathedral shaped like a ger, Pope Francis met leaders of Mongolia’s tiny Catholic community, offering them encouragement but also reminding them that faith and unity must be at the centre of their lives.
Without daily prayer and respect for the structure and unity of the Church, “our strength will fail, and our pastoral work will risk becoming an empty delivery of services, a roster of duties that end up inducing only weariness and frustration,” the Pope said September 2.
At the Cathedral of Ss Peter and Paul in Ulaanbaatar, the Pope met with Cardinal Giorgio Marengo, apostolic prefect of Ulaanbaatar, and with the priests, religious and lay volunteers who minister to Mongolia’s 1,450 Catholics and offer education, health care, food, shelter and other social support to thousands of others.
Pope Francis praised the Churchworkers for making love for the poor their “calling card” but assured the government and those suspicious of the Church that “the Lord Jesus, in sending his disciples into the world, did not send them to spread political theories, but to bear witness by their lives to the newness of his relationship with his Father, now ‘our Father’”.
Pope, Mongolian religious leaders vow to promote harmony, shun violence
The 86-year-old Pope Francis and other religious elders gathered in a ger-shaped theatre to speak of the earth and the divine, harmony and beauty, peace and the human family.
In Mongolia, where all religion was brutally repressed for seven decades under communist rule, Pope Francis paid tribute September 3 especially to Mongolia’s Buddhists, the largest religious group in the country; beginning in the late 1930s, thousands of Buddhist monks were condemned to death and hundreds of Buddhist temples were destroyed.
The Pope prayed that the memory of past suffering would give all Mongolians “the strength needed to transform dark wounds into sources of light, senseless violence into the wisdom of life (and) devastating evil into constructive goodness”.
Leaders of the Buddhist, shamanist, Muslim, Evangelical, Seventh-day Adventist, Latter-day Saints, Hindu, Shinto, Baha’i and Russian Orthodox communities in Mongolia also spoke at the event in Ulaanbaatar’s Hun Theatre.
Jesus is the answer to human longing, Pope says
Like the land struck by a ‘zud’, the human heart has a thirst and longing that can be alleviated only by the God of love, Pope Francis told Mongolians gathered for Mass in Ulaanbaatar’s Steppe Arena.
Countless generations of Mongolians have feared the ‘zud,’ an extreme weather event of drought or impenetrable ice that decimates herds and flocks.
In his homily at the Mass September 3, Pope Francis emphasised the day’s response to Psalm 63: “My soul is thirsting for you, O Lord my God.”
Every person thirsts for happiness, for direction and for meaning in life, the Pope said.
But “more than anything, we thirst for love, for only love can truly satisfy us, bring us fulfilment, inspire inner assurance and allow us to savour the beauty of life”.
Pope Francis told the estimated 2,000 people in the arena that “the Christian faith is the answer to this thirst; it takes it seriously, without dismissing it or trying to replace it with tranquilizers or surrogates”.
The Mongolian Catholic community numbers only about 1,450, but hundreds of Catholics from throughout Central Asia travelled to Ulaanbaatar for the papal Mass.
While the Chinese government refused to allow any Catholic bishop or priest from the mainland to attend, small groups of lay Catholics managed to cross the border to see the Pope, and official Church delegations arrived from Hong Kong and Macau.
Bishops and pilgrims also came from South Korean and Vietnam.
At Mass in Mongolia, Pope sends ‘warm greetings’ to neighbouring China
While China allowed Pope Francis’ plane to cross its airspace on the way to Mongolia, an office of the Chinese Communist Party prevented any Catholic bishops or priests in the mainland from traveling there to see the Pope.
But a retired cardinal and the future cardinal of Hong Kong were at papal events throughout the Pope’s September 1-4 stay in Ulaanbaatar, the Mongolian capital.
At the end of Mass September 3 in the Steppe Arena, Pope Francis called retired Cardinal John Tong Hon of Hong Kong and Cardinal-designate Stephen Chow Sau-Yan of Hong Kong up to him.
Taking them by the hands, he told the crowd: “These two brother bishops – the emeritus of Hong Kong and the current bishop of Hong Kong – I want to take the opportunity of their presence to send a warm greeting to the noble Chinese people.”
The Pope said he wanted to wish the best to the entire Chinese nation, “and to Chinese Catholics, I ask you to be good Christians and good citizens”.
While bishops and priests from the mainland were not permitted to travel to Mongolia, several small groups of lay Catholics from China did manage to cross the border to see the Pope.
Charity is motivated by love, not designed to win converts, Pope says
Pope Francis ended his four-day visit to Mongolia where Catholic missionaries began – with charity.
Blessing the new House of Mercy in Ulaanbaatar September 4, the Pope insisted that while Catholic charitable and social service activities have attracted Mongolians to the Church, the service is motivated by love alone.
Pope Francis used his speech to the charity workers and volunteers “to reject certain myths”, including one about why Catholics offer education and health care, feed the hungry, shelter the homeless and care for widows and orphans.
A big myth, he said, is that “the Catholic Church, distinguished throughout the world for its great commitment to works of social promotion, does all this to proselytise, as if caring for others were a way of enticing people to ‘join up.’
“No! Christians do whatever they can to alleviate the suffering of the needy because in the person of the poor they acknowledge Jesus, the son of God, and, in him, the dignity of each person, called to be a son or daughter of God,” the Pope insisted.
OSV News
10_01 – Pope Francis arrives at the headquarters of the Apostolic Prefecture of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, September 1, where the Pontiff stayed during his four-day visit to the country. Photos: CNS.
10_02 – Pope Francis meets with Mongolian President Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh in a ceremonial ger at the State Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, September 2.
10_03 – People cheer as Pope Francis leaves Ss Peter and Paul Cathedral after meeting bishops, priests, deacons, religious, seminarians and pastoral workers in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, September 2.
10_04 – Pope Francis receives a scarf as a gift from a Buddhist leader during an ecumenical and interreligious meeting at the Hun Theatre in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, September 3.
10_05 – Pope Francis waves as people behind him raise a Chinese flag before the Pope’s Mass in Steppe Arena in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, September 3. At the end of the Mass, the Pope sent greetings to China and to Chinese Catholics.
10_06 – Catholic devotee Perlimaa Gavaadandov (71) recites a prayer before bed in a yurt on the outskirts of Arvaikheer city, Mongolia, August 28. Photo: OSV News/ Joseph Campbell, Reuters
10_07 – Members of a Mongolian honour guard march after receiving Pope Francis at Chinggis Khaan International Airport in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, September 1.
10_08 – Pope Francis is welcomed by children dressed in Mongolian attire as he attends the inauguration of the House of Mercy in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, the final event of his four-day trip to Mongolia before returning to Rome, September 4.