Tokyo: Pope Francis arrived in Japan on Saturday, where he is expected to deliver a robust anti-nuclear message of peace in the only country to have suffered an atomic bomb attack.
The 82-year-old Argentine is fulfilling a long-cherished ambition to preach in Japan, where years ago he hoped to be a missionary.
He arrived in Tokyo in heavy rain and high winds, the white cape of his papal outfit blowing up around his face as he stepped gingerly down the staircase from the Thai Airways plane that carried him from the first stop of his tour in Thailand.
His four-day trip will begin with visits to Nagasaki and Hiroshima, cities forever associated with the nuclear bombs dropped on them at the end of World War II, killing at least 74,000 people and 140,000 people respectively.
In a video message to the Japanese people before he left the Vatican, Francis railed against the “immoral” use of nuclear weapons.
“Together with you, I pray that the destructive power of nuclear weapons will never be unleashed again in human history,” said the head of the world’s 1.3 billion Catholics. Francis arrives from Thailand, where he preached a message of religious tolerance and peace.
He is expected to do the same in Japan, a country with only approximately 440,000 Catholics out of a population of 126 million.
In the 17th century, Japan was closed to the outside world and Christians were persecuted, tortured, crucified and drowned as they were forced to recant their faith. (AFP)
