Literally, it means God (Isten) brought you here. And in the case of Pope Francis' weekend visit to Budapest, the nation's picturesque capital straddling both sides of the Danube, one could also say "ITA hozott".

ITA, of course, is currently Italy's flagship airline. It was established in 2020 when Alitalia was closing down its operations.

ITA now transports the pope - along with his entourage and some 70 journalists - to and from his foreign destinations.

(By the way, the reporters and camera crews in the back of the airbus don't fly for free. Those in the press pay premium prices for cattle class, thus subsidising the pope's travels.)

It used to be standard procedure that the pope would return from his foreign journeys on the flagship airline of the last country on his itinerary. That doesn't happen much anymore. But if it did, it would pose a slight problem for this trip.

Hungary's national carrier, Malév, went out of business in 2012.

The only thing approximating something like a flag carrier in the Central European country now is privately owned Wizz Air, a multinational Budapest-based super low-cost airline.

Can you imagine the headlines? "Pope is Wizzed back to the Vatican"... "Francis takes a Wizz flight home"...

The pope's dogged determination

Seriously, though, the pope deserves our admiration for his dogged determination to keep travelling, despite being 86 years of age and having extreme difficulty walking.

But as our correspondents have noted, his decision to visit Hungary has confounded many observers.

Francis was in Budapest for a few hours in September 2021 in order to celebrate the closing Mass of the International Eucharistic Congress before moving on to neighbouring Slovakia for a State visit.

While he was here back then, he held talks with Hungary's president and prime minister, privately addressed the nation's Catholic bishops, and met with representatives of the Ecumenical Council of Churches and some Jewish communities.

No such ecumenical or inter-confessional meetings were scheduled for this weekend's trip, which is odd given that Hungary is a multi-faith, if mostly Christian, country. In any case, it is not predominantly Catholic.

And although this papal trip is an official State visit to Hungary, the entire itinerary was planned to unfold in central Budapest. No trips to any other cities in this small, landlocked country.

A visit to the famous Benedictine Archabbey of Pannonhalma? Nem köszönöm. A trip to the Ukrainian border? Not on the schedule...

One of my Hungarian friends joked that Francis wanted to come back to Hungary because he probably misses the food! It's delicious, of course, but many non-Hungarians find it a bit too rich and heavy for their daily diet.

Anything for peace in Ukraine

The best possible explanation for the papal visit is that Francis is once again exercising what I like to call his "diplomacy of vulnerability".

This pope has shown time and again that he is willing to go to any length - even to abase himself - in order to achieve certain results.

Such was the case with his historic meeting with Kirill, the Russian Orthodox Patriarch, in 2016.

The pope practically had to beg for the meeting, which took place at an airport hangar in Havana. He even set aside certain guarantees and pre-conditions that his Vatican aides were insisting on.

Relations between the pope and the patriarch, which were never what you'd call rosy, have soured terribly since the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

There's that little matter of Francis accusing Kirill of being Vladimir Putin's "altar boy", of course, an odd thing to do if you really believe - as the pope for some reason does - that the Holy See can play a role in mediating an end to Russia's aggression and land grab.

It cannot. But, again, one must admire Francis for trying so hard even to the point of debasing himself.

The pope evidently believes that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, whose government has warm relations with the Kremlin, can help him get to Putin or somehow end the Russia-Ukraine war.

And Francis doesn't give a fig if Mr Orban or others in Hungary try to use the papal visit for their own advantage, the pope will happily allow them if the end result is peace in Ukraine.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch

The big news from the Vatican this past week was the announcement that Pope Francis has decreed that a fixed number (70) of "non bishops" (priests, deacons, non-ordained religious, lay men and women) are now to be full voting members of assemblies of the Synod of Bishops.

Naturally, this was greeted by reform-minded Catholics - and bemoaned by traditionalists - as some sort of ecclesial revolution.

The former see it as a major breakthrough that includes the laity (especially women) in the Church's decision-making process.

The latter seem to see that, too, but they are not in favour of taking authority away from bishops (heirs of the apostles).

Neither group seems to have grasped what has happened. The bishops are still very much in charge. Well, one of them is anyway - the Bishop of Rome.

He's the one who decides who the 70 non-bishops will be, choosing them "from among a list of 140 people selected (and not elected) by the five International Reunions of Bishops' Conferences (CELAM, CCEE, SECAM, FABC, FCBCO), the Assembly of Patriarchs of Eastern Catholic Churches and, jointly, by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Canada (20 for each of these ecclesial realities)".

