Pope Francis could Travel to Uruguay this Year

The Archbishop of Montevideo and Primate of Uruguay, Cardinal Daniel Sturla, held a meeting with Pope Francis this Thursday, in which he reiterated his invitation to visit the South American country. The Holy Father responded: “If I go to Argentina, I go to Uruguay.”

Cardinal Sturla is in Rome, and on 7 February, he presided over a Mass for the Uruguayan community in the Basilica of the Holy Apostles, where the image of the patron saint of Uruguay, the Virgin of the Thirty-Three, is located.

In his meeting with Pope Francis, as the cardinal reported on his X account (formerly Twitter), he renewed his invitation to visit Uruguay. “If I go to Argentina, I go to Uruguay,” the Holy Father responded.

Weeks ago, in an interview with Telemundo Uruguay, the Archbishop had explained that “the Uruguayan Church invited him, I gave Pope Francis the invitation in May of last year, then the then Chancellor Bustillo, in October, went on behalf of the government and gave him a letter from President Lacalle inviting him, and that the Pope had expressed his intention to come.”

“Recently the Pope spoke of the second semester as a possible visit to Argentina, and we know that the visit to Uruguay is linked to the visit to Argentina. Obviously, there are complicated date issues because we are in an election year, but let’s hope that this visit can happen, and we look forward to it.”

If completed, it would be Pope Francis’ first visit to Uruguay. “The Pope from the River Plate has been to several Latin American countries but he is missing none other than Argentina and Uruguay, so let’s hope he arrives,” Cardinal Sturla hoped.

On his first international apostolic trip, Pope Francis visited Brazil in 2013, within the framework of World Youth Day (WYD) held in Rio de Janeiro. In July 2015 he traveled to Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay. In September 2015 he went to Cuba and in February 2016 he visited Mexico.

In September 2017, the Pope went to Colombia. In January 2018 he traveled to Chile and Peru. His most recent trip to Latin America was in January 2019, when he participated in WYD in Panama.

Regarding the possible trip to Uruguay, Cardinal Sturla told Telemundo: “I think it will be more towards the end of the year because he has a trip to Polynesia in August, and I imagine that he will have to recover because We must also think that the Pope is already old, he is 87 years old, so it will be a great effort, without a doubt, for him.”

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