Pope would visit Poland in 2006, declaration of Polish Bishop

Rome, Italy, Aug 25, 2005 / 22:00 pm

Pope Benedict XVI  could travel to Poland in 2006, in a declaration from Bishop Kazimierz Nycz, to oversee the Polish Episcopal encounter in Czestochowa.

Bishop Nycz declared “the Polish Bishops invited Benedict XVI immediately after his election . The Bishops got an answer from the Pontiff saying he will make the pilgrimage next year.”

The close collaborators of the Pope “received orders to prepare this trip” he added, without any specifications or details on the visit. End of April, Polish  head of State Alexander Kwasniewski had already officially invited  Benedict XVI to visit the mother land of his predecessor John Paul II.”

“It would serve as an homage of all of us to John Paul II” who died on April 2nd”, “ a symbolic event of an other dimension. Today we have a representative of a neighboring country, Germany, at the head of the Church, a country with which through centuries of strenuous relations, we reconciled to build together a united Europe.”

On August 19, during a briefing for reporters at World Youth Day ceremonies in Cologne, papal spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said that there were no plans in place for future papal trips abroad, but that some events could be set on Pope Benedict's schedule in the near future.