Europe Can Learn from Malta, says Pope

(17 Apr 10 – RV) Malta has a “valuable role in the ongoing debates on European identity, culture and policy”, placed as it has been “at the crossroads of many of the great events and cultural exchanges in European and Mediterranean history, right up to our own times”. One of these debates evoked by Pope Benedict Saturday in comments to press on board the plane to the Mediterranean Island nation, is the “great challenge of immigration”.


Welcoming the Pope at Luqa Airport, Maltese President George Abela also spoke about illegal immigration, particularly from Africa and the near East, which he said is overstretching Maltese resources. Despite this, he added solidarity and hospitality are rooted Maltese values that should never be lacking migrants to their shores.
 
Pope Benedict asked the Maltese to “to promote the welfare of those less fortunate than yourselves, as an expression of genuine Christian charity”.  
 
“Malta contributed so much to the defence of Christianity by land and by sea”
  
The Pope, who is in Malta for a mere twenty-four hours, said the Maltese people “are rightly proud of the indispensable role that the Catholic faith has played in their nation’s development”. The young Republic is one of Europe’s newest member states and has an overwhelmingly Catholic population, 93% of its 413 thousand inhabitants. Its fortified walls are a silent witness to their two thousand year defence of their faith.



A role President Abela said they will defend in the current European-wide “conflict between Christianity on one side and securlarism on the other”, adding that for Maltese people, the Crucifix remains “a symbol of our history, of our culture, and above all of our Faith”.


After the welcoming ceremony Pope Benedict XVI, travelled to the capital Valetta. The pope mobile was escorted by a police motorcade through crowded streets to the Presidential Palace, where he paid a traditional courtesy call with state authorities.


There he exchanged gifts with the President, receiving a hand crafted silver statue of Christ the King and bestowing on the people of Malta a mosaic depicting St Paul’s Shipwreck after a fresco in the Apostolic Palace.


To the joy of the thousands of children who had waited for hours beneath the balcony of the Palace of the Grand Masters, the Pope appeared for a few moments, enough for them to sing ‘Happy Birthday’, marking the Pope’s 83^rd birthday on April 16 th last.