Pope Leo XIV to pray at the site of the 2020 Beirut port blast
Rome: Pope Leo XIV will pray at the site of the 2020 port blast in Beirut that killed over 200 people and compounded Lebanon’s economic and political crisis during his first foreign trip as pope next month, which will also take him to Turkiye to mark an important anniversary with Orthodox Christians.
The Vatican on Monday released the itinerary of Leo’s Nov. 27-Dec. 2 trip. It includes several moments for history’s first American pope to speak about interfaith and ecumenical relations, as well as the plight of Christians in the Middle East and regional tensions overall.
Pope Francis had planned to visit both countries, but died earlier this year before he could. He had particularly long wanted to go to Lebanon, but the country’s economic and political crisis prevented a visit during his lifetime.
The main impetus for travelling to Turkiye this year is to mark the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, Christianity’s first ecumenical council.
Leo made clear from the start of his pontificate that he would keep Francis’ commitment, and has several moments of prayer planned with the spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians, Patriarch Bartholomew I.
Nicaea, today located in Iznik on a lake southeast of Istanbul, is one of seven ecumenical councils that are recognised by the Eastern Orthodox. Leo will travel there by helicopter on Nov. 28 for a brief prayer near the archaeological excavations of the ancient Basilica of Saint Neophytos.
Another significant moment in Turkiye is Leo’s Nov. 30 prayer at the Armenian Apostolic Cathedral in Istanbul. Francis didn’t go there during his 2014 trip, but a year later, he angered Turkiye when he declared the slaughter of Armenians by Ottoman Turks “the first genocide of the 20th century.”
Historians estimate that up to 1.5 million Armenians were killed by Ottoman Turks around the time of World War I, an event widely viewed by scholars as the first genocide of the 20th century.
Turkiye, however, has insisted that the toll has been inflated, and that those killed were victims of civil war and unrest, not genocide. It has fiercely lobbied to prevent countries, including the Holy See, from officially recognising the Armenian massacre as genocide.
Leo has tended to avoid polemics during his first six months as pope, so it will be telling if he repeats Francis’s characterisation of the slaughter.
In addition to the traditional protocol visits with Turkish and Lebanese leaders, meetings with Catholic clergy and liturgies, Leo’s visit to the site of the Aug. 4, 2020, Beirut port blast will likely be another stirring moment in his trip, coming on its final day.
The blast tore through the Lebanese capital after hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate detonated in a warehouse.
The gigantic explosion killed at least 218 people, according to an AP count, wounded more than 6,000 others and devastated large swaths of Beirut, causing billions of dollars in damage. Lebanese citizens were enraged by the blast, which appeared to be the result of government negligence, coming on top of an economic crisis spurred by decades of corruption and financial crimes.
