Pope Francis to visit 3 African nations

Francis will stay in Kenya between November 25-27, before moving on to Uganda from November 27-29, and concluding the trip with a two-day visit to vehicle from November 29-30.

Millions of Christians – Catholics and others – are expected to turn out for public celebrations of Mass, presenting a challenge for national security forces to keep the pontiff and the huge crowds safe.

Francis is the third pope to visit Africa, a continent that now counts one in six of the world’s Catholics and whose importance to the Church is to grow significantly over the coming decades.

He is following in the footsteps of Paul VI, who became the first pope of modern times to set foot in Africa when he visited Uganda in 1969.

Among those who will receive him at the JKIA are President Uhuru Kenyatta, senior government officials and Catholic bishops. “Security arrangements have been put in place, right from arrival”.

The pope will also seek to heal ethnic rifts that have long plagued Kenya.

The spiritual leader of more than 1.2 billion Catholic Faithful will commence a three-day trip in the East African nation of Kenya on Wednesday.

The visit is expected to draw more than a million people to Nairobi from Wednesday until Friday.

That would mean scrapping the visit to a camp for people displaced by the CAR’s sectarian conflict, a stop to pray at a mosque in Bangui’s notoriously unsafe PK5 neighborhood and a stadium mass.

The pope will visit the Nairobi headquarters of the United Nations on Thursday. After that he visits the Central African Republic, a country torn apart by Muslim-Christian strife.

In Uganda, where police said they would deploy 12,000 officers for the visit, the pope holds Mass on Saturday and then addresses young people on a continent that has a big youth belt.