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Is the Pope Welcome In The UK?

Dan Damon Dan Damon | 12:52 UK time, Tuesday, 7 September 2010

In some ways, the visit of Pope Benedict XVI to Britain next week (he's here from Thursday 16th to Sunday 19th) is more exciting than the previous Papal visit, by John Paul II in 1982.

Sure, was a rock star and the mood of love and reconciliation with the Church of England was in the air then.

This time, the atmosphere is darker, overshadowed by the child abuse scandal and the Vatican's decision to make it easy for Anglicans to leave their church and "come over to Rome" if they don't like the idea of women bishops.

The news is that takeup of tickets for the openair masses at which Benedict will officiate is much lower than expected. Contributions from the faithful to defray costs of the visit are coming in short too.

And yet Roman Catholicism remains a central part of the lives of hundreds of millions of people around the world.

Some of those feel that the Pope and those around him have let them down and led them into a social, medical and theological cul-de-sac.

How will Britain's many faithful Catholics respond to Pope Benedict XVI? How much impact will the demonstrators from the campaign have? We'll be examining these issues on World Update in the coming weeks.

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