ALGIERS: Pope Leo XIV’s newly announced visit to Algeria in April has been welcomed as a dream come true by the archbishop of Algiers.
The trip will mark the first time a head of the Catholic Church has visited the North African Muslim-majority country.
“This dream of a pope visiting Algeria ... has come true!” Jean-Paul Vesco, the Franco Algerian cardinal of the Catholic Church who serves as the Archbishop of Algiers, wrote in a statement.
He added that the pontiff had come to see “the Algeria of today, a meeting point between north and south, east and west, the West and the Arab-Muslim world.”
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The Algerian presidency said the pope’s trip reflected Algeria and the Vatican’s ‘shared belief in the need to build a world based on peace, dialogue, and justice, against the various challenges currently facing humanity.’
French-language newspaper El Watan said the “symbolic” visit was “of great historical significance in a country where ancient Christian memory coexists with the Muslim reality of today.”
Arabic-language newspaper El Khabar agreed that the visit, announced by the Vatican on Tuesday, “carries a great symbolic and spiritual dimension.”
For Leo, the trip is in honor of fifth-century Saint Augustine, who was born in modern-day Algeria and whose order he follows.
Leo, who was elected in May last year, will visit the capital Algiers and the city of Annaba — where the Basilica of Saint Augustine stands — from April 13 to 15.
The 70-year-old pontiff said the trip would allow him to “continue the discourse of dialogue and bridge-building between the Christian and the Muslim worlds.”
After Algeria, the pope will visit Cameroon, Angola and Equatorial Guinea.
