Vatican City, 25 November 2015 (VIS) –
This morning the Holy Father departed for Kenya, Uganda and the
Central African Republic, on the eleventh apostolic trip of his
papacy.
At 7.15 a.m., before leaving for Rome's
Fiumicino airport, he received in the Domus Sanctae Marthae eleven
women and six children from a Refuge House for victims of domestic
violence and trafficking for the purposes of prostitution, according
to the Apostolic Almoner. The women were Italian, Nigerian, Romanian
and Ukrainian, and are housed in a structure managed by a religious
congregation in a village in the Lazio region.
Following the audience, the Pope
travelled by car to Fiumicino where he departed for Nairobi, the
capital of Kenya, where he is expected to arrive shortly after 3 p.m.
(Rome), 5 p.m. local time. He will be received by the president of
the Republic, Uhuru Kenyatta, and by the cardinal archbishop of
Nairobi John Njue, along with the president of the Episcopal
Conference Bishop Philip A. Anyolo and other representatives of the
episcopate.
He will then transfer to the State
House of Nairobi, where the welcome ceremony and courtesy visit to
President Uhuru Kenyatta will take place. Subsequently, in the garden
of the State House, he will meet with the authorities and the
diplomatic corps, along with other figures from the political,
economic and cultural spheres, after which he will pronounce his
first discourse on African soil.