Pope to meet Papua New Guinea Catholics who embrace both Christianity and Indigenous beliefs

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Pope Francis’s visit to Papua New Guinea will take him to a remote part of the South Pacific island nation where Christianity is a recent addition to traditional spiritual beliefs developed over millennia.

Francis will visit the diocese of Vanimo on the main island of New Guinea, one of the most remote and disadvantaged in a poor and diverse nation, according to local Bishop Francis Meli.

Trappings of modernity are scarce. There is no running water for the more than 120,000 people who live in the diocese, according to a church website. Electricity is a luxury for the few who can afford solar panels or portable generators.

The visit is an extraordinary religious highlight in an area where Christian missionaries did not arrive until 1961, and where the religion coexists with traditional ancestor worship, animism and sorcery.

The pope will meet around a dozen missionary nuns and priests from his native Argentina during his visit scheduled for Sept. 8. He will also inspect a church-built high school and crisis center for abused women and girls.

Argentinian missionary Tomas Ravailoli, a priest of the Institute of the Incarnate Word, said he came to the Vanimo Diocese 14 years ago after his superiors told him there was “a big need for priests.”

While Christian churches are full, Indigenous “customs and traditions are very much rooted,” Ravailoli said.

“Sometimes for people, it’s not easy to live Christianity 100% because they have traditions that are pagan,” Ravailoli said.

“But honestly, I think Christianity here in Papua New Guinea is very, very strong,” he added.

Papua New Guinea is an overwhelmingly Christian country — a 2000 census showed 96% of the population identified with the religion — but the