(21 Mar 09 - RV) The highlight of the first leg of Pope Benedict’s African voyage
was the unveiling in Cameroon of the working document for the upcoming 2nd
African Synod, due to be held in Rome October next. Berhaneyesus Demerew Souraphiel
is the Metropolitan Archbishop of Addis Abeba, Ethiopia, and the President of the
Ethiopian Catholic Bishops’ Conference. He is just one of the hundreds of local leaders
who came to receive the document from the Pope and take it home to his church in Ethiopia,
he spoke with Festus Tarawalie about the importance of the Pope’s presence on African
soil: