Thousands pack Bahrain national stadium for Pope’s main Mass

Pope Francis arrives to celebrate mass at the Bahrain National Stadium in Riffa, Bahrain on Saturday, November 5, 2022 (Alessandra Tarantino/AP/PA)

Thousands of Christians from around the Gulf packed Bahrain’s sports stadium on Saturday for Pope Francis’s big Mass, as he shifted the attention of his four-day visit to ministering to the Catholic community in the overwhelmingly Muslim region.

The English-language liturgy was aimed at the South Asian migrant workers who make up the bulk of the Gulf’s Catholics, with prayers in Malay, Tagalog and Tamil and a priest offering English translations of the pope’s native Spanish homily.