News/International

SILAO, Mexico - Arriving in Mexico on his second papal visit to Latin America March 23, Pope Benedict XVI said he came as a "pilgrim of faith, of hope, and of love," promoting the cause of religious freedom, social progress and the Catholic Church's charitable works.

Bells tolled and the assembled crowd cheered as Pope Benedict XVI appeared through the door of his Alitalia plane at Guanajuato Internal Airport in central Mexico. He was greeted by Mexican President Felipe Calderon and other dignitaries, including Archbishop Jose Martin Rabago of Leon and Archbishop Carlos Aguilar Retes of Tlalnepantla, president of the Mexican bishops' conference and the Latin American bishops' council, CELAM.

LEON, Mexico - Thousands of Catholics formed a human wall lining parts of the highway and boulevards leading into and through this industrial city of shoe factories and tanneries in anticipation of Pope Benedict's arrival March 23 -- his first visit to Mexico since being elected in 2005.

Many dressed in white T-shirts and waved Vatican flags as they waited in the hot sun. Others chanted support slogans and screamed as motorists honked horns while passing. Some even began lining up in the predawn hours.

WARSAW, Poland - A prominent victim of clerical sex abuse has rejected the Polish church's stance that it is following a zero-tolerance policy toward priests and offers moral support for victims.

Ewa Orlowska, whose book about her ordeal, "I Accused a Priest," was published in 2008, charged that the church is holding "victims up to ridicule" while "behaving as if nothing has happened."

OXFORD, England - The Dutch church has pledged to fully cooperate with investigations into reported claims that Catholic institutions castrated boys and young men in their care to rid them of homosexuality.

Bert Elbertse, spokesman for the Dutch Catholic bishops' conference, said the bishops found the reports "shocking and appalling" and that they "condemn and regret such practices in the strongest possible terms."

"Our church has been badly damaged by accusations of sexual abuse. The fact that people were unsurprised by these latest claims suggests our image couldn't get any worse," he said.

ABOARD THE PAPAL FLIGHT TO MEXICO (CNS) -- En route to Latin America for his second papal visit to the region, Pope Benedict XVI called for patience with the Catholic Church's effort to promote freedom in communist Cuba, and criticized Catholics who participate in illegal drug trade or who ignore their moral responsibilities to seek social justice.

The pope, flying to Mexico March 23, followed his usual practice of taking a few preselected questions from reporters on the papal plane.

Responding to a question about human rights in Cuba, where he will arrive March 26, and where opposition leaders have been arrested after publicly appealing for a meeting with him, Pope Benedict said that the "church is always on the side of freedom, freedom of conscience, freedom of religion."

LEON, Mexico - Pope Benedict XVI will address the pressing issues of poverty and insecurity during his visit to Mexico, along with orienting Catholics toward a missionary mentality, the president of the Mexican bishops' conference said on the eve of the pontiff's arrival.

"Without doubt, he will express preoccupation with the situations the country is experiencing," Archbishop Carlos Aguiar Retes of Tlalnepantla told Catholic News Service March 22.

VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict's trip to Mexico and Cuba March 23-28 will be a relatively brief one, consisting of a little more than two days in each country. Yet his visit is bound to highlight a wide range of prominent issues affecting an entire continent of crucial importance to the Catholic Church.

The Pope arrives in Leon, in central Mexico, late afternoon local time March 23. His first full day's schedule will be light, no doubt reflecting concerns for the health of the pope, who turns 85 April 16. Pope Benedict's flight will have taken him across eight time zones, to a city 6,000 feet above sea level (compared to only 70 in Rome).

VATICAN CITY - The Catholic Church's position on the U.S. economic embargo of Cuba is "no mystery," the Vatican spokesman said, and there's a good chance Pope Benedict XVI will publicly criticize the embargo when he visits Cuba.

At the same time, Pope Benedict also will call for greater freedoms -- particularly religious freedom -- and respect for other human rights during his stay in Cuba March 26-28.

VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict XVI has appointed a German bishop who had been accused of financial irregularities and hitting children to the Vatican's health care council.

Retired Bishop Walter Mixa of Augsburg was named a member of the Pontifical Council for Health Care Ministry March 21.

JERUSALEM - Religious leaders in Jerusalem urged peoples of all denominations to take their faith-based commitment to the stewardship of God's creation to the U.N. Rio+20 Conference on Sustainable Development in Brazil June 20-22.

"We need to bring an invitation for all religious leaders from all faiths" to speak publicly, with determination, "so that we turn religion into a part of the solution rather than ... risking more and more becoming part of the problem," Melkite Archbishop Elias Chacour of Haifa told Catholic News Service at the March 19 Interfaith Climate and Energy Conference coordinated by the Interfaith Center for Sustainable Development.