In Africans’ fight against injustice, he said, the church is their natural ally.

“In the face of suffering or violence, poverty or hunger, corruption or abuse of power, a Christian can never remain silent,” the Pope said.

The 81-year-old pontiff stood on a platform at Yaounde’s airport next to Cameroonian President Paul Biya, who welcomed the Pope.

The Pope said he came to Africa as a pastor, not a politician, to a continent where the saving message of the Gospel needs to be “proclaimed loud and clear.” The encounter with Christianity, he said, can transform situations of hardship or injustice.

He cited the regional conflicts in Africa that have left thousands homeless, destitute and orphaned, as well as human trafficking that has become a new form of slavery.

“At a time of global crisis in food shortages, financial turmoil and disturbing patterns of climate change, Africa suffers disproportionately. More and more of her people are falling prey to hunger, poverty and disease. They cry out for reconciliation, justice and peace, and that is what the church offers them,” he said.

“Not forms of economic or political oppression, but the glorious freedom of the children of God. Not the imposition of cultural models that ignore the rights of the unborn, but the pure healing water of the Gospel of life.”

The Pope described Cameroon as a “land of hope,” noting that the country has accepted refugees from neighbouring countries and tried to settle border disputes with patient diplomacy. Cameroon is also a “land of life, with a government that speaks out in defense of the rights of the unborn,” he said.

It was Pope Benedict’s first papal visit to Africa. As a cardinal, he visited the continent only once, attending a theological conference in 1987 in what is now Congo.

The main purpose of the Pope’s stop in Cameroon was to deliver a working document for the Synod of Bishops for Africa, to be held in Rome next October. The Pope said the synod would be a summons to all African Catholics to “rededicate themselves to the mission of the church to bring hope to the hearts of the people of Africa, and indeed to people throughout the world.”

For the Catholic Church, Cameroon represents an evangelization success story on a continent that has experienced an explosion of church growth over the last century. Over the last 40 years, the number of Catholics in Africa has increased from 11 per cent to 17 per cent of the total population; in Cameroon, Catholics today constitute 27 per cent of the population, up from 23 per cent 40 years ago.

Africa also has the fastest growth in priestly vocations, and Cameroon, with 26 seminarians for every 100,000 Catholics, has one of the highest vocation rates on the continent.