_WORLD WATCH______________________________
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Papal schedule nearly set
First-ever visit to a mosque
Plans for the May visit by Pope John Paul II to Syria are almost completely in place, according to the Catholic bishop in charge of the papal schedule.
Archbishop Isidore Battikha of Damascus, the Melkite Catholic prelate who is coordinating plans for the Pope’s trip, told the Rome news agency I Media that the program for that trip is nearly complete. “We are just waiting for confirmation on his stop at Aleppo,” he said.
The Pope’s trip—a part of the “Jubilee pilgrimage” in which he is visiting the sites that are tied to the history of salvation—will take him to Syria from May 5 through 7. He is scheduled to stay in Damascus, but it is not certain whether or not he will travel across the country to Aleppo.
During his visit the Pope will visit with the different Catholic communities in Syria: Melkite, Maronite, Chaldean, Armenian, and Syrian. He will also meet with leaders of the Orthodox Church. And on May 6 he will visit the grand mufti of Damascus and make the first trip ever by a Roman Pontiff to an Islamic house of worship. The mufti’s mosque, the Omeyyades mosque, is said to house the remains of the head of St. John the Baptist, who is venerated by Islam as a great prophet.
Archbishop Battikha emphasized that the Pope’s visit to the mosque should be understood as an opportunity
to pay homage to the relics of the saint. The archbishop pointed out that the Omeyyades mosque was once a Christian basilica, which was taken over by Islam after the Muslim conquests of the 7th century. However, during the ceremony at the mosque, the Holy Father will deliver an address to the Muslims who make up 87 percent of Syria’s population.
New Patriarch for Syrian Catholics
Previous leader now in Roman Curia
Pope John Paul II has recognized the election of a new leader for the Syrian Catholic Church: Patriarch Ignace Pierre VIII of Antioch. In a formal letter made public by the Vatican, the Pontiff also extended full ecclesial communion to the new Syrian Catholic leader.
Patriarch Ignace Pierre VIII was elected by the Syrian Catholic synod of bishops on February 16, to fill the post that was vacated when Patriarch Ignace Moussa I Daoud resigned to take up his new duties as prefect of the Congregation for Eastern Churches.
The new patriarch followed the tradition of the Syrian Catholic Church in taking the name Ignace followed by another name of his own choosing. He was born Gregory Peter Abdel-Ahad in Syria in 1930, ordained to the priesthood in 1954, and became a bishop in 1996. He has spent most of his priestly ministry in the Holy Land, and was serving as the Exarch of Jerusalem at the time of his election to the patriarchate.
The Syrian Church broke with Rome early in the 5th century, after a series of Christological disputes. In 1782, the Syrian Orthodox Patriarch of Aleppo declared himself to be a Catholic, and successfully sought a restoration of full communion with the Holy See. Since that time, the Syrian Catholic Church—with headquarters now in Beirut—has come to number about 80,000 faithful. Most of these Eastern-rite Catholics live in Syria, Lebanon, or Iraq, although there are small Syrian Catholic communities in France and the United States.