Holyrood to play host to Her Majesty and the Pope

Published on Tuesday 16 March 2010 22:03

THE first state visit by a Pope to Britain will begin in Scotland where he will meet the Queen and thousands of wellwishers in Edinburgh and Glasgow.

• Church leaders have revealed the Pope will use his visit to remind Britain of Catholic roots. Picture: Getty Images

The historic trip by Pope Benedict XVI is taking place during the 450th anniversary of the Reformation in Scotland.

And church leaders made it clear that he intends to use the visit to remind Britain of its Christian and Catholic roots and bring the message of the Gospel.

This will include tackling issues such as the right to end life and Margo MacDonald's bill in the Scottish Parliament, the breakdown of marriage and the clash with the Labour UK government over its equality bill which the Pope has condemned for discriminating against believers.

But Cardinal Keith O'Brien, head of the church in Scotland, and Archbishop Vincent Nichols, head of the church in England, made it clear that there would be no apology for child abuse by priests, arguing that the problem was dealt with firmly in Britain and was not the same issue it was in Ireland.

• John Haldane: 2010 Scots visit very different from 1982

Cardinal O'Brien said: "A defining feature of Pope Benedict's teaching has been to remind Europe of its Christian roots and culture, and to give us guidance on the great moral issues of our day and it is my hope that we all open our hearts to his words."

But he insisted the Pope would not tell people how to vote, following questions on his recent comments that Labour should be "given Hell" over their record in office on moral issues.

"I am a churchman not a politician and the same is true for Pope Benedict," he said.

The visit is the first since that of John Paul II, who came to Britain in 1982, but that occasion was a pastoral visit organised by the church itself.

The Pope will arrive in Edinburgh on 16 September where he will go to the meet the Queen at the Palace of Holyroodhouse.

The importance of the occasion has been underlined by the Queen's decision to break with protocol and travel to meet a guest.

As she is holidaying in Balmoral, it is normal for guests to go to Royal Deeside, but out of respect for the Pontiff's age of 83, she has decided to travel down to Edinburgh. This will also to allow him more time to meet Catholics and other members of the public.

The church yesterday also denied conspiracy theories that His Holiness was meeting Her Majesty in Scotland to avoid embarrassing questions over his call for Anglicans to rejoin the Catholic Church.

While the Queen is head of the Church of England, she is only a member of the Church of Scotland, because of the constitutional settlement around the Act of Union.

Following a reception involving 200 guests at the palace, the Pope will travel up the Royal Mile and through the centre of the city in a glass-topped "Popemobile", where it is hoped the streets will be thronged with wellwishers.

He will then travel to Glasgow where he will lead an open-air mass for thousands of worshipers at Bellahouston Park, the site of his predecessor John Paul II's mass in 1982 where around 300,000 attended.

Early estimates put the expected crowd at 150,000 but Scottish Catholic officials suggested that it could be many more with Catholics travelling from Ireland and the north of England for the event.

Later that evening, he will fly to London for two days of events before going to Coventry for the beatification of the 19th-century cardinal and leading thinker John Henry Newman.

Planning has been under way for some considerable time after the invitation to visit from Prime Minister Gordon Brown was first communicated to the Pope in an audience he granted to Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy.

Mr Murphy, a devout Catholic, said yesterday that it was a "unique" event – this being a papal visit unlike John Paul II's which was pastoral.

He added: "As we all know, this is a truly unique event.

"It is the first ever official papal visit to our country combining state-to-state discussions and related engagements, as well as pastoral events being organised by the Catholic bishops' conferences of England, Wales and Scotland."

It is understood the visit will cost around 20 million, picked up by the state and the church.

The visit is also laden with symbolism for Catholic leaders, not least because it falls within the 450th anniversary of the Reformation in Scotland and the country's break with the Holy See.

The date of the visit will be the feast day of St Ninian, the man who brought Christianity north of Hadrian's Wall in the fifth century.

The meeting with the Queen at Holyrood will be one of the aspects of the trip that Catholic leaders in Scotland hope to use to remind people of the country's Catholic roots.

The palace is the site of a former Catholic Abbey built after King David I had a vision of the holy cross – the meaning of Holyrood – whilst hunting.

SNP First Minister Alex Salmond welcomed the papal visit. He said: "I warmly welcome the announcement that His Holiness will travel to Scotland this September and visit Edinburgh and Glasgow.

"The papal events in 1982 were an enormous success and this visit will be a wonderful occasion for the whole of Scotland.

"The Scottish Government will be working with the palace, the Catholic church and UK government to ensure the Pope's visit is a successful and memorable event."

ST NINIAN'S DAY

THE Pope has decided to visit Scotland on the feast day of the country's first saint – St Ninian – as part of a symbolic gesture to remind Scotland of its Christian and Catholic roots.

St Ninian was believed to have been a Briton born in 397 who went on to study in Rome.

From there he was sent by the then pope in the early fifth century to convert the Southern Picts.

He established a church in Whithorn in Dumfries and Galloway where legend says he is now buried.

He was later immortalised in St Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People, written around 731.

According to Catholic leaders in Scotland, by coming on St Ninian's feast day, the Pope hopes to remind Scotland of its Catholic roots in the year which is the 450th anniversary of the Reformation and the schism with Rome.