The Synod secretariat said that it is"requested that 50% of them be women and that the presence of young people also be emphasised" (italics mine).

The pope can also add more people if he chooses. Another development is that heads of Roman Curia offices are not automatically ex officio members of Synod assemblies.

The pope will decide which Vatican hierarchs to include.

That's because the Synod of Bishops is not part of the Roman Curia. It is a permanent body that functions as a consultative body at the discretion of its president, the Bishop of Rome.

• Robert Mickens is editor-in-chief of La Croix International
• Published in La Croix and republished with permission

In a recent media interview Francis says Patriarch Kirill's support of the war in Ukraine became clear to him during their 40-minute zoom discussion in March.

In this, Kirill spent half the time reading out justifications for President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine. "I listened and told him: I don't understand anything about this.

"Brother, we are not state clerics, we cannot use the language of politics, but that of Jesus.

"We are shepherds of the same holy people of God. That is why we must seek ways of peace."

It was in this context that Francis added: "The Patriarch cannot become Putin's altar boy."

Francis has successfully engaged with Kirill in the past.

In 2016 he and the Patriarch had an historic meeting in Havana, Cuba (pictured) - the first in nearly 1,000 years since the split between Eastern orthodoxy and Rome.

A second encounter had been planned to take place in Jerusalem in June this year but has been called off.

Steadfast, diplomatic peacemaking

On Sunday, the Pope appealed for peace in Ukraine and called the suffering of vulnerable elderly people and children a "macabre regression of humanity".

He has offered to meet Putin in Moscow as part of the Holy See's peace efforts but the Kremlin has yet to respond.

"I fear that Putin cannot and does not want to have this meeting right now," he says.

His efforts for peace have seen him repeatedly condemn the invasion of Ukraine in February and the suffering it is causing. He avoids mentioning Russia and Putin by name however.

Meantime, the Vatican seeks to work through its diplomatic channels and maintain dialogue with the Russian orthodox leadership.

Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Holy See's Secretary of State and - in the pope's words - a "great diplomat", has offered the Vatican's services as a mediator.

It is possible that NATO "barking at the door of Russia" may have facilitated the conflict, Francis suggests.

He likens the situation in Ukraine to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda and the 1930s civil war in Spain, in his condemnation of the arms trade.

Wars take place to "test" the weapons that have been made, he says.

"I don't know how to answer- I am too far away - whether it is right to supply the Ukrainians."

Back in 2014, the Pope warned that a third world war was taking place in a piecemeal fashion. At that time, he pointed to conflicts in Syria, Yemen and "now one war after another in Africa".

During his meeting last month with the President of Hungary, Viktor Orban, the Hungarian leader told him that Russia planned to end the war on May 9, when Russia celebrates its victory over Nazi Germany.

"I am pessimistic," Francis says.

"But we must make every possible effort to stop the war."

Source

• The Tablet
• Image: AmericaMagazine

He is following in the footsteps of his immediate predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, who visited Cuba in 2012 and expressed his opposition to the US trade embargo.

Now Cuba and the US have dramatically thawed their relations, Francis's visit to Cuba may well have included a behind-closed-doors push to edge the Castro regime toward greater political, economic and especially religious liberalisation.

The current pontiff has been credited as a central figure in the negotiations that ultimately restored US-Cuba relations.

Pope John Paul II had called for the lifting of the embargo, but nothing was done at the time; other religious and humanitarian organisations pressed for the ending of the US embargo but to no avail.

It was probably Obama's decision to accept the mediation of Pope Francis that allowed the Holy See to help broker the deal.

There were plenty of incentives for both sides to accept the Holy See's mediation.

Perhaps Obama thought he needed to piggyback on the pope's popularity to break through; the president has mentioned Francis's role twice, once in his December 2014 Cuba speech and again in his January 2015 State of the Union.

This is hefty stuff indeed, and a measure of the pope's unique diplomatic position.

Quiet influence
In both Cuba and the US, Francis will have been greeted by each country's papal ambassadors, formally called apostolic nuncios. Unlike any other religious leader, the pope can send and receive ambassadors and sign international treaties.

The nuncios, who are usually also archbishops, represent the pope to more than 180 countries and organisations.

Many would ask why the pope is allowed to send and receive ambassadors and sign international treaties at all.

Part of the answer lies in the existence of the Vatican City State, the 108-acre site in central Rome, but this is not the whole story. Continue reading

• Luke Cahill is a PhD student at the University of Bath. His thesis, "'How many divisions has he got?' Influence of the Holy See on US foreign policy, 1990-2003", explores the influence of the Holy See on US foreign policy.