Napoleon and the Pope

Despite the somewhat primitive transport contraptions at the time of Napoleon and the many calls on his time from his war-torn empire, Napoleon still found time to visit Gozo and sleep at the St Francis Convent in Victoria, though he was not on good...

Despite the somewhat primitive transport contraptions at the time of Napoleon and the many calls on his time from his war-torn empire, Napoleon still found time to visit Gozo and sleep at the St Francis Convent in Victoria, though he was not on good terms with the Church.

Given that His Holiness Benedict XVI is much frailer than Napoleon was, he cannot possibly wish for more faithful subjects than the Gozitans, whose diocese has been described by one smart in figure crunching as possibly the one which has given the Church, proportionately, the most vocations.

Would it not be possible with the modern transport means to enable the Pope, say, to cross to Gozo and just sleep at the Seminary in Victoria instead of at the Nunciature in Tal-Virtù and return in the morning to Malta for the rest of the programme?

Fancy celebrating the first Sunday in Lent dedicated to the laity when for Pope Benedict's first visit to the islands one of the two dioceses will be completely excluded.

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