Pope offers hope to poor in visit to namesake’s Assisi home

By ALESSANDRA TARANTINO and NICOLE WINFIELD
Associated Press

ASSISI, Italy (AP) — Pope Francis is visiting the hilltop town of his namesake for the fifth time of his pontificate, to mark the Catholic Church’s world day of the poor. The Friday visit is one of his first outings since the coronavirus pandemic. Francis took his time greeting schoolchildren and some of the 500 people brought by Catholic charity groups to Assisi to participate in the pope’s visit. A refugee gave Francis a pilgrim’s walking stick and cloak outside the Basilica of St. Mary of the Angels, which hosts the famed Porziuncola chapel, birthplace of the Franciscan order of the pope’s namesake, St. Francis of Assisi.