Catholic Bishops in Bethlehem for Pilgrimage Conference

(09 Jan 09 - RV) Bishops and other Church leaders are arriving in Bethlehem today, for an annual pilgrimage to the Holy Land and a conference in support of the region’s Christian community. The Co-ordination Group of Bishops Conferences in Support of the Church in the Holy Land was set up in Jerusalem at the request of the Holy See in 1998, and its aim is to encourage pilgrimages to the land where Christ lived and died. The Archbishop of Liverpool and Vice President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, Patrick Kelly, is leading the delegation. He told Phillippa Hitchen the on-going violence adds a different dimension to the trip…