© FRANCE 24 screen grab | Pope Francis arrives at
the Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington
D.C. for his first-ever visit to the US on September
22, 2015
Pope Francis arrived in the United States on
Tuesday for his first visit – a historic six-day trip
to the spiritual home of capitalism after his tour of
communist-ruled Cuba.
The 78-year-old Argentine pontiff stepped onto US
soil for the first time at Andrews Air Force Base
outside Washington, where he was greeted by US
President Barack Obama and his family, as well as
Vice President Joe Biden.
US Catholic leaders and a select crowd of several
hundred well-wishers were on hand to greet the
pope, who wore his traditional papal whites and
waved to the cheering crowd.
A small group of children from Catholic schools in
the Washington area were brought forward to
welcome the pontiff.
Obama will host the Jesuit pope at the White
House on Wednesday. Francis will make two key
speeches during his visit, addressing the US
Congress on Thursday and the United Nations on
Friday.
On the plane from Cuba to the United States, the
pope told reporters that he would not specifically
raise Washington's embargo on Havana in his
speech before American lawmakers, but expressed
his opposition to it.
"The Holy See is against this embargo, but it is
against all embargos," he said.
Topics will include critiques of the dominance of
finance and technology; a condemnation of world
powers over the conflicts gripping the planet;
appeals to protect and welcome immigrants; and
climate change, according to Vatican sources.
The visit will take place under tight security, with
US authorities on top alert to handle the
complexities of protecting a pope who insists on
traveling in an open vehicle to be closer to the
masses.
Authorities are facing a particular security
headache in New York, where Francis plans to
criss-cross Manhattan at a time when 170 world
leaders will be in town for the UN General
Assembly.
He will preside over an inter-faith ceremony at
Ground Zero, visit a Harlem Catholic school and
greet crowds on a procession through Central
Park.
He will wrap up his trip Saturday and Sunday in
Philadelphia at an international festival of Catholic
families.
Anti-American pope?
The pope arrived from Cuba, where he visited three
cities in four days, said three masses before
adoring crowds and met President Raul Castro and
his big brother Fidel, the men who have ruled the
communist island since its 1959 revolution.
The pontiff, the first from Latin America, played a
key role in brokering the recent rapprochement
between Washington and Havana, which resulted in
the restoration of diplomatic ties in July after more
than half a century.
In the United States, he will find an American
public that widely respects him, but has a less
favorable view of the Catholic Church.
While 81 percent of Catholics have a positive view
of the Church, only fifty-five percent of Americans
as a whole do, according to a new poll conducted
by The Washington Post and ABC News earlier this
month.
But for some critics, the dominant themes of his
papacy – his critique of consumerism, calls to
embrace poverty and condemnation of a
"throwaway culture" – sound suspiciously like an
indictment of the American way of life.
That was underlined ahead of his trip when
Republican Congressman Paul Gosar, who is
Catholic, declared he would boycott the pontiff's
historic address to Congress to protest his "leftist"
views.
The pope has been active in urging compassion,
including for those historically shunned by the
Church, and for calling for action against economic
inequality and environmental degradation.
Americans in general approve of those efforts, with
54 percent wanting him to "continue as he has
been" and another 23 percent urging him to be
even more active.
'Build bridges'
During his Cuba visit, Francis discreetly refrained
from chastising the communist regime for its
crackdowns on dissidents and curbs on civil
liberties.
Before leaving the island on Tuesday, Francis said
mass in Cuba's second city Santiago, cradle of the
Castros' uprising against dictator Fulgencio Batista,
calling for a new kind of "revolution."
Speaking at a basilica to Our Lady of Charity of El
Cobre, Cuba's patron saint – a mixed-race Mary
that symbolizes the island's intertwined Spanish
and African roots – he praised her as the
embodiment of a "revolution of tenderness."
He urged Cubans to follow her example "to build
bridges, to break down walls, to sow seeds of
reconciliation," in comments that appeared to
allude to the nascent reconciliation across the
Florida Straits.
Francis then addressed an audience of families,
asking for their prayers as he prepares for a synod
on the family next month that has unleashed
internal conflicts among the Roman Catholic clergy
over sensitive issues such as divorce,
homosexuality and unmarried couples.
