Will Pope Francis visit India in 2017? Book in Hindi on Pope made available

Mangalore Today News Network

Kochi, Nov 26, 2016: Pope Francis is likely to visit India next year, Archbishop-designate Joseph Kalathiparambil stated on his return from the Vatican.

Kalathiparambil, who returned from Vatican, said an indication in this regard was conveyed to him when he visited the Pope at his residence.

“What I understood is that the Pope wishes to visit India next year. An indication in this regard was given to me when I visited him at his residence at Santa Marta in Vatican,” he said.

Kalathiparambil is set to take over as the Archbishop of Latin Archdiocese of Verapoly in Kerala on December 18.  Earlier, there were reports that Pope Francis would “almost certainly” visit India but no dates were specified.

Kalathiparambil said he requested the Pope to visit Kerala and Verapoly Archdiocese, and his response was positive.  Pope St. John Paul II, now a saint,  had visited India for the first time for 10 days in 1986, and again in November 1999, his 89th Apostolic visit outside Italy, for the occasion of solemnly promulgating in the Post Synodal Apostolic Exhortation “Ecclesia in Asia”, in New Delhi.   During his India visit in 1986, Pope St. John Paul II had visited Kerala to beatify Sister Alphonsa and Kuriakose Elias Chavara, bothe now saints.

Prior to appointment as the archbishop, Kalathiparambil was serving as the Secretary of the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People after being called for the assignment by Pope Benedict XVI in February 2011.

The 64-year-old bishop replaces Archbishop Francis Kallarakal, who has retired.

A Jesuit priest in Patna has written a biography of Pope Francis in Hindi, the national language.

Fr Raymond Cherumbim, the author, says the book deals with the pope’s views on the challenges he is facing as the leader of the Catholic Church, especially regarding issues such as women’s ordination, inter religious dialogue, churches’ stand on abortion, contraception, refugee crisis, child abuse by priests.

The book published by the Claretian publications, Bangalore, is priced 125 rupees. The author says the book is available with him at St Xavier’s College, Digha Ghat, a suburb of Patna, or at nearby Prabhat Prakashan, the publication wing of the Patna Jesuits.

Written in simple Hindi, the book may be the first one in Hindi dealing with the Pope and the Church. The author, is the controller of examinations and a Hindi professor in St Xavier’s College, Patna.