Vietnamese Catholics who flew thousands of miles to see Pope Francis in Mongolia had one message for the pontiff: They wanted him to visit their communist-run country.
“Visit Vietnam, Papa,” some in the group shouted as the pope was driven in a golf cart past a crowd of about 2,000 people of various nationalities on the grounds of the Catholic cathedral in Ulaanbaatar on Saturday.
Vietnam broke off relations with the Vatican after the communists took over the reunited country at the end of the Vietnam War in 1975. The authorities then viewed the Catholic Church in Vietnam as having been too close to the former colonial power, France.
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