Pope Francis and President Gjorge Ivanov of North Macedonia in Skopje.

In his first speech on North Macedonian soil on Tuesday, Pope Francis encouraged the West Balkan state in its effort to be a beacon of peace, acceptance and fruitful integration between cultures, religions and peoples.

Cultural wealth

Addressing the nation’s authorities, the diplomatic corps and representatives of civil society at the presidential palace in the capital, Skopje, the Pope described the land as a bridge between East and West and a meeting-point for numerous cultural currents…

The homily was brief and to the point. But, most of all, it was addressed directly to the children who were there to receive their First Holy Communion: all 242 of them.

Rakovsky is the most predominantly Catholic town in Bulgaria, and the children had come from every corner of what Pope Francis called this “Land of Roses”…