Pope in East Timor: “Beware of Those Who Want to Change Your Culture.”
In a small country in Southeast Asia, 600,000 people came to see the Holy Father
East Timor, a small nation of 1.3 million people in Southeast Asia, is one of the stops on Pope Francis’s journey between Asia and Oceania. About 600,000 people attended the Holy Father’s Mass today, nearly half the population, according to local officials.
In East Timor, long a Portuguese colony and independent of Indonesia since 2002, 98% of the population is Catholic. According to Cardinal Carmo da Silva, archbishop of the capital Dili, this visit has been awaited here since 1989, when John Paul II’s visit took place. Then the pontiff spoke in favor of the independence of this small country; today, while independence exists, Francis warns: “Beware of ‘crocodiles’ who want to bite you and change your culture. People and children are the most precious thing you have. It’s beautiful here because there are many children: you’re a young country where you can feel life pulsing and exploding at every corner.”
There was also a reference to sandalwood, a typical local production known for its special fragrance. Francis drew a parallel with the “odor of the Gospel,” which is strongly felt here and which “must be spread against everything that humiliates, mutilates, and even destroys human life, against those wounds that produce inner emptiness and suffering, like alcoholism, violence, disrespect for the dignity of women.”
