Pope Benedict XVI will be accompanied by a 29-member group of the Vatican representatives, including Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, and people from the International Catholic Centre, as well as up to 70 journalists on his visit to the Czech Republic.
The Pope will arrive in the Czech Republic on Saturday, September 26. On Sunday morning, September 27, he will celebrate a mass for tens of thousands of pilgrims at the Brno-Turany airport.
The Vatican also confirmed that Benedict XVI would spend two nights in the Czech Republic in the seat of the Vatican diplomatic mission in Prague, Federico Lombardi, spokesman for the Vatican state secretariat, told CTK.
Two bulletproof "papa-mobiles" (cars specially adjusted for the Pope) were sent to the Czech Republic two weeks ahead of the visit. A Czech policeman is to drive them.
Hundreds of Czech policemen will protect the Pope during his three-day visit to the Czech Republic on September 26-28. The security measures are to be as tight as during the April visit by U.S. President Barack Obama to Prague.
On September 28, the day of St Wenceslas, patron Saint of Bohemia, the Pope will celebrate a public mass in Stara Boleslav, central Bohemia, where St Wenceslas died a martyr death in 935. Czech church and political representatives are preparing various gifts for the Pope that will be presented at a press conference in Brno.
This is the first time a Pope has visited the Czech Republic for 12 years. The predecessor of Benedict XVI, Pope John Paul II, visited the Czech Republic in 1995 and 1997, and in 1990 he paid a visit to the former Czechoslovakia.
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