Pontifical Council addresses Pastoral care of Tourism

April 24, 2012: Catholic Church’s 7th World Congress on the Pastoral Care of Tourism started off on Monday in Cancún, Mexico with the theme, “Tourism that Makes a Difference.” The five day Congress began with a presentation by P. Bentoglio Gabriel, the Under-Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Pastoral Care for Migrants and Itinerant People, highlighting the progress made by the Council over the years.

It was followed by a round table discussion on the theme: Good practices of religious tourism, in which the topics such as the management of cultural heritage, the importance of hospitality, places of worship in the service of evangelization, were explored.

Another Round Table had the theme: Collaboration for religious tourism. The participants here discussed areas such as cooperation of civilian agencies, the collaboration of travel agencies, hotel collaboration of entrepreneurs, the role of those who promote and those who accept the leisure travel.

At the onset Father Gabriel said that the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People is "an instrument in the hands of the Pope," that "addresses the pastoral solicitude of the Church to the particular needs of those who were forced to abandon their native land or none at all."

As a department of the Roman Curia, it deals with "matters which are reserved to the Apostolic See, and those that exceed the limits of competence of individual bishops or their conferences, as well as those that are assigned by the Supreme Pontiff.

It is a body of the Holy See, which is dedicated to the pastoral care of human mobility, inspires, promotes and coordinates initiatives for the good of the universal Church, he added.

In the Apostolic Letter Apostolicae Caritatis, which established the Pontifical Commission for the Pastoral Care of Migration and Tourism, the Holy Father Paul VI said that "the pastoral activity should be geared not only towards those who live within the defined limits of the parishes, associations and other similar institutions, but also to those who by choice or by necessity leave their habitual residence."