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Pope Francis is only the second pope to visit Belgium and Luxembourg (from September 26 to 29, 2024), after John Paul II. The Polish pontiff only went to the Grand Duchy once, in 1985, but he visited Belgium twice, in 1985 and 1995. The first trip, a true tour of the country in all its depths, was a popular success. However, the second — limited to Brussels — took place in a climate of relative indifference, reflecting the rapid secularization of the country in the space of a decade.
A hostile environment in the Netherlands
From May 11 to 21, 1985, John Paul II’s 26th apostolic journey took him successively to the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and Belgium. The Dutch leg of his tour was one of the most difficult of his pontificate. Between satirical broadcasts about his positions on sexual morality and riotous demonstrations, his trip took place in a hostile climate in a country that was then 40% Catholic.
The Pope was challenged, criticized, and provoked by his direct interlocutors, including when Prime Minister Rudd Lubbers dared to declare to the Polish Pontiff that the word “Rome” aroused “a feeling of circumspection, even defensiveness” in the Netherlands.
Since then, no pope has returned to the Netherlands. A short trip by Pope Francis to Amsterdam was envisaged at the start of his pontificate, in 2013, but the project never materialized.
A warm welcome in Luxembourg
In contrast to the Dutch experience, John Paul II’s short stay in Luxembourg, on May 15 and 16, 1985, took place in a much more amicable atmosphere.
The Polish Pontiff was warmly welcomed by Grand Duke Henri of Luxembourg, born in 1921 and godson of the pope’s distant predecessor Pope Benedict XV (1914-1922).
In the presence of the Grand Duke, a veteran of the Second World War who joined the Irish Guards and took part in the Battle of Caen in 1944 and the liberation of Brussels, the Polish Pontiff paid tribute to Luxembourg’s central role in the construction of a “united Europe.”
“It’s been forty years now since, thanks to your allies and your own courage, you regained your independence with dignity,” John Paul II emphasized in his first greeting to the people of Luxembourg.
The Pope celebrated Mass in Esch-sur-Alzette on May 15, in front of a 20,000-strong crowd that represented over 85% of the population of the town, the country’s second-largest commune after Luxembourg City. Wearing a hard hat, the Polish pontiff visited a steelworks.
After another Mass the following day in Luxembourg, the Pope’s stay in the Grand Duchy concluded with a meeting with young people at Echternach Abbey. He called on them to “prepare together the way for a new Europe, a Europe not only of goods and merchandise, but of values, people, and hearts, a Europe that finds its soul in faith in God and Christ and in awareness of its authentic Christian past.”
1985: The Pope encounters popular Catholicism in Belgium
From May 16 to 21, 1985, John Paul II embarked on an extensive tour of Belgium, visiting numerous towns and cities in Flanders and Wallonia, including Brussels, Ghent, Antwerp and the Marian shrines of Beauraing and Banneux. From Ypres, a town devastated during the First World War by the first mass chemical bombardments in history, the Pope paid tribute to the reconstruction of this martyred city, a symbol of the ravages of the “Great War.”
Pope John Paul II, who had worked for the Belgian Solvay group as a clandestine seminarian during the Second World War and had personally visited Belgium as a young priest in 1947, was attentive to the popular piety of the Belgians. He received a warm welcome from the population in Namur, one of Wallonia’s towns with the strongest Catholic roots.
However, as with his tumultuous stay in the Netherlands a few days earlier, the Pope found himself somewhat rushed during his double visit to the Flemish university of Louvain on May 20, 1985, and to its French-speaking equivalent, Louvain-La-Neuve, on May 21.
John Paul II was questioned bluntly about his conservatism, and asked to reform the Catholic Church with regard to the role of the laity, especially women.
An invitation to leave dissent behind
The Polish Pontiff noted that “various experiments are taking place just about everywhere in the world, including in the field of human life.” Consequently, he asked the Catholic academics he met in Louvain to formulate “a clear and convincing testimony” on moral principles likely to enlighten consciences and to place themselves “in perfect harmony with the clear affirmations of the Church in matters of faith and morals, and with the pastoral orientations she gives.”
These remarks were made against a background of tension between Rome and members of the Church in Belgium over moral issues, since the publication of the encyclical Humanae Vitae in 1968. Cardinal Suenens, then primate of Belgium, had publicly distanced himself from the ban on the contraceptive pill formulated in this encyclical by Paul VI, who had followed the line defended by the then-archbishop of Krakow, Cardinal Wojtyla, the future John Paul II. These public disagreements left deep scars on Catholic circles in Belgium.
The short stay in 1995
On June 3 and 4, 1995, Pope John Paul II, weakened by illness, returned to Belgium, but only to Brussels, to complete a trip originally planned for 1994. Welcomed off the plane by King Albert II, the Pope paid tribute to his brother, King Baudouin, who had welcomed him 10 years earlier.
“I salute in him the Christian who, closely united with Queen Fabiola, knew how to serve his compatriots with a truly evangelical devotion,” declared John Paul II.
The main objective of the visit was the beatification of Fr. Damien de Veuster (1840-1889), a missionary of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, known for his work in ministering to lepers in Hawaii, where he eventually contracted the disease and died.
“I give thanks to the Lord for the people who accompany and surround the sick, the little ones, the weak and defenseless, the excluded (…). By their actions, they remind us of the incomparable dignity of our brothers and sisters who suffer, in body or heart; they show that every life, even the most fragile and suffering, has weight and value in the eyes of God,” declared John Paul II in his homily.
Fr. Damien would be canonized by Benedict XVI on October 11, 2009, in Rome.
A cold reception
But John Paul II’s second trip to Belgium was marked by “a great coldness,” in the sense both of the weather and of his reception by the Belgians. “The streets were empty,” recalls one of the Polish Pontiff’s companions, who had been accustomed to seeing the Polish Pontiff lead journeys “that were veritable epics,” meeting huge crowds even in countries where Catholics represented only tiny minorities. Belgium emerged as one of the few countries indifferent to the Pope.
The financial cost of his trip and of the beatification Mass in Brussels led to criticism in the media, even by representatives of the Church. The relative failure of the trip left a lasting impression on the Pope. During the latter part of his pontificate and that of Benedict XVI, Belgian Catholicism was a cause for concern in Rome, given its statistical decline and fading influence in society.
This historical context sheds light on Pope Francis’ own trip to the countries.
