BEIRUT — Pope Benedict XVI traveled to Lebanon on Friday, arriving in a region transformed by popular uprisings and war since his last visit to the Middle East in 2009. The visit coincided with a moment of fresh religious turmoil, marked by spreading protests against an incendiary anti-Muslim video. Even before protests against the video erupted in half a dozen countries this week, leaving at least nine people dead, the upheaval in the region, including the war in Syria, had complicated the pope’s trip, which he has called a “peace pilgrimage.”
The Vatican had downplayed security concerns, saying the pope would be warmly welcomed in Lebanon, where roughly 30 percent of the population is Christian. On Friday, hours before his arrival, banners with Benedict’s likeness lined the highways as Army soldiers in armored troop carriers deployed along a coastal road.
The pope’s comments on the changes in the region since the uprisings began in 2011 were certain to be closely scrutinized, especially on Syria, where the deepening civil war has left thousands of people dead and unleashed grisly sectarian violence that has imperiled the country’s diversity. The war is spreading beyond its borders and unsettling neighboring countries including Lebanon, where political factions are divided between Syria’s warring sides.
The pope is expected to focus primarily on the ongoing difficulties facing Christians in the Middle East, an ancient community whose numbers have thinned perilously in recent decades in the face of wars, occupations and discrimination.
Despite shifts toward elected politics in several countries, the rise of Islamist parties in the region has further unsettled many Christians, who fear groups like the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt are seeking to tie aspects of citizenship much more closely to Muslim religious identity.
The protests this week against the United States added new peril to the pope’s trip, and the Vatican has walked a fine line in order not to upset Muslim feelings.
On Wednesday, after news of the death of J. Christopher Stevens, the United States ambassador to Libya, the Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, issued a statement that focused on a video mocking the Prophet Muhammad, which had instigated riots, saying that “unjustified offense and provocations” against Muslims produce “sometimes tragic results” that yield “unacceptable violence.”
On Thursday, Father Lombardi issued a statement decrying the ambassador’s death, saying that it called “for the firmest possible condemnation on the part of the Holy See. Nothing, in fact, can justify the activity of terrorist organizations and homicidal violence.”
In a dark moment in his papacy in 2006, Benedict angered Muslims when on a visit to Turkey he quoted a Byzantine emperor who called Islam “evil and inhuman.” In response, Muslims demonstrated around the world and an Italian nun was killed in Somalia. The pope later apologized.
In Lebanon, the pope is expected to deliver six speeches, which have likely been carefully vetted so as to cause minimum offense. The Vatican has characteristically played down the political dimensions of the trip, saying that the pope is bringing a pastoral message of peace.
During the three-day trip, the pope is expected to meet Lebanon’s political and religious leaders, along with Middle East bishops and young people.
He will also present a document produced by bishops of the Middle East at a synod, or conference, at the Vatican in 2010, outlining issues of concern to the Catholic Church in the Middle East. The visit culminates with a large outdoor Mass on the Beirut waterfront on Sunday morning, before the pope returns to Rome that evening.
In a speech delivered in Turkey earlier this month, the Rev. Miguel Ángel Ayuso Guixot, the secretary for the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, said that in Syria, the Holy See called for “an immediate end to violence from whatever part,” as well as “dialogue toward reconciliation as the necessary path to respond to the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people.”
It also sought “to preserve the unity of the Syrian people regardless of ethnicity and religious affiliation” and to ask Syria, “to be also cognizant of the legitimate concerns of the international community.” Father Guixot also called on “the international community to dedicate itself to a process of peace in Syria and the entire region for the benefit and well-being of all humanity.”
Kareem Fahim reported from Beirut and Rachel Donadio from Rome and Vatican City.
The Vatican had downplayed security concerns, saying the pope would be warmly welcomed in Lebanon, where roughly 30 percent of the population is Christian. On Friday, hours before his arrival, banners with Benedict’s likeness lined the highways as Army soldiers in armored troop carriers deployed along a coastal road.
The pope’s comments on the changes in the region since the uprisings began in 2011 were certain to be closely scrutinized, especially on Syria, where the deepening civil war has left thousands of people dead and unleashed grisly sectarian violence that has imperiled the country’s diversity. The war is spreading beyond its borders and unsettling neighboring countries including Lebanon, where political factions are divided between Syria’s warring sides.
The pope is expected to focus primarily on the ongoing difficulties facing Christians in the Middle East, an ancient community whose numbers have thinned perilously in recent decades in the face of wars, occupations and discrimination.
Despite shifts toward elected politics in several countries, the rise of Islamist parties in the region has further unsettled many Christians, who fear groups like the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt are seeking to tie aspects of citizenship much more closely to Muslim religious identity.
The protests this week against the United States added new peril to the pope’s trip, and the Vatican has walked a fine line in order not to upset Muslim feelings.
On Wednesday, after news of the death of J. Christopher Stevens, the United States ambassador to Libya, the Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, issued a statement that focused on a video mocking the Prophet Muhammad, which had instigated riots, saying that “unjustified offense and provocations” against Muslims produce “sometimes tragic results” that yield “unacceptable violence.”
On Thursday, Father Lombardi issued a statement decrying the ambassador’s death, saying that it called “for the firmest possible condemnation on the part of the Holy See. Nothing, in fact, can justify the activity of terrorist organizations and homicidal violence.”
In a dark moment in his papacy in 2006, Benedict angered Muslims when on a visit to Turkey he quoted a Byzantine emperor who called Islam “evil and inhuman.” In response, Muslims demonstrated around the world and an Italian nun was killed in Somalia. The pope later apologized.
In Lebanon, the pope is expected to deliver six speeches, which have likely been carefully vetted so as to cause minimum offense. The Vatican has characteristically played down the political dimensions of the trip, saying that the pope is bringing a pastoral message of peace.
During the three-day trip, the pope is expected to meet Lebanon’s political and religious leaders, along with Middle East bishops and young people.
He will also present a document produced by bishops of the Middle East at a synod, or conference, at the Vatican in 2010, outlining issues of concern to the Catholic Church in the Middle East. The visit culminates with a large outdoor Mass on the Beirut waterfront on Sunday morning, before the pope returns to Rome that evening.
In a speech delivered in Turkey earlier this month, the Rev. Miguel Ángel Ayuso Guixot, the secretary for the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, said that in Syria, the Holy See called for “an immediate end to violence from whatever part,” as well as “dialogue toward reconciliation as the necessary path to respond to the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people.”
It also sought “to preserve the unity of the Syrian people regardless of ethnicity and religious affiliation” and to ask Syria, “to be also cognizant of the legitimate concerns of the international community.” Father Guixot also called on “the international community to dedicate itself to a process of peace in Syria and the entire region for the benefit and well-being of all humanity.”
Kareem Fahim reported from Beirut and Rachel Donadio from Rome and Vatican City.