Year In Review: Pope Francis Announces He's Coming To Philadelphia In 2015
By Mark Abrams
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- KYW Newsradio is looking back at the stories that made headlines in 2014. The Philadelphia archdiocese spent months pitching the Vatican for a visit by Pope Francis to the World Meeting of Families set for next September in the city.
A high-level delegation from Philadelphia visited the Vatican and met briefly on St. Peter's Square with the pope last March urging him to come to the city.
A Vatican delegation from the Pontifical Council for the Family, which is co-sponsoring the World Meeting of Families 2015, also visited Philadelphia to scout out sites for possible papal events.
Finally, the official word came from the Vatican on November 17 and Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput was there.
"I had a couple of days advance notice that he was going to make this announcement, but it never is official until it comes from the mouth of the Pope himself. And so it was a great joy for me to be with him when he made that announcement."
Actually, Chaput confessed, the Pope whispered to Gov. Tom Corbett when the delegation was in the Vatican last spring, that he hoped to come to Philadelphia. But, the governor and the delegation were sworn to secrecy until the Vatican officially confirmed it.
Chaput says the highlight of the trip will be a papal mass on the Ben Franklin Parkway, tentatively set for Sept. 27, 2015.
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