McAleese invites Pope to Ireland

Should the Pope visit NI?

Irish President Mary McAleese has discussed with Pope Benedict an invitation for him to visit Ireland.

Mrs McAleese quoted the Pope as saying: "We will have to see what is possible." She said such a visit would be supported "in every way possible".

They also discussed the NI peace process during their meeting in Rome.

The Pope told her the world needs it to work to show that Christians can co-exist together, demonstrating that reconciliation can work.

Mrs McAleese said the pontiff told her if power-sharing succeeded it would be a "very powerful Christian witness" for the Balkans and the Middle East, two other regions where conflicts have had a religious element.

Praise

Pope Benedict welcomed the structured, inter-church dialogue initiated by the Irish churches, and said he hoped this would become a model for other countries.

On this day: 1979 visit

During the meeting, held to mark 50 years of the European Union, he also praised the Irish government for its "selfless" development aid to poor African countries.

Back in 1979, Catholics from all over Ireland flocked to see Pope John Paul II.

He was the first Pope to visit Ireland and was greeted by vast crowds during a hectic schedule which included Dublin, Drogheda, Galway, Limerick and Knock.

But perhaps the most enduring memory of that Papal visit was his impassioned plea for peace in Northern Ireland.

About 250,000 people at Drogheda heard the pontiff make a direct appeal to the paramilitaries.

Pope John Paul II was warmly greeted during his 1979 visit

"I wish to speak to all men and women engaged in violence," he said.

"I appeal to you, in language of passionate pleading. On my knees I beg you, to turn away from the path of violence and to return to the ways of peace."

His visit to Drogheda, just across the Irish border, was the closest the Pope got to Northern Ireland.

His advisers had feared that, with the north in the grip of the Troubles, the Pope could be a target for loyalist paramilitaries and that his visit would heighten tension between Catholics and Protestants.

It was the only papal visit so far to the island of Ireland.