Thousands gather for Pope Leo’s first mass in Angola

LUANDA, Angola: Tens of thousands gathered outside Angola’s capital, Luanda, for a giant open-air Sunday (Apr 19) mass led by Pope Leo XIV on the second day of his visit to the resource-rich country marked by deep poverty.

Pope Leo flew to Portuguese-speaking Angola on Saturday to start the third leg of a four-nation African tour.

He went immediately into a meeting with President Joao Lourenco and other officials, where he spoke out against oppression and the “suffering” caused by poverty and the rampant exploitation of natural resources.

The remarks continued a theme of his 11-day tour during which he has delivered pointed warnings against corruption and the plunder of the continent’s natural wealth.

Multitudes – many seeking a message of hope in difficult circumstances – turned out to join Pope Leo for the Sunday mass at Kilamba on the outskirts of the capital.

Patricio Musanga, 32, said he was looking for encouragement for young people in Angola, where a lack of work made many seek better opportunities in Western countries.

“He needs to give us hope, to help us understand that from here we can live better than abroad,” he told journalists.

“We are very rich in natural resources but … there is a glaring inequality between those who live well and the others,” said Musanga, wearing a cap and a T-shirt showing the Pope’s image.

Even though Angola is one of Africa’s top producers of crude oil and is also rich in resources like diamonds, around a third of its population of 36.6 million people live in poverty, according to the World Bank.

“There’s a concentration of wealth in the hands of very few, and of course, the war just aggravated the situation,” said Father Pedro Chingandu, who had come from the eastern province of Moxico to attend the mass.

Angola is still scarred by a civil war that erupted after independence from Portugal in 1975 and ended in 2002.

“We need real democracy and the redistribution of wealth and justice,” Chingandu told AFP.