Pope visits Medellin, talks of reconciliation
MEDELLIN (Reuters) - Pope Francis yesterday traveled to Medellin, once notorious as the stomping grounds of drug lord Pablo Escobar, to find a city transformed since his predecessor Pope John Paul visited in 1986.
Violence between cartels, paramilitary groups and guerrillas raged in the poor “comuna” neighborhoods on its outskirts and the late pontiff was moved to decry drug violence.
The city is now heralded as a model of urban development. It has installed cable cars up the steep Andean slopes that surround it to save working-class residents a punishing climb home and built libraries in neighborhoods once host to gun battles.
Feared drug trafficker Escobar, Medellin’s most infamous resident, was gunned down in the city in a US-backed operation in 1993. He was recently resurrected as a character in the popular Netflix series Narcos.
During his visit to the city, Francis highlighted those who choose the habit and the cassock over secular careers, as the number of new entrants to vocations in the Roman Catholic Church has slumped.
At the La Macarena meeting, Francis prayed before the relics of Mother Laura Montoya, a nun who was the first female Colombian saint. Montoya was a teacher and prolific author who hosted classes in her own home when the 1895 civil war forced schools to close.
The leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Roman Catholics has brought a message of national reconciliation as the country tries to heal the wounds left by the conflict and bitter disagreements over a peace deal with guerrillas agreed last year.
On Friday, he urged Colombians skeptical of a deal with FARC guerrillas to be open to reconciliation with those who have repented, speaking hours after a top rebel leader asked the pontiff for forgiveness.
He will visit the city of Cartagena today before leaving for Rome at night